Browns Extend Chudzinski

The Browns haven’t officially announced it, but multiple sources are reporting that offensive coordinator Rob Chudzinski has removed his name from consideration for the Baltimore Raven’s head coaching vacancy and signed an extension to continue with the Browns. Thanks to RockKing for the heads up on the story. Here is the link for the Plain Dealer article. Interesting to see how or if this has any impact on the Romeo Crennel extension talks.

Obviously, we are thrilled with the news! Let’s hope this is the beginning of a great sports day here in Buckeye land!

Forget Derek Anderson and Jamal Lewis…

Without Rob Chudzinski, the Browns are in trouble.

 

Found this in the Plain Dealer today.

Browns offensive coordinator Rob Chudzinski will interview for the Baltimore Ravens head-coaching position, General Manager Phil Savage said Thursday. Chudzinski, in his first year with the Browns, helped develop the Cleveland offense into one of the best in the NFL. The Browns ranked eighth in the league with an average of 25.1 points and 351.3 yards per game. One reason for their success was quarterback Derek Anderson, who was fifth in the NFL with 29 touchdown passes.

The Browns’ success this season can be attributed to many things; a revamped and healthy offensive line, a solid running game led by Jamal Lewis, the improved play of Braylon Edwards, Kellen Winslow and of course Derek Anderson. But in my opinion, Rob Chudzinski was reason 1A that the Browns’ offense was a success.

An Order of Crow With a Side of Humble Pie to go, Please

John returns with his state of the Browns evaluation, and this time it’s surprisingly optimistic. 

Hey everyone . . . So, last time you heard from me I was entertaining the idea of calling for Romeo Crennel’s head. OK, I admit I was a bit hasty; mostly because I was writing out of frustration after watching my beloved Browns give away a game to the Steelers. I have had some time to settle and have to admit that this team has made significant improvement this season.

At the beginning of the season, my hope was that the Browns would win 8 games. Well, Sunday’s win over the Jets was number 8, and with 3 games to play the Browns are staring at a likely playoff berth: they hold the second Wild Card spot with destiny in their hands (a good position to be in). There is even an outside (way outside) shot at the North Division Champion spot as Pittsburgh continues to struggle. When all is said and done, I believe the Browns have a really solid shot at winning 10 games.

Does Brady Quinn need to play?

Hear me out Browns’ fans. I’m not saying he should be the starting QB…

As the Browns continue to win, and get closer to the playoffs, Derek Anderson cements his place as the team’s starting QB. He will get Pro-Bowl consideration this season. He has led this team to their best record since my nephew was born. But let me ask you a question, if Derek were to get hurt this week or next what would happen to the Browns’ playoff chances?

The Browns have a second string QB that has never thrown a pass, or taken a snap in an NFL regular season game. Imagine this scenario, fourth quarter of a playoff game in Pittsburgh with the Browns down 4 and D.A. gets Kimo’d. (Sorry Bengal fans.) Quinn comes in for his first ever series? Is that fair?

So here’s my suggestion. Sometime in the next couple of weeks (like say, this one) Romeo needs to pull Derek and Brady in the office and have a conversation something like this-

Is It Time to Bid Farewell to Crennel?

John is back, and he is a little mad about today’s Browns game. John the floor is yours. 

It’s bad enough that the Browns’ secondary couldn’t cover a high school receiving corps, but when your coaching crew wastes 2 valuable timeouts to review a play that was an obvious catch it might be time for Savage to line up some interviews for some new coaching. Harsh? Maybe, but when the game is close it comes down to coaching and the Steelers with rookie head coach Mike Tomlin out-coached the Browns staff to beat Cleveland when it counted.

Kudos to Roethlisberger, Tomlin and the Steelers for playing 60 minutes and pulling off the comeback. Down 21-9 at the half, the Steelers made the defensive adjustments that stymied the Browns’ offense in the second half. Pittsburgh’s D didn’t even give up a first down in the second half until there was less than 2 minutes in the game.

So why do I blame this loss on the Brown’s coaching staff? Fundamentals, plain and simple. The Cleveland defense allows teams to pick apart their secondary consistently week after week. What have they done about this problem? I really don’t know because there has been no obvious adjustments being made. Penalties: while they are not one of the most penalized teams in the league, the penalties always seem to come at the critical times in the game destroying drives and extending the opponents’ drives at just the wrong time. And how does a defense give up a 30 yard touchdown run up the middle to the quarterback? Arm tackles and blown coverage are becoming the norm for the Brown’s late in games. And that’s bad coaching when it comes to fundamentals.

Browns’ O-Line dominant in OT win over Seahawks

Jamal Lewis runs for 4 TD’s; no sacks allowed all day for Browns!

The Browns fell behind early, but came on late to win a close game over a good opponent. The Seahawks may not be a Superbowl contender this year, but they came in with a 4-3 record, good enough for first in the weak NFC West. The Browns had trouble stopping Seattle’s passing attack, as Hasslebeck picked the Browns apart to the tune of 318 yards. Everytime the Browns had Seattle in a third and 5 it seemed Bobby Engram was always open. Well, judging by his 14 catches and 139 yards I guess he was.

This game nearly went into the loss column for two reasons. First, the Browns stubborn refusal to rush more than 3 defenders. On Seattle’s game tying drive in the fourth quarter, the Browns sent only three rushers everytime. It might as well have been a 2 man rush, because nose tackle Shaun Smith seemed to take every other play off, staying at the line of scrimmage and trying to bat the ball down. Had it not been for a replay reversal of a Hasslebeck scramble, the Browns probably lose that game because they couldn’t get any pressure on the QB.

The second reason the Browns nearly lost this game was dropped passes. There were at least six balls dropped by Browns receivers. Braylon Edwards had the most violations, including a drive killer in the fourth quarter, and a dropped TD pass that eventually was overcome by a Lewis TD run. Winslow also dropped a TD on that drive, but stayed focused and set up the game tying score with a nice catch and run to the 1 yard line. Winslow finished with 125 yards on 11 catches. Edwards had an off game, failing to reach the end zone while grabbing 5 balls for 67 yards.

The Browns Bengals Enigma

What do you get when you cross an offensive powder keg like Cincinnati with a Browns team struggling to find an offensive identity? An unbelievable offensive shootout, of course.

Charlie, We Hardly Knew Ye

So, Charlie Frye is now Matt Hasselbeck’s back-up. I say, good for him, bad for the Browns. I am also not surprised in the least. As quick as Crennel pulled him for Anderson Sunday I knew Charlie wasn’t going to be wearing the brown and orange for long. It’s my opinion that Frye has been on the trading block since training camp began. The powers that be were just afraid to pull the trigger until now because of Quinn’s holdout and lack of practice in the system. Crennel has never really shown any confidence in Frye and Anderson has never really performed.

NFL News and Notes

The Browns have announced that Charlie Frye will be the starter for the Pittsburgh game. Crennel said that Frye give the team the best chance to win against the Steelers. Hmmm…I think I said something pretty similar about a month ago. Seriously, I don’t many people that believed anyone but Frye would start this game. What was interesting to me is that Crennel said the QB situation will be evaluated on a week by week basis. Wow. That’s kind of brutal isn’t it? Better not have a mediocre game…that hook is coming if you do. Romeo also failed to mention who was going to be the second string QB. Let me end the suspense…if the Browns are getting shelled, Quinn might see the field this week. If it is a close game and Frye goes down, you better believe Anderson is getting the ball.

Was it good enough?

Good points John. I wonder was Charlie Frye’s performance good enough to be named the opening week starter this week? I thought Charlie did a good job, particularly his handling of third down situations. He certainly looked comfortable running the offense. And speaking of that it was nice to see Jamal Lewis move the ball on the ground. Did you notice he got most of his yards running to the left side? Makes a lot of sense to me. Thomas did well run blocking, but I thought struggled a bit in pass protection. His man got the sack on Anderson, and on the very next snap he needed double team help to keep Dumervil off Derek. I was less impressed by Derek as everyone else I’ve talked to about the game has been. Sure, he was 7-9 for 74 yards, but I felt he didn’t take enough chances down field, and let’s face it the offense sputtered when he was in the game. Whether that is a result of the play calling, or the defense I’m not sure, but He had another chance to get them in the end zone and failed to get it done.

Look Busy, The Boss is Here

Yesterday, NFL boss, Commissioner Roger Goodell,  visited Berea and met with the Browns’ players, coaches, executives, and media. It reminds me of the meetings we had at Cincinnati Christian before semesters and breaks. It was the, “Remember you represent us, so don’t make us look bad” kind of pep talk. But according to the responses of Browns’ players and Coach Crennel it meant more than that and was very well received.

Rookie Defensive Back Eric Wright said about Goodell, “He’s going to defend and have our best interest in mind, so you have to respect that.” Even veteran Wide Receiver Joe Jurevicius was impressed, “It’s obvious his message is going to be effective.”

Romeo Crennel agreed with Goodell’s approach to discipline, “Basically, we are all responsible for what we do,” said Coach Crennel. “And if we don’t do the right thing, there’s a consequence to be paid for it. And that’s all of us. So a rule is a rule, we know what it is, and if we don’t follow the rule we have to pay the price.”