The News Herald (Willoughby, OH)
Browns need offensive coordinator with math skills
We’ll get to the autopsy of the Browns’ 12th loss in their 12th game this season in a few paragraphs. But before that, let’s pick the good out of the 19-10 loss to the Chargers on Dec. 3.
I have ripped Sashi Brown for his inability to evaluate talent often since the start of the 2016 season, but he deserves credit for selecting tight end David Njoku in the first round in April. Njoku is quick, he’s strong, runs good routes and has sure hands. He scored the Browns’ only touchdown against the Chargers. He leads the Browns with four touchdown catches and set a team record for rookie tight ends in that category.
And you know what is significant about the Njoku pick? The Browns traded up to get him. They traded their second-round pick (33) and fourth-round pick (108) to the Packers for the 29th overall pick.
Trading up can result in acquiring impact players. Trading down results in missing impact players, namely quarterback Carson Wentz in 2016 and Deshaun Watson in 2017 and paying for those mistakes long after the accumulated draft picks are spent.
The hope for a better future with Josh Gordon in the lineup was another positive from the game with the Chargers. Gordon was targeted 11 times.
He caught four passes (which does not mean he dropped seven) for a team-high 85 yards. Sometimes DeShone Kizer overthrew Gordon and sometimes he underthrew him.
Casey Hayward, one of the best cornerbacks in the NFL, was tight on Gordon throughout the game. But the evidence is there. If Kizer and Gordon improve their timing, as they should with more practice time, better days should be ahead for the Browns’ offense.
Falling to 0-12 on the same day the 49ers won means the Browns are closer to clinching the first pick in the draft for the second straight year. The 49ers and Giants are 2-10. Four games remain.
OK, now that the good is out of the way, let’s get to the 12th edition of why the Browns are winless.
If Hue Jackson has any chance of returning in 2018 as head coach — he is 1-27 — team owners Jimmy and Dee Haslam should demand he hire an offensive coordinator. It should be an offensive coordinator well-versed in elementary math.
The Browns were trailing, 19-10, when Jackson called a timeout with 4:59 remaining facing thirdand-goal at the 15. The play clock was a factor.
Unless Jackson had a nine-point play no one in the history of the NFL knew existed, he should have saved the timeout, called for a pass in the end zone to Gordon, Njoku, Corey Coleman or Seth DeValve, and if it didn’t work, kick a field goal because the Browns had to score twice no matter what happened on the third-down play.
Nor is this the first time Jackson has made questionable decisions in the heat of the moment. Space, even on the Internet, does not permit a list of the others.
Kizer lost the ball on a strip sack on the play that followed the timeout and he threw an interception the next time the Browns had the ball. It was reminiscent of the Jacksonville game when he turned the ball over on his last three possessions. Kizer has to protect the ball better. The focus, though, should be on Jackson and his scoreboard and time management. The Browns’ defense played better in the red zone, allowing the Chargers only one touchdown in four opportunities inside the 20. But those opportunities were at the end 10, 11, 10 and 12-play clock-grinding drives.
Chargers punter Drew Kaser punted only twice because the defense could not get a stop. The same thing happened last week in the 30-16 loss at Cincinnati. Bengals punter Kevin Huber punted only twice.
The Browns defense ranked ninth in the NFL heading into the weekend after finishing 31st at the end of 2016. That is something for defensive coordinator Gregg Williams to brag about, but that doesn’t tell the story. The Chargers had the ball nearly 10 minutes longer than the Browns.
The Browns do show signs they are getting better. It just isn’t showing up on the scoreboard.
Some errors are correctable, starting with hiring an offensive coordinator next season.