DawgTalkers.net Forums DawgTalk Gameday vs Pittsburgh Post Game Discussion....

Easy win for the Steelers today (sighs)......

Of the 3 things you can't do? We excelled - in the wrong way. Penalties, turnovers, and sacks.

I thought Watson did better under center

I don't like him in the shotgun

It hurts the run game

He rolls back so much and still gets sacked

Judkins doesn't seem to see the holes to run through

The O line opened up holes and he goes where all the defenders are

Monken needs to give up play calling and the team needs a real OC

5-3 is second best in the AFCN

Can't complain much

Better than 1-7

I Hope the Browns get a chance to knock the Steelers out of a play- off game and the Browns advance

This game in no way has me worried about upcoming games

GO BROWNS !!!

the first drive set the tone. We win the toss, elect to receive, and then Watson gets dinged in the head, our OL collapses, and we fumble.

We were simply out manned on the OL and DL unfortunately. Our run D is a major concern.

Hopefully we have a better performance next Sunday

You forgot stopping the run.

- Embarrassing loss against a division rival. Regular season losing streak is up to 23 consecutive losses when playing in PIT.
- Defense played like crap and seemed uninspired from the jump. Our run defense continues to be the atrocious. Good thing we play NO next week who has close to no running game.
- Verse seemingly did nothing to back up his mouth but Pittsburgh easily backed up their response. The guy looks like all bark, no bite so far.
- Watson held the ball too long at times, but think the vast majority of the sacks were because of the Oline, which played bad in both pass blocking and run stopping IMO. I'm sure going up against the Steelers line played a part but it was still bad. I'd be interested to hear others' opinions that subscribe to the larger field view that might be able to chime in on any consistent coverage problems that led to those sacks???
- The weekly, voluminous OL penalties are nauseating.
- Career day by Fannin. Good for him.
- This loss feels like the JAX loss in Week One.

I"m growing concerned about Verse too. He almost seems like a net negative at this point.

I'm also afraid that Carson is injured and/or being exposed for being over aggressive

There were a few good things (Fannin, Watson et al...) but far too many areas that need addressing: penalties, run defence, poor tackling, etc. Disappointing loss but predictable...

Agreed. I meant to include that. He doesn't look 100%...Not sure he is 75%.

Spot on team performance. Verse ran his mouth and did NOTHING to back it up.....did get slammed to ground. We got out toughed in a drastic way.
I'm thinking our D, linebackers with ankle injuries just can't keep up with offensive backs.....performance hurt to nagging injuries, but best we have so they are out there. Having lost for decades in Pittsburgh, I wish they'd shut up and play hard....don't talk till you have accomplished something.

For Sanders lovers, we got a short taste of what he can do.......not much in small sample....Perfect percentage his fans will scream, ZERO production.

Browns Offensive line got exposed big time today. They are really bad at picking up blitzes and both Tackles got owned. McLaughlin is a blocking liability, he is horrible. Watson in the shotgun 99% of the time sucks. Rushing out of the shotgun is too hard, especially with no play action and Watson still holds the ball way, way too long. Our run defense continues to be very bad.

Fannin is a beast and makes you forget about Njoku in the passing game. KC should have been a much larger part.of the game plan. Play calling definitely was not the greatest and very predictable with very little creativity and calls to defend against the constant blitzing. Bad coaching on all 3 sides. The offense folded against a real Defense.

You win the toss, you defer especially since our 1st Quarters have been embarrassing all year.

Judkins is starting to have Trent Richardson vision when it comes to seeing open holes.

I don't like what happened today but being honest I'm really not surprised.

I was a little surprised to see this too. My only guess as to why they took the ball was perhaps they thought, if they scored early, PIT might shy away from the run which I assumed the Browns knew to be one of their weaknesses. Again, just a guess.

As a follow up to this.....I'd hope/expect the Cleveland media to challenge Verse on his comment now that we got spanked and he couldn't back it up.

Are we BLESSED to have a HC who speaks the TRUTH. He said we earned the loss and he's off to the next game. Players know they played a very poor game. HC said it all, but on to next game- we earned 5-3....we need to play better and earn the next win.....GO Browns!!!!

I don't like Pittsburgh, but they have a winning culture. We had it in the 50s and 60s, hope the culture of winning shows up, again....GO Browns!!!

I feel like our run defense is worse with graham in there. Am i the only one who thinks this?

I am glad this game didn't get flexed to the night game. So is the NFL and the network.

Verse is a waste

They ran over , through and all around him.. I dont think he is back physically ..

Another thing. Monken has been talking about fixing the penalties all season. It hasn't happened. That is on him and the coaching staff. Start fineing these guys or something. This is ridiculous

On the one hand - disappointing. We were out played, out physicaled and we continued with an absurd amount of penalties. Most of our offensive production occured in what your would consider garbage time because the game was already over.

Of particular concern - the OL. An inability to block in the run or passing game. D has a huge problem stopping the run, whether that is a reflection of playing a lot of snaps with 2 LB idk, but we didn't adjust. Verse - is a full on dud at this point, and if his trash talk continues he feeds the opposition while giving the Browns little in return. INjuries - as others have mentioned Schwesinger looks like he is playing hurt. For the first time I was really disappointed with the prep and game planning/play calling. It was if the intensity that Pit played on D came as a complete surprise and we literally had no counter - with the exception of one drive where it was the Fannin show.

With all that said - I'm a little sick of the doom and gloom that Browns fans seem to show. we are 5-3 ... no-one expected that. I am still happy we have won those games and shown some attitude and spirit to come back in games we would have previously rolled over in. I have no problem with monken receiving the kick off with the attitude of trying to set the tone. It back fired ... big whoop, I applaud the mindset. We were always most likely going to lose this game ... sweeping good teams is tough when you're a really good team let alone one that's barely finding it's feet with 2 rookie OL and 2 rookie WR and a handful of sophomores. The same mindset as when fans last week claimed we were a bad team for not thrashing the Titans ... the same Titans that just took the Bengals to overtime in Cinci. The Bengals who were healthy and widely tipped to run away with the AFC North.

The positives - Fannin balled and is becoming a bigger part of the offense. We need to find a way for that to then open up #12 and #1. And for all that Judkins doesn't have elite vision or Chubb's break away speed - the dude runs hard and plays tough. He and Fannin looked like the only guys wanting to punch the Pit D back in the mouth. I think that toughness is something we need.

The Saints won't be a push over - and they are coming off a bye week. But most of the talk this week will be about how the Browns are the Browns and I expect to see NO as 3.5 point favorites or better. . . Looking forward to that game and then the 4 game home stand for the Browns including a well timed bye week in week 11.

Teams cannot expect to win consistently if they cannot run the football and stop the run on defense.

there are some lingering areas of concern:

- Penalties have been an issue since week 1 and now they are even leaking into personal conduct type
- The run defense is the worst we've had in a long time
- The run game simply doesn't pull it's weight on offense (mixture of OL and Judkins I'd assume)
- Jared Verse is a big negative right now, both in play and behavior. He's been disappointing

I agree Mac - next game is important for us to adjust to stuff that was giving us trouble. So far this year the team has responded to adversity

I’m very disappointed over yesterday’s result also. We are a young team with a new coaching staff. We have to move on from this learn from this and focus on our next game.

I agree. With all of the youth and an entire new coaching staff this is a process. Most people thought the Browns wouldn't win more than 5 games all season but here they are after 8 weeks with 5 wins.

That's how quickly expectations change. With some early success suddenly people forgot about the learning curve that simply didn't disappear. It was there all along. I believe Monken has done a fantastic job overall considering. This in Monken's first stint as a HC. These kids are a very young group. From the OL to the WR's they have an entire new roster for the most part.

As young as this team is and with Monken being a first time HC, I think of it this way.

When a first time pet owner tries to house train a new puppy, it's going to pee on the carpet once in a while. It's just part of the process.

Am I happy about that? Like everyone else on this board I want to see the Browns win every game. I'm just trying to look at the circumstances and have realistic expectations.

The Steelers high " intensity Level" was probably due to comments made by one or two of our players.

It may have helped but they have beaten the Browns in their house for 22 years in a row so I wouldn't read too much into that.

I do agree however that Vers needs to shut the hell up until he earns the right to run his mouth. He hasn't shown he has earned the right to run his mouth since he's been here.

there's no doubt the steelers were amped up to beat the browns physically and it showed. Our guys cowered away