Thanks to the quiet of the bye week in Browns town, the Peyton Hillis “story” was big news all week long. It cluttered the airwaves at 92.3 WFAN and even Adam the Bull couldn’t help but say that teams should keep stuff like this “in house” but that he was glad they didn’t because it was good for his afternoon drive-time show with Dustin Fox. You can certainly debate whether or not it was good for his show, but there is little doubt that it was all around a bad week for Browns fans as an unnecessary potential wedge was being driven between Browns fans and Peyton Hillis. All of it began with a report from Adam Schefter about alleged “whispers in the Browns locker room.”
You may or may not believe me, but I honestly didn’t want to talk about any of the Peyton Hillis stuff. I didn’t think it was much of a story. We’ve been through this before with beloved players like Josh Cribbs. We love Browns players, but we love the Cleveland Browns team even more. When that team is seemingly at odds financially with a player, it is a sticky situation. Everyone would be better off if we just acted like Tom Heckert and only discussed these things after deals are completed. That’s obviously unrealistic, but now we’re finding out so were Adam Schefter’s reports.
Per Pro Football Talk…
Per a source with knowledge of the situation, a meeting between Hillis’ agent and the team occurred the day after the Miami game. And while progress still need to be made (not so much as to amount but as to structure and guarantee), there was no reason for Hillis to make any type of statement by shying away from playing.
Before we rake Adam Schefter over the coals too much, his report might have been accurate. He could have heard whispers from some player sources inside the Browns locker room that at least a few players were suspicious that Peyton’s absence in the Miami game was a contract ploy. The real issue comes when you take that piece of information and don’t apply any logic to it.
I can believe a couple of players in a tough-guy league like the NFL might have had it cross their minds that Peyton Hillis should have played against Miami. Just reporting something like that is titillating and fosters speculation.
That’s ultimately why I wanted to try and put some more reasonable speculation out there last week. But where was Adam Schefter? Did he not feel the need to update the story? Is everything dead after he reports “whispers?” Make no mistake, Adam Schefter fills a niche with his information, but maybe we should all be a little bit more careful how we use that information and to what extent. There was a whole lot of speculation fostered with a pretty incomplete bit of information last week.
