Some thoughts from a game I couldn't (bear to) watch...

So I spent my Sunday driving from Chicago to Cleveland, and so couldn't watch what I expected to be one of the worst games ever played, between the 1-8 Lions and the 1-8 Browns.  Little did I know that it would turn out to be such a "great" game, at least for fans with no rooting interest.

I'll give my perspective.  By the time I got a score, I was driving through an area where I could only get the Packers game on about 6 different stations, but no Lions-Browns, and found out it was 24-3 Browns in the first quarter and Brady Quinn had 3 touchdowns.  Now, even tonight, I haven't seen highlights of the first quarter, so I can only assume he had a good quarter from the stat line I heard.

Here, however, is my perspective on Quinn's performance, gathered from the second quarter on when I could pick up the Lions' radio network.  There seemed to be a LOT of the same from Brady.  Either balls thrown behind or over the intended receivers, especially when trying to go deep.  This seemed to be a pattern I am only too used to seeing from Quinn.  No ability to make the great 20+ yard throw.  The announcers were basically saying if a couple of balls to Massaquoi would have been on target, they could have gotten even a couple more touchdowns, but the deep accuracy wasn't there. 

Now the defensive effort can speak for itself. Ugly.  But overall this year, the defense has played reasonably well, at least in contrast with the anemic offense. 

Finally, what the hell is up with WTAM 1100?  I could not pull that station in until I was well past Toledo.  I thought it was a powerhouse AM station?  I had no problem picking up 1000 ESPN Radio from Chicago even past Sandusky, and WLW 700 from Cincinnati was clear as a bell from mid-Indiana on.  Even the Redskins' Washington station came in way before WTAM.  Somewhere along the way, they must have had their power cut.

And finally, again.  I like Jim Donovan.  As a news sports guy, as a Cleveland guy, etc.  But I listened to half a dozen games on the radio during my drive Sunday, and I can really say I don't like him that much as a play by play guy.  I don't know if it's his "too exciteable" way of announcing, or what, but he just seems a bit minor league for me.  I miss Nev Chandler still, I guess.

MNF Haiku

#Haiku. It may be Monday/
But it's still a day of rest /
For the #Browns offense.

Are the Ravens Sarah Marshall?

Bill Simmons seems to think so...

Ravens (-10.5) over BROWNS
I was watching "Forgetting Sarah Marshall" at something like 4:30 in the morning recently because my body clock is screwed up and I keep waking up at weird hours like the girl in "Paranormal Activity." Anyway, Half-Asleep Me had this half-awake epiphany that the Browns are Sarah Marshall and Browns fans are Jason Segel's character. In other words, there was a devastating breakup (Sarah/Browns dumping Segel/fans), followed by Segel/fans being in the dumps, followed by an improbable reconciliation (Cleveland getting football again/Sarah wanting to make sweet love to Segel again) … and then, the awkward sex scene in the movie (when Segel can't perform, then realizes he needs to get away from Sarah) has been like the past 10 years of Browns football (when the Browns just sucked and kept sucking). Half-Asleep Me liked this parallel so much that I stumbled out of bed and fumbled for my glasses, then wrote it down on a notepad before falling back asleep.

Whether it made sense or not, I will never watch that movie without thinking of Browns fans again. The return of the NFL to Cleveland has been like one long awkward hotel-room sex scene. And it won't end. Just hire Bill Cowher already. For God's sake.

Browns' Efficiency Rating

Well, "Efficiency Rating" might be a bit of a misnomer, but listening to Aaron Schatz from FootballOutsiders.com on the BS ESPN Podcast, I was checking out the team efficency ratings. Not surprised at all that the Browns were near the bottom (actually I was surprised they weren't AT the bottom), but who knew that --compared to the baseline average--they have the #1 most efficient special teams in the NFL?

Of course that doesn't offset the second-worst offense and fourth-worst defense.

http://footballoutsiders.com/stats/teameff

Schefter: The Browns "ship is sinking"...

Umm, kinda looks like it's at the bottom already to me.

http://espn.go.com/video/clip?id=4618940

Kokinis out??

The latest sorry chapter in "As The Unmitigated Football Disaster Turns" has taken place today in Berea. According to numerous reports, including one from The Plain Dealer, the glorious half-season reign of Browns GM George Kokinis has ended. Per the PD's Mary Kay Cabot:

Kokinis was escorted out of the Browns facility in Berea by security, two league sources told the Plain Dealer, and is believed to have been fired.The Browns did not immediately return calls or emails, including an email to owner Randy Lerner.

Lerner spent considerable time following Sunday's 30-6 loss to the Bears on Sunday talking one-on-one with Dawn Aponte, Vice President, Football Administration, who was under Kokinis' jurisdiction in the football operations department.

Afterwards, Lerner told two reporters that he wouldn't fire Mangini during the bye this week but that was searching for a football authority to guide the organization.

"There's absolutely no question about that," he said. "The highest priority that I have is a strong, credible, serious leader within the building to guide decisions in a far more conspicuous, open transparent way..I think my highest priority is to have a stable figure that represents the voice that explains the decisions."

Even though Mangini has been the voice of the organization since his hiring, Lerner seemed irked that Kokinis didn't take a more high-profile role in the organization.

Kokinis' ouster comes just days after the Browns dismissed Mangini's hand-picked director of team operations, Eric O'Brien. O'Brien was Mangini's righthand assistant with the Jets.The move also comes just weeks after Lerner brought Bernie Kosar on board in an unofficial capacity as another pair of eyes.

So, what exactly does this change, besides making the Browns look even more dysfunctional? Perhaps this is a shot across Mangini's well-fed bow, telling him that he may be next to go. Maybe Lerner didn't want to fire both of his hires at once for fear of scaring away a big-name GM from joining an already constantly in-flux organization.

Otherwise, Kokinis's dismissal means nothing for the immediate future, and there's no way #19 is going to be named GM, no matter what your Bernie Fathead may be whispering to you at 2AM. We need a guy with NFL experience, and although I do believe Kosar is a football genius who would be a great guy to have within the organization, one year of picking players for the Arena League's Cleveland Gladiators is not nearly enough to recommend him for such a critical, high-profile gig.

I cannot commend Lerner for pulling Kokinis's plug, if that is indeed what happened today. Too little, too late...an experienced GM should have been brought in after the firing of Phil Savage. Did Lerner not learn the lesson from that failed experiment? Now we have fans planning "Brown Outs" in limp-wristed protest of a team that makes one pine for the days of Jerry Ball and Darrin Chiaverini. I cannot remember a lower point for this organization. This is not just a bad season in a decade full of them, this is incompetence of historical proportions, the kind Terry Pluto (or Stephen King) could easily be mining for the subject of his next book.

Lerner can shuffle deck chairs all he wants. The only way this ends is if he cuts his losses, does what's right, and sells the franchise. You gave it a go Randy, and it is not working. Sell low and give Cleveland back its football team.

This World Series is gonna be hard.

Game 1 tonight between the Yankees and Phillies. I think we might see Cliff Lee and CC Sabathia a few times in this series, and it's gonna hurt each time. What could have been, if the Indians just could play to their potential, the fans could just go to a few more games, the team just have a bit more revenue, the league's financial system just be a bit more fair. It's hard times in baseball. Especially in Cleveland.

Opening night jitters...we hope

The first game of the Cleveland Cavaliers' 2009-10 campaign was eerily reminiscent of the thuddingly anticlimactic final six games of the team’s 2008-2009 playoff run. Namely, the opposing team killing Cleveland with transitional threes and LeBron controlling the ball too much on offense. Trade Boston’s white over green jerseys with Orlando’s Disneyfied blue ones and there’s not that much difference between the two performances.

LeBron is calling it a “transition period.” Acclimating two new starters into the lineup after a flu-ridden, Delonte-less pre-season will certainly take some games, but I still don’t like to see the Cavs lose to an elite team at home in a manner depressingly similar to past disappointments.

The Cavs just looked slow and disjointed after the first six or seven minutes of the first quarter. The Celts took our opening punch and impressively locked down their defense, while Sheed, Allen and House splashed quick-transition threes. Fans got smacked with even more Orlando déjà vu with the reappearance of Bad Mo - both offensively and defensively – a bench bunch that was thoroughly outplayed, and some head-scratching possessions when the game was still winnable.

It didn’t take long for the Cavs to earn national disrespect. At halftime of the TNT broadcast, friend-of-Cleveland Charles Barkley (looking fairly ridiculous in a suit and a pair of Frank Costanza’s untied white orthopedic tennis shoes) proclaimed Boston and Orlando the top teams in the East.

I’m not going to get too crazy over Chuck’s assessment, his unfortunate choice of footwear, or the first game of a what should be a fun season. After all, the NBA regular season is just one long dress rehearsal for these Cavs, one where I’ll be looking at physical health and a mentally stable Delonte (whose presence was sorely missed last night) as barometers going into what will hopefully be a championship run starting in late April.

However, last night did re-expose flaws that Ferry’s off-season moves were supposed to fix. The Cavs have enough talent to overcome those flaws and beat down poor to mediocre squads on the way to 55-60 wins, but we won’t know until the playoffs whether that will be good enough to take out the top-flight teams.

The new-look Cavs have to prove they’re different from last year’s playoff-flameout iteration, but thankfully they have plenty of time to prove it.

The hard-luck life of a Browns fan

A good article about what it's like to be a Browns fan these days. I'm sure all of us can relate a little.

From Geoff LaTulippe page 2 on ESPN.com

"In reality, it all began Jan. 17, 1988.

Yeah, OK, the hooks were in place way before that -- I was born in Berea, a Cleveland suburb, and even though I lived there for only a year, I'm too loyal for my own good. The Browns were my team by birthright, not unlike jaundice or fetal alcohol syndrome....


Click here for his 10 reasons I haven't given up on the Browns

Taking it from all sides

One thing I expected to see in Rolling Stone each issue is a blistering condemnation of some industry, government program, military exercise, or some other rail against the man by the often brutal Matt Taibbi. One thing I didn't expect to see when I opened my new issue of Rolling Stone was an article by Taibbi titled "Cleveland Chaos", which includes devastating review of the Cleveland Browns, but more specifically, coach Mangini. The article (which I can't find a link to) includes such gems as:

-I always wondered what happened to Augustus Gloop, the fat little boy in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory...a boy with fat bulging from every fold, with two greedy eyes peering out of his doughball of a head--(but he) somehow ended up as head coach of the Cleveland Browns, perhaps the most fucked franchise in all of sports right now."
-Mangini's performance with the Browns is "one of the truly thrilling sports disaster stories ever"
-"a sort of Hurricane Andrew of football mismanagement"
-"horrific losses"
-"incredible tales of pointless disciplinary tactics."
-Mangini spent his time "frowning on the sidelines like a man with the winner of the annual Kansas great Pumpkin Weigh-Off up his ass, frantically changing his mind about which of his two psychologically battered quarterbacks to throw into the breach next."
-"Mangini's Browns have already done more laying down on national TV than Paris Hilton.."
-(Not often) "have we witnessed this kind of coaching catastrophe unfold. Enjoy it for the very short time it is sure to last.


____________________

Of course, anyone in Taibbi's sights takes it hard like Mangini. But it still caught me by surprise, The Browns must really be embarrassing to take this kind of national criticism every week. And hopefully they're embarrassed too.

Monday Haiku

Disaster weekend;
Tressel costs Buckeyes a win;
Usual result for Browns.

It was a hard week to be a Cleveland/Ohio football fan (given that the Bengals lost as well). It certainly looks like neither the Browns nor the Buckeyes have a quarterback nor a coach who can deliver us to the proverbial promised land. Or, in the Browns case, just mediocrity instead of embarassment.

Phiten Anyone?

I wondered why so many MLB pitchers & Players wear those thick ugly necklaces? They are Nylon coated with Titanium from a Japanese based compay called Phiten.

I wonder if Dolan has any room in the budget to out fit the team...