Another great article by Joel Cade: Five Under the Radar Browns players.
Joel kicks it off with Shon Coleman. He explains most of his penalties last season (Offensive line coach Wylie had done this before; long story).
Joel is particularly good at evaluating offensive linemen, and seems to like Shon's chances at left tackle. For me, it's between him and Corbett, and I lean 1.675% towards Corbett.
Austin Corbett is not a "project". Yes, NFL left tackle is a whole new ballgame, but perhaps the foremost reason he was drafted ahead of consensus-better left tackles was the fact that he's unusually "polished" and pro-ready.
Joel thinks it would be best for Austin Corbett to spend his rookie season watching and learning. I respectfully disagree.
Next is Carl Nassib. I couldn't agree more. It'd be insane to write this third year player off the roster (yet).
Like I did last week sometime, Joel points out that it's more common than not for players (especially defensive ends) to come into their own in their third seasons, and this kid has all the physical tools in spades.
Joel didn't mention this, but I will redundate: Carl Nassib is 6'7", and Hans and Franz probably have him pumped up to over 300 lbs now, and I repeat:
None of the other defensive ends on the roster are that big (or "long").
As Joel himself points out later (in re Jamie Meder), in the age of sub-packages, there is a role for Nassib here (and the two of them would probably fit the same anti-run package).
Next, Joel lists backup center Austin Reiter AMEN BROTHER! You'd better believe it! When the Browns drafted Corbett, and all these guys started talking about him playing center, I didn't get it.
1: Reiter was injured, not killed. He is alive and well, and still a Cleveland Brown honest!
2: Austin Reiter is exceptionally athletic; an exceptional inside-zone blocker and linebacker-hunter on the run. He was a good pass-blocker too. He needed to get bigger and stronger, and work on leverage.
Well, we can safely assume that Hans and Franz have been pumping him up, too duh.
Next on Joel's list is Jamie Meder, for the reasons I've cited for years.
Joel suggested that Jamie needs to change his style of play to fit better in Gregg Williams' one-gap scheme, but that's not realistic.
Jamie isn't the athlete the other guys are. But right after Joel said that, he said that Meder fits as a sub-player here.
Defensive line coach (and former quarterback-smasher) Clyde Simmons said he's one of the best run-stuffing defensive tackles he's ever worked with.
And here, Joel missed something:
The "over" tackle usually engages the right guard and two-gaps, even for Gregg Williams.
Briean Boddy-Calhoun naturally. As Joel points out, he's "cross-training" at free safety now. Briean is a shrimp, but plays like he's 220.
Now for the math lesson:
I've read three articles recently: A Browns Film Room on Genard Avery's strengths, an article on how Mychal Kendricks fits into this defense, and another (long overdue and months late) article on how happy Gregg Williams was with Joe Schobert in 2017:
Nothing new here: I told you half way through last season that Schobert was a freaking prodigal "field general" in Gregg Williams' defense.
It was amazing! Schobert had played outside linebacker (mostly in a 3-4) in college (but I told you when they drafted him he belongs inside, remember?)
...then I told you he was not only instictive but really smart too and had a good chance to start in the middle for Williams in 2017 remember?
And a week or so ago I said Schobert isn't the guy Kendricks will challenge here because he's such a prodigy as a field general remember?
(If you're like many people I know, you'll remember thinking of it yourself, just after I published my posts).
Eventually, somebody will catch up to where I was two days after Dorsey signed Mychal Kendricks (redundancy alert): Christian Kirksey (not General Schobert) is on the spot.
Gregg Williams said that now, Joe needs to add some splash-plays to his resume, and he could have said the same thing to the much more experienced Kirksey.
"Tackling machine" is a catchy phrase, but if Kirksey is a machine, so is Joe. But Joe was an edge-rusher in college, and (as I discovered) a basketball star in college.
He weighed 244 lbs at his combine, and posted boring numbers in the drills. He's not a "quick-twitch" athlete, but all along relied on his brains and instincts.
As I mentioned, he shed weight since he was drafted, and had to know he would play inside for Gregg Williams.
Regardless of what Gregg Williams said about splash-plays, he's happy with what he already has in Joe Schobert. He's just "pushing" him now.
Joe Schobert isn't going anywhere, and Kendricks and his clone Avery are the future at outside linebacker.
My guess is that Kendricks will be number one at one outside linebacker slot, and number two in the middle.
Dan Justik has caught up with me on the probability that Nick Chubb will become the predominant every-down running back over Carlos Hyde. Welcome aboard (again) Dan!
Doug Lesmerisis doesn't steal my stuff (I don't think), but lags behind me a lot too (Terry Pluto is the only guy who is less than a week behind me, usually).
Here, Doug compares the Browns to the 76ers, and the similarities are remarkable (and all-Doug).
The Sixers scapegoated the GM who built their team, kept the Head Coach, cashed in all their wins for a top pick, have a thus far disappointing young star (we have Corey Coleman) who could emerge in his third season, etc.
Great article, but not perfect:
1: I'm not a basketball guy, but can tell you that nobody in any sport deliberately "tanks" to get higher draft picks.
I know that Doug understands this, but am irked when he generalizes, because the ignorant masses think that Sashi Brown deliberately sabotaged Hue Jackson and stuff when he writes "tank".
Sashi Brown focused on the draft from the start, and brought in stud veterans in year two. He brought in a ton of talent. Most of it was inexperienced, but that's not tanking. It's up to the coaches to make use of talent.
2: Doug declares the Wentz trade-down a mistake. Maybe it wasn't. We'll know in a couple more years, after we see how a big chunk of this roster performs...because it came from that trade.
Like everybody else except me, Lesmerisis thinks that a great quarterback can win Superbowls with garbage around them.
They can't. Quarterback is the most important position in football, Doug. It's not the ONLY position, and in my own opinion, Mayfield will be better than Wentz anyway.
3: Doug calls DeShone Kizer a "miss", but that's premature. (Redundancy Alert) Kizer was a SECOND round pick who was "raw, and shouldn't start for 1 or 2 seasons".
Hue Jackson not only made the pick (if you think DePodesta did, you're clueless), then started him immediately.
...then kept him in the pocket, and made him throw deep, and wouldn't (nevermind see earlier posts) anyway, DeShone Kizer will certainly become an above average (at least) quarterback in time.
He wasn't a first round pick, and he is a quarterback. Don't call that a "miss" (yet).
...not to mention, Damarius Randall was a first round pick.
4: Doug anticipates the Browns going after AJ Green. He's implicitly expecting Josh Gordon to get busted again, or...whatever, but Gordon is better than Green, and should be cheaper too!
Despite these ass umptions and conclusion-leaps which Doug is prone to, this was still an excellent article overall.
He's even got the "overpaid veteran" guy (for the Browns that's Landry), and "the next GM" comparison (the weakest one-the Sixers guy got in trouble somehow--but made a smart move).
Dorsey's roster is a lot bigger than that, but (not my opinion, but the guys on NFL Radio and other REAL experts' opinions), Dorsey has done a great job so far.
Lesmeris's premis is that the Browns and Sixers look eerily similar, and he made his case in spades.
Doug guesstimates 6 wins in 2018, and I won't quibble with that, but in 2019 he says 10-6 and the playoffs, and that's pessimistic.
1: Two seasons from now, Ebineezer Bell probably isn't a Steeler, and Gramps Rottenburgers might not be either. Ditto Gramps Suggs, Flacco, and a bunch of other geezers in the AFC North.
2: Baker Mayfield WAS THE BEST quarterback in this draft class (or the last one, and probably the next one too), and he'll have had a year to ripen in the nursery.
3: See earlier posts: best (and youngest) talent in the AFC North.
Doug, and a lot of you guys, suffer from Stockholm Syndrome.
You percieve the Stoolers (and maybe even the perennially-overrated Ravens) as godlike/invincable because you've been held down so long.
That's brainwashing. Are you brainwashed?
Well, you are if you think that 0-16 in 2017 or 1-31 in the last two seasons is what the 2018 Browns are.
The 2018 Browns have an 80% new secondary, including the best man corner in this draft, and four upper-echelon young veterans.
As I've told you, Mychal Kendricks and Rodney Averyfield represent big upgrades at linebacker.
Skip the defensive line! Two defensive tackles were rookies...just skip it (earlier posts).
No need to mention the offense--even YOU see Landry, Gordon, Johnson, the offensive line, and Taylor...
Where was I? Oh yeah what's wrong here?
I wish I was close enough to slap Doug Lesmerisis (or you) "out of it": there's NOTHING wrong here (except the downgrade at left tackle).
I don't get Doug (or most of you people he's writing for):
Why should a team with Todd Haley running the offense and Gregg Williams running the defense (for the third year), with a dual-threat proven veteran quarterback, with all this talent lose ten games in 2018?
Wtf is the matter with you people? You expect Tyrod Taylor to crap out vs Big Ben, Brees, Flacco, Dalton?
Can't beat the brilliant genius Marvin Lewis? Can't beat the...nevermind you don't get it, but the players on the 2018 Browns roster do:
1: This is one of the best-coached and most talented rosters in the NFL.
2: Tyrod Taylor is a top ten quarterback *run threat; unofficial upgrade from PFF stats I have access to* who doesn't screw up, and who does have a strong arm that he can use for once...
As Doug Lesmerisis mentioned in his article, Baker Mayfield is the first quarterback the Browns have drafted in the top ten since Tim Couch.
If you are dumb enough to expect either Tyrod Taylor or Baker Mayfield to crap out based on that internet jersey, that's Stockholm Syndrome:
1: Tyrod Taylor is a proven veteran. He did more with less, and done growing yet.
2: Baker Mayfield was the best quarterback in this draft class, and technically the best to come along in several years (including the Wentz and Watson classes) (don't argue with me: see PFF, Numberfire, Charlie Weiss, and several more real experts in an ex-quarterback-deep field including the "arm-talent" obsessed Phil Simms (and his son).
3: Back off this notion that to be a top 5 team, or to win a Superbowl, you need a top five quarterback.
I haven't checked out those stats yet, but will, eventually.
Tom Brady is exceptional, because it doesn't matter who he's got to work with. But Aaron Rodgers is like that too.
Nobody (with a brain) in their right mind declares Tom Brady better than Aaron Rodgers...
Is any of this sinking in yet? The Pats just lost another Superbowl to another more talented team led by Nick Foles.
Wow you mean somebody beat the best quarterback in history with only 21 other guys? How is that possible?
See my earlier posts: Even among real experts like Pat Kirwan, the quarterback is all there is, and...
No, the quarterback isn't all there is. How did Saint Thomas lose?
He lost when the other 21 players overmatched his guys, and had coaches right in the Sith Lord's face.
Doug Lesmerisis and you people need to get over your quarterback fixation, and give the other 21 players their due.
Frankly, it's downright ignorant to think Tyrod Taylor can't do better this year than he did last year...
Duh
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