Early lead, Mayfield key Browns’ big win
Cleveland Browns quarterback Baker Mayfield considered an early lead a gift.
Although the team won the toss in their 48-37 playoff win over the Pittsburgh Steelers on Sunday night, they elected to defer receiving the ball into to the second half.
It was of no matter. One play later after a misfired snap and a recovery by Karl Joseph in the end zone, the Browns held a seven-point lead on the way to racking up a leaguerecord 28 points in the first quarter. It proved to be one of five turnovers the Browns defense produced on the evening to go with four interceptions of Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger.
Sports were made for talk and football was designed to talk all week. This week, in the shadier corners of our chat rooms, there will be talk about the relative merits of the Steelers and their beefy old quarterback, Ben Roethlisberger. There will be talk about Big Ben's four picks and the Steelers' five turnovers — about how the Steelers, if not for their first three giveaways, could've won going away.
There will be talk about how Baker Mayfield wasn't really that good, not if you check his advanced metrics, which say he has no chance against Patrick Mahomes. There will be talk about how the Browns haven't a prayer of beating the Chiefs on Sunday in Kansas City.
The point, though, is the scoreboard. The Browns beat the Steelers 48-37 in the wild-card round of the NFL playoffs. The Browns pulled this off despite playing without their head coach, three members of his staff and a chunk of their roster. COVID-19 protocols racked the Browns. Their offensive line was a taxi squad.
Yet, they beat the Steelers. In Pittsburgh.
It marked the Browns' first playoff victory since Jan. 1, 1995, when Bill Belichick was their coach and Nick Saban was their defensive coordinator. (Of course, the Browns blew a lead and lost to the Steelers in overtime in the next round.)
Three months later, Mayfield was born and my son celebrated his third birthday. Before the year ended, owner
Art Modell announced he was moving the team to Baltimore. Three years after that, I bought a hat at City Center.
The new Browns were awful. There's no need to get into much detail about that other than to say they had an 0-17 streak in Pittsburgh. The Steelers treated the Browns, old and new, like something to scrape off the sidewalk with a little shovel and slide into a plastic bag.
Browns fans and non-fans alike, after 50 years of training, believed the Browns would blow the 28-zip lead they built in the first quarter. It seemed inevitable when the nemeses Steelers drew to within 12 points early in the fourth quarter. Surely, the Browns would soil their underwear. Right?
For once, they didn't.
NBC analyst Cris Collinsworth guessed right: By the end of the game, people were pouring into the streets by the shores of Lake Erie. My Cleveland correspondent began texting pictures and videos from the Warehouse District just before midnight. Some of the captions:
“A shirtless man just emerged and smashed a glass bottle in the middle of W. 9th.”
“Sam is on the bullhorn.”
“The car horns are deafening.” “Look at this guy breakdancing.” “Collinsworth called it: Someone stopped their car and got on the roof.”
It really doesn't matter what happens next in Kansas City. What happened Sunday in Pittsburgh put a lid on generations of pain and suffering in Cleveland. Rarely has a city experienced such a cathartic tidal wave.
“A very loud ‘Pittsburgh Sucks' chant just broke out.”
marace@dispatch.com