Tuesday, November 17, 2009

They even found a way to play "The Shot"

Wow.

Bravo to everyone involved. That was a night of awful. Just pure awful.

Everybody had their moments; the Browns looked like they didn't practice any offense over the bye week, the announcers kept piling on (they managed to find a way to show 'Jordan over Ehlo') and to the Ravens managed to injure Josh Cribbs on the final play of the game. Kill me now.

If you're looking for a silver lining, the defense only gave up 10 points, so that's something (never mind the fact that Baltimore missed a FG and twice passed (and failed) on 3rd and 2).

The play calling was bad (this was a game plan with two weeks preparation?!), the execution was bad (dumb penalties, dropped passes, missed blocks) and they simply looked like a team without a clue.

Somehow this game was both better and worse than I imagined. The first half wasn't completely terrible. The Browns were actually tied at halftime (0-0 but still, tied) and the defense looked more than solid. Sure, the offense was painful to watch but the Browns were still in the game.

And then things went to hell. A four play touchdown drive followed by a pick-6 and that was all she wrote. The offense never got better (Quinn threw deep... out of bounds) and the play calling never made sense (down two scores and running Jamal Lewis and 1st and 2nd, are you trying to set up 3rd-and-long?). Quinn couldn't throw more than 7 yards, the line couldn't block, Lewis missed blocks and took 12 steps to go maybe two yards. All in all, just awful. Eric Mangini should've been fired midway through the fourth quarter.

It's hard to imagine at this point that Mangini will be around next season. This is an absolute mess. The rumor mill has the Browns targeting Mike Holmgren and I tell ya what, I'm all for it. Bring in Holmgren and let him hire one of his old Green Bay or San Francisco coaches. Have him bring in Jon Gruden to coach (ya, he just signed a deal with ESPN, but there were certain points during the game where he sounded like he wanted this job) and let them do their thing. Whatever it they'd do, it has got to be better than this garbage.

Please, save us Mike Holmgren, we'll give you all the seals you can eat.

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