Oct 302012
 

I admit that this is bad, but I have been taking a ghoulish delight in the meltdown that is the Kansas City Chiefs this season. Now, this is not because I actually harbor any ill-will towards the team. After all, they aren’t regular opponents of the Browns, and really haven’t done anything particularly heartbreaking against the team. Yes, there was the infamous “helmet” incident, but that was entirely on the Brown’s player, and not something that the Chiefs did.

No, my pleasure is derived from the fact that the Chiefs are proof that people who failed with the Browns previously are, in fact, just not good at their jobs, and that this wasn’t some sort of failure by the Browns to realize untapped potential.

In fact, the Chiefs are practically the Browns v 2.0 right now. The roll call is frightening in terms of who’s migrated over there:

Scott Pioli — GM. He was originally thought to be a top contender for taking over as Brown’s GM, and at the time, was considered to be the best man in the NFL for a GM position. In the end, typical Lerher weirdness took place, with Pioli not getting the job, first being reported as “asking for the moon,” but later reports contradicting such statements. Whatever. As it turns out, it doesn’t look like he was up to the task, as his 4 years have only lead to the current disaster. I will say that Tom Heckett’s time in Cleveland has been far more productive (and, of course, now he may easily be fired at the end of the season due to the new regime, ugh).

Romeo Crennel — When Romeo took over as interim coach last year and won some games, and was then hired on full time, I could see this outcome happening. After all, I saw it in Cleveland: he has a great run, and then just can not keep the team together as a head coach. A great guy by all accounts, but seemingly overwhelmed with how to fix problems on the team.

Brain Daboll — Daboll, as all Browns fans remember, was an offensive coordinator for the first time with the Browns, having previously been a QB coach. He wound up taking a huge amount of flak in Cleveland for the tepid play-calling, low-scoring, and general offensive ineptitude. I don’t think that anyone in the city was sad to see him go. He went on to the Dolphins, and started to have some more success (although the Dolphins were one of the 4 teams to lose to the Browns). But so far his work at the Chiefs has still been as uninspiring as ever. Recently, the big complaint is that he is not getting the ball to his best players — a charge, by the way, that was often leveled at him here in Cleveland.

(By the way, all of the three gents above were part of the Patriots dynasty of the early 2000s, so it’s easy to see why they would all form together again.)

Brady Quinn — 1st round draft pick of the Browns, meant to be Cleveland’s new franchise QB. He came from a winning program, was a Browns fan as a kid, and was instantly loved by the fan base. Unfortunately, he turned out to transition poorly to the pro game, having constant accuracy problems and also injury issues. In fact, even the old Browns motif of the QB controversy is now inherited by the Chiefs: Matt Cassel is benched for mediocre play, Brady is officially given the job for the rest of the season, but then Brady is injured in his first game as a starter, and now Cassel is back as the starter for a couple games. This is exactly the same type of thing that the Browns have suffered through for years with Couch/Holcomb, and Anderson/Quinn. Especially because it was essentially one average QB replacing another.

Peyton Hillis — The breakout star and darling of the fans the year he hit over 1,000 yards rushing, Hillis then followed that up with a year marred by injuries, bad agent decisions, flakiness on a level not seen since a reality TV show, and questionable work ethics. Oh, and fumbles. He did get things together in the last few games of the season, but by then, it was too late. Now, he works on the Chiefs, but still has problems with fumbles and injuries.

For me, the most beautiful moment of this whole ordeal for the Chiefs was this excerpt for the recap of their week 2 game against the Buffalo Bills, which KC lost 17 – 35:

“I thought that we would be better, and we’re not,” coach Romeo Crennel said. “So we have to try and figure out what that is. From what I’ve seen, if we do what we’re supposed to do, then we would be better.”

KC’s offense managed just 71 yards on its first five possessions and then coughed up the ball on its sixth, when Hillis fumbled at the goal line.

“I messed up and let the team down,” Hillis said. “I put the blame on myself.”

I swear, replace the “KC’s” with “Brown’s” and this would have been a word-for-word reprint from a Browns recap of a loss just a couple of years ago.

Sep 302012
 

Currently, the Cleveland Browns have the same record as the New Orleans Saints: 0-4.

I doubt anyone would claim that the Browns are on the same playing field as the Saints, but it is rather amusing when you consider the old adage: “Nothing matters except the Ws.” And right now, neither the Browns nor the Saints have any.

Personally, I think the Browns have the bigger challenge — they get to go and play the Giants on the road next week, so I doubt anyone is considering that one as an upset. Mind you, the Browns did upset the Giants on national television back in 2008, so stranger things have happened.

Aug 142011
 

It’s currently drizzling outside — been raining in varying degrees of intensity sine last night, and even though I was planning to go to CostCo and the gym today, I have to admit that I really have been enjoying this rain. It’s been rather soothing, and that’s been good after an absolutely monstrous week at work: I checked, I put in about 86 hours this past week. Basically I worked from 9-6, came home, then worked another 5-8 hours at home. We had a hard deadline for this Friday, and there was a lot of work in terms of level design to do. Even though the levels I made will need to be balanced and adjusted, it’s good to know that at least they are all in place, and I fixed all of the outstanding bugs in them so that people can play through them. This week I’ll spend more on the actual balancing, making the score thresholds proper, and also trying out some more “interesting” designs — I had some ideas the past couple of days, the type that only come about after you’ve played through the levels and started to see how you can make a tweak here and there to really crank up the fun of the game.

It was also interesting because, since I had been spending so much time in front of the computer over the past week, when I got home, I decided to go for a short jog. Only about 2 miles or so, but it was a beautiful day, and I really wanted to not only spend some time outside, but also get moving around again. So, I donned my running shoes and shorts, and was off. Overall, a nice little run, and I kept the pace simple, so I didn’t overwork myself, but it was still nice to moving again. I also realized that this would be a good time to start getting back into a regular workout routine. As a result, I have now added to my Task list “30 Min of High Impact Exercise” as a daily recurrence. With the rain, I might do another home workout today, but it would be nice to get into the gym to work on some weight training; I need to get the core muscles strengthen up so I can support the spine better, you see. And just look better in general.

This upcoming week, I’m trying to make up for my lack of social life the past week by scheduling a lot of lunches and after-work drinks/dinners. Being NYC, it’s hard to actually get people to commit to something, so who knows how well I can pull things off, but I’m hoping to at least catch up with a few folks.

Also on the plate is the apartment hunt. This is going to be rather tricky, as I’ll need to see about checking out places after work, since I doubt I can pull it off during lunch — I’ll likely need to go out to Brooklyn and Queens to check things out, and getting there and back to Manhattan will likely take longer than an hour, esp. if I intend to take my time to inspect the place fully. Even though I haven’t moved, I have found myself actually getting creative with how I want the apartment to look, in terms of decoration. I’ve decided that I’m going to go with a “Tech Farm” look. By that I mean I plan to have a mix of rustic, country imagery and high-tech devices blended together. The color palette will be green and blue, the two colors I realized I missed the most when I was surrounded by gray, brown, and beige, back in L.A. I’ll go through my photos, pick out the ones I like that fit this motif, and then get them printed out and framed. I also think I’m going to actually get some plants for the new place — I’ll have to read up on how to properly care for plants in an apartment, how often they need to be watered, and if daylight bulbs can help replace the lack of sunlight — and then for the Tech side, I’ll just have to look at properly setting up all of my electronics in a nice, balanced display. I have all my game consoles, my computers, my nice TV: I’m sure that with a little wiring and ingenuity, I can make them all connect easily and look awesome at the same time. But — first I need to find an apartment; then I can make something which will go on the cover of Better Homes and Gardens.

Oh yeah, and how about those Browns, eh? Can’t say too much about a preseason game, especially when not all of the starters are playing on either side, but Colt did lead the team down the field on 2 touchdown drives, and even better, he did so with some great passes and great reads. We’ll see as the pre-season goes on, and really see in the first regular season game, but so far you have to like what you see. The offense looked much more crisp and precise than we’ve seen in years, and this is really interesting because most of the plays were, in fact, passing. If nothing else, it would be a wonderful change of pace if the Browns offense was fun to watch, rather than the dull, inept force is has been the past few years. Incidentally, I’ll be interested in tracking how Brain Daboll does down in Miami. The Dolphins snapped him up right away, so not only will it be interesting to watch how the Browns offense works in the West Coast offense system, but also how well Miami does with Daboll in charge. Maybe he hits his stride, but I have to be honest: the Dolphins are more unsettled at quarterback than the Browns were, so I really expect them to rank offensively at #30 or lower.

Jul 302011
 

Well, not yet, but it is interesting in that I’ve been watching the NFL more closely now, curious as to what moves the Browns will make in Free Agency to try and bolster the team. So far there haven’t been any really big signings or big names, and in some cases, I have been a little surprised that they haven’t picked up some people to serve in their areas of need — with Eric Wright leaving, the real question is what they will do for cornerback, as they don’t seem to be interested in the big names that are still available. Still, I do like that they are picking up younger guys that are still improving, rather than guys that are on the waning side of their years.

I also find it interesting that the whole Derek Anderson experiment in Arizona was declared a failure, officially made when they acquired (finally) Kevin Kolb from the Eagles. When he was cut from Cleveland, and spouted off about how much he hated the place (and he did have some reasons) I was worried that yet again, a player that the Browns couldn’t make work was going to suddenly flourish outside of the “Curse of Cleveland.” But, no, he had the exact same problems in Arizona that he had in Cleveland: tempted the fans with some good throws early on, only to settle into a series of bad decisions and inaccurate throws as the season wore on. He was benched due to poor play, and the came back when the starter was injured, only to show that he still had the same issues. He also demonstrated that his trouble dealing with criticism was not just because of the Cleveland press/fans; his blow-up on the podium after being asked about his laughing on the sidelines while his team was getting pounded into the dust on national TV was right up there with Dennis Green’s classic meltdown. So, yeah, a change of scenery didn’t do him any good, as the Cardinals have now cut him after one year. I wouldn’t be surprised if he lands somewhere soon though as another back-up. He has experience, and every team can use a QB with that.

Oh yeah, and speaking of ex-Browns, it looks like Braylon Edwards will not be returning to the Jets. It’s not really a matter of not liking him in this case, but rather that after spending the money on Holmes, they would rather get a WR cheaper than what Edwards is asking for. Still, I can’t help but wonder if this is the first time that Edwards really had to deal with rejection in the professional level. While in Cleveland, everything bad that happened was everyone else’s fault: the coaches, the organization, the fans (I still love that whole, “They didn’t like me because I’m from Michigan and not because I kept dropping passes” reasoning). Now, with the Jets, he has to be taking this pretty hard. Think about it: They made their decision to sign Holmes to the big contract, so they valued Holmes over Edwards. Okay, that’s not too bad, since Holmes has a Super Bowl ring from his effort with the Steelers. But then the Jets start seriously chasing Nnamdi Asomugha, and Edwards had to realize that meant that the Jets weren’t interested in his services — no way they would be able to sign Nnamdi *and* Edwards. Then, the next indignity, is that the Jets are even looking into Burress, who hasn’t played a down since 2008 — Burress has more interest from the Jets than Edwards. And since Edwards said he loved the Jets, he has no-one to point the finger at and say “It was thier fault, not mine.” But, again, he has enough talent that he’ll land somewhere. Hey, I hear the Browns are looking for a veteran WR….

As for Brady Quinn, well, he’s still buried in the depth chart in Denver, but at least he still has a job. You have to take what you can in this economy, right?

Speaking of the Broncos, it seems that Josh MacDaniels decision to give Kyle Orton (who has played pretty well, to be fair) last year has placed the Broncos in a pinch with their cap space. Unless they can trade him, they can’t sign any new agents because of the cap. Again, it feels really good to know that for once, it wasn’t the Browns who majorly screwed up their personnel decisions by hiring a head coach that wound up sinking the whole franchise. And now that John Elway is involved, I can only hope that he proves to be as every bit a franchise genius as other players-turn managers before him, like Isiah Thomas, or Matt Millen. Boy, that would be so awesome.

Apr 292011
 

I normally don’t really follow the draft, but this year I’ve been interested in how it would play out, both to see how the Browns did, but also because there are no rules or guarantees in terms of how the rookies will be signed, as there is still no CBA in place.

Personally, from my own limited knowledge in the ways of the draft (which, as far as I can tell, puts me on par with a lot of the “gurus”), I was impressed with the haul that the Browns got in terms of picks. The talk is that the Bengals were also approached by Atlanta (so the Falcons could get A.J. Green) but that deal fell through at the end.

My guess is that the package originally offered to the Bengals was not as sweet as the one offered to the Browns. Instead, what I think might have happened is that after the Bengals decided that they wanted Green for themselves, the Falcons realized that Jones was the only other highly-rated receiver in the draft, and that with Peterson gone, it was highly likely that the Browns would take Jones. So, they offered more to the Browns, as they could not miss this chance.

I also think that the fact players could not be traded, only picks, was another big advantage for the Browns. Maybe the Falcons wouldn’t have wanted to trade some of their players, but they did have a lot of quality starters that the Browns could have used. With that option gone, it was all picks, and that’s something to relish. After all, 2 number 1 picks in the 2012 draft (assuming the NFL still exists at that point) is a luxury that few teams have.

Feb 232011
 

…I saw a magazine with the headline, “Engaged to be Married!”

I always thought this phrase was a bit redundant. I mean, seeing a gossip magazine with the word “Engaged” in the headline makes it pretty clear what’s happening; I wouldn’t think that it would be something like, “Engaged to go Bowling” or something.

[ S H E I L D B R E A K ! ! ! ]

Remember how I had mentioned that I hoped the new Cleveland Browns regime dropped the False Start Master, John St. Clair? Well, they did a couple of weeks ago, among some other veterans.

Again, I’m not sure why he was in the line-up; if anything can be pointed to as a failure of Mangini’s coaching (aside from the two years of 5-11), this is definitely it.

Feb 072011
 

Well, I would be supporting the Pack, regardless of the opponent, for a number of different reasons. Partly because I support Aaron Rodgers and the decision to go with him over Brett Favre, partly because Donald Driver has always been a class act and deserved to finally get a ring, but mainly because the Packers are my second team behind the Browns. I don’t live and die with them as I do with Cleveland, but they’re still close to my heart.

However, I was really much more happy that the Steelers lost. And, ironically, this has little to do with them being division rivals of the Browns, and everything to do with the QB, Ben R. I used to support the Steelers in the post-season, because I liked to see the AFC North constantly represented, but now that Ben’s gone through 2 separate cases of alleged sexual assault, I just can’t support a team that has him as a starter. Yes, he was never charged with anything, but to me, it’s clear that he knew he did something “very bad,” and lucked out from having to pay for his transgressions. I see it as a little bit of justice that he was denied another Superbowl ring, and with any luck, he’ll never get another one.

Jan 102011
 

I saw this posted on cleveland.com today, and thought it was a pretty nifty oppurtunity. Sure, it’s pretty thankless, highly stressful, and everyone who has tried it in the past ten years has been fired, but the plus side that you get paid kooko-sized bucks, and they pay you even after being fired! Talk about awesome!

And besides, all Cleveland Brown fans have all said the same thing at some point: “I could do better than this.”

http://www.cleveland.com/pdq/index.ssf/2011/01/heres_the_job_application_for.html

Jan 062011
 

With Mangini now gone, it’s anyone’s guess what happens to the Defensive Coordinator and the Special Teams coordinator. Both units certainly showed improvement, and you could see them sticking around. (The Offensive Coordinator, Brain Daboll, who may have been the albatross around Mangini’s neck, certainly won’t be back — his offense ranked 32rd and 31st in the league during his two years. And, for those not aware, the league only has 32 teams).

However, I will admit that I do hope Offensive Lineman John St. Clair is moved over the off-season, or at least regulated to 3rd string. Seriously, every game he would give up a huge sack, earning him the nicknames, “Turnsile” and “El Matador.” Plus, you could bet safe money on him always getting at least 1 false start penalty each game. Maybe he can work as a back-up in the depth chart, but it’s hard to believe that he was really the best the Browns had as a starter.