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November 16, 2014
What does Browns loss to Texans really mean? – WFNY Podcast – 2014-11-16
November 16, 2014I know how this thing goes. Every week, we use the latest sampling to define the team. We’ve seen weeks where the Browns were the most unstoppable rushing team in the history of the NFL. We’ve seen weeks where the Browns had the best or worst quarterback, and multiple times where the team was embroiled in an impossible QB controversy. I know it’s frustrating to watch the Browns lose any game, especially against a Texans team at home 23-7, but it doesn’t have to have some overarching meaning other than the Browns got beat this particular week.
It does play into one trend that sticks out to me. The Browns struggle – and hard – against teams with excellent players on the defensive front. The Browns lost that game to Jacksonville, struggled to win against Tampa, and then struggled mightily this week against J.J. Watt and the Texans. It happens. There are some seriously bad matchups for the Browns whenever a defensive front takes away the rushing game. We knew this before the game started.
So, let’s talk about J.J. Watt for a minute, because he’s a major reason the Browns lost. I hate even saying it. J.J. Watt was annoying. The TV crew was fawning all over him to the point that I wanted to bite my own face off. I’m not saying J.J. Watt isn’t good, but when an entire three-plus hour game is seemingly described through a Watt-ian lens, it gets obnoxious. As annoying as that was, Watt was a major reason the Browns lost. There’s no denying it.
Brian Hoyer hardly looked comfortable all game long. Watt strip-sacked him and the Browns just couldn’t seem to consistently keep Hoyer on his feet, but it wasn’t just Watt. Jadeveon Clowney was back today for the Texans and Brian Cushing got the biggest lick of the game in on Hoyer and it was a serious one. Hoyer wasn’t good – going 16 for 41 is ugly – but this game wasn’t even close to being all on his shoulders.
Which brings me to another thing that bothers me. There’s this idea that the Browns are constantly embroiled in a QB controversy, but it’s even worse than that. There’s also a general undertone that Brian Hoyer is up against every other quarterback in the league every week. Aaron Goldhammer tweeted that Hoyer was outplayed by Ryan Mallett and I know that’s far from a definitive opinion in Cleveland, but it’s so silly. After watching this Browns game, if you found it to be a duel between Brian Hoyer and Ryan Mallett, I don’t know what to say to you.
@WFNYCraig since the Rams are gonna beat the broncos Shaun Hill>Peyton Manning
— I480BRIDGE (@I480BRIDGE) November 16, 2014
The Cleveland Browns are an average to slightly above average team. They have a competent quarterback who understands the offense, can read the defense and thrives with the play-action. We know this about Brian Hoyer and the Browns. The Browns and their chances every Sunday are never about Brian Hoyer dueling with opposing quarterbacks. It wasn’t the case when the Browns beat Andy Dalton’s Bengals, and it wasn’t the case when the Browns lost to Ryan Mallett and the Houston Texans.
I know that this doesn’t help anyone feel better. I also know that it won’t stop all the chatter this week that looks to use it to define everything from Brian Hoyer to Mike Pettine. I know people will say things like, “The Browns don’t know how to deal with success!” They will say, “This is what the Browns do with ten days between games?!” I implore you to find the easiest answers though. The Cleveland Browns didn’t play a great game against a team that was a particularly bad matchup for them. It doesn’t mean anything definitive about whether the Browns can beat the Falcons or Bills over the next few weeks.
The bad news? The Cleveland Browns squandered an opportunity at home against the Texans before hitting the road for the next two. The good news? The Browns only lost for the second time in the last seven games. Oh yeah, and they get Josh Gordon back too. It wasn’t fun today, but this team could easily still win more than they lose this year. That doesn’t change simply with a loss to the Texans. The Browns might lose every game for the rest of this season, but that ending wasn’t written on November 16 and anyone who tells you it was, is not to be trusted.
37 Comments
Craig – are you still offering Hoyer $10M a year like you were on Wednesday? Or are we going to maybe agree with what the reasonable people said to wait until the end of the year. Today was Hoyer’s 3rd game where he completed less than 50% of his passes. That can’t happen in a league where its so easy to throw the ball.
Look I’m not saying today was all Hoyer’s fault. It wasn’t. I am saying that there will always be games like today and Hoyer needs near perfection from every one of his teammates in order to be this “unstoppable winner” that people have made him out to be.
Kind of agree. This game may not define everything but that doesn’t mean it defines nothing other than a snapshot of a single moment that provides no indicators of what they are and where they are. Here’s what I think this game showed:
– The roster is not deep. They can’t lose good players like Mack and Cameron on offense and Dansby and Taylor on defense and cover enough resulting warts.
– They have players who cannot maintain intensity. Paging Paul Kruger, last week’s Sir Impact. Texas was bringing it, on the road and in the cold. The Browns did not.
– Browns coaches are still on a learning curve.Not adjusting anything to create pressure on Mallett – what?
– Crowell may be the one explosive back, but doesn’t know the plays and is prone to major mistakes.
– The team is resilient. That comes from Hoyer, who keeps fighting even when things get bleak.
Not the end of the world, but not nothing. The Browns are developing right now. Next week is another steppingstone. And 8-8 would be a major step forward.
Yes. I want Hoyer to play one more year for the Browns. If it costs me nothing but $25 million of Jimmy Haslam’s money over two season, then yes I’m still going to pony it up. It’s not my money and Hoyer is the best the Browns have for half of the next season at least, if I had to make my best educated guess.
Don’t know what this game means but for some reason I wasn’t surprised. I figured Hoyer would have to play very well to get a W today because we would struggle with their front. He played bad but our D is real bad too.
I guess the point is that Hoyer needs a lot of help to be successful and is not capable of putting a team on his back and being the difference in a game. Which is, of course, what a franchise QB is supposed to do.
With our history it’s a tough call. I think we gotta see what we have in the kid tho.
That picture sums up the whole game.
Two things to remember:
1. The NFL is designed for widespread parody. Games like this are going to happen (The Bengals looked a lot different than last week).
2. This team has massively overachieved.
As much as I’m rooting for the guy, Brian Hoyer looks less and less like the long term answer at quarterback. He misses too many throws and makes too few. By “make”, I am referring to the fact that Hoyer can throw to open receivers, but he struggles mightily to throw receivers open. This could partly be due to the lack of size at receiver (example of a position the Browns have overachieved at), but if Hoyer tries to fit a ball into a receiver with a DB anywhere near the target, it seems to be an incomplete, and usually very ugly, pass every time. Basically, I don’t think the Browns will be able to justify signing a long-term deal with a QB who consistently flirts with a 50% completion percentage or less when he has to shoulder the load because of an inconsistent run game or when he has to play from behind.
Love the Kruger comment. I’ve never seen more of a “Jekyll and Hyde” type player on the Browns. It seems he either dominates or disappears.
Also, I will continue to valiantly back Mike Pettine, but seriously, where was the pressure? Mallet’s first start ever, on the road and you aren’t going to blitz the kid?
I feel like the running backs are starting to have an identity crisis. The idea of featuring the back whose strengths match up the best against the opponent sounds great in theory, but they just don’t seem comfortable with it. Tate left Houston for more carries, West was basically the only player in the history of Towson that ever mattered and he touched the ball on just about every play, and Crow was in a similar situation at Alabama State. The system just doesn’t seem as fluid as it did at the beginning of the year (i.e. when Tate was out).
Franchise tag.
Agreed re: tough fronts (Hoyer noted as much in his comments), but while Atlanta is a type that favors the Browns, the Bills will be a tough game on the road – see Thursday night, even in a loss. Indy is just a good team, period. Cincy will be itching for revenge, Carolina may still be in a first-place hunt and has a solid front seven (though it’s been oddly disappearing this year), and Baltimore we’ve already lost to at home.
http://media3.giphy.com/media/cvHSpGveXf5rG/200.gif
I am smoking from the ears after this game; not because of how poorly the Browns played but because of how people make every game a referendum on Hoyer. I can’t understand how anyone who has any football sense can think that Hoyer is a barely above average QB, or only temporarily better than Manziel.
For years, literally YEARS we have made excuses for a legion of quarterbacks – “just wait until he gets his receivers back”, “they need an outside speed receiver to free things up over the middle”, “just wait until Cameron gets a bit more seasoning”. Now we have a guy who started out with a barely functional group of receivers – remember how everyone was saying we were cooked if Gordon got suspended? Well the only thing that changed was that Hoyer is back. His top receivers are an undrafted rookie and a seasoned practice squad player. This offseason, there was serious talk about cutting Benjamin too. What kind of QB takes those guys and has a pro bowl season? Peyton Manning? Tom Brady? If they had to trot out with that, they’d retire and GMs would be fired.
Instead of thinking about how Hoyer is doing lately, how about this – put Hoyer on the Saints; with Graham, Colston, and Cooks. How do you think he’d be doing? His QB rating is 10 points lower than Brees as it is; I think it’s fair to say he’d be competitive. Or put him on Denver in place of Manning – how do you think Hoyer’s 2014 work translates to a team with Thomas, Thomas, Sanders and Welker?
But he doesn’t have those weapons. He has what he has, and he has his team at 6-4 despite some serious struggles running the ball, and some defensive breakdowns earlier in the season. The Browns should not pay him $100m because nobody else will. But fans should realize that Hoyer is not just “decent” or “solid” or a role player who won’t win but also won’t lose you the games. He is at the very least, a hundred times as good as what we’ve had in over a decade, and with a developing team, could be much more. We owe him the chance to take us where he can.
Browns aren’t as good as they showed last week and they aren’t as bad as they played this week. For further proof look at Cincinnati.
it’s simple. hoyer cannot be a game changer with his arm. if he does not have the running game going behind him, he will be miserable. and our defense is poor to bad. with the big names on this d, to play like they have, and being swiss cheese vs the run, its unacceptable. very average team. maybe gordon will make a huge difference, but he can’t run the ball.
It’s “parity,” but for this game, “widespread parody” may be more apt.
Was it just me, or did it seem like they consistently ran the ball to the right into the waiting arms of Watt? Would love to see the run breakdown. Could have just been my frustrated perception.
The interesting thing about Hoyer that no one seems to talk about is that he is Inverse Alex Smith. I think this fact pretty much ensures a ceiling on his value, and it is not illogical to question if a 29 year old with a clear ceiling is worth a large contract. That said all of those who overreacted to Hoyer’s best games, and those who overreacted to his worst games are each making the same mistake, which is the basis of more than half of all sportswriting these days. Basically I just stop reading/listening when someone goes too far into the “proof that player X is/isn’t FOR REAL” narrative.
Back to the Inverse Alex Smith thing, I’ve heard both of these quarterbacks described as “Game Managers” over and over, which I take to mean that their respective teams feel they need to limit the number of passes they make (I think this part is accurate of each coaching staff). However aside from this, Smith and Hoyer couldn’t be more different. Smith is effective in quick timing short passing. He throws to hot reads often and when criticized it is often for checking down too much, or not seeing the open man deep. His arm strength is also questioned. He is among the league leaders in completion percentage, yet pedestrian in Yards per Attempt.
Hoyer, on the other hand, has not shown great short pass timing with his receivers. I’m not sure he’s ever made a hot read, and he rarely checks down (look at how few RB receptions we have this year). But Hoyer makes more long passes than the average QB. Despite his bottom of the pack completion percentage, he is top 5 in Yards per Attempt. He is very willing to wait in the pocket or move around to let a play develop, and he has good vision to see when a receiver is about to get open. His arm strength is quite good, but his accuracy limits some of the plays where he sees the open man, but can’t make the throw.
The point of this comparison is that I have often heard people say that there is a “right way” to play quarterback. Some think checking down is for wimps, some think inaccuracy is never acceptable. Yet Quarterbacks are constantly trying to balance these two issues. I don’t think Brian Hoyer is likely to become a great short passing QB, and this really will limit how far the Browns can go with him, but it is also not true to say that he stinks, and his game will never work.
I know this team has overachieved, but this loss was still disappointing. As of this moment, they’re tied in the win column for the division lead.
I don’t really care what the preseason expectations were for this team. They’re in the hunt with 6 to go. Gordon is coming back, so they’ll have more help on offense.
Don’t let this game define you, Browns! You are still in the drivers seat. If you win, the rest will fall into place.
On to Atlanta!!!!
Indy Is a good team, but the Browns will get a good shot at them. It’s a home game outdoors and Indy can’t run the ball very well and can’t stop the run.
When I talk about bad match ups, the Browns might be a very bad matchup for Indy if they can run the ball and if the secondary holds up.
Gimme those baby backs running at DQ Jackson right now.
I’m game. Again, it’s not my money.
“It doesn’t mean anything definitive about whether the Browns can beat the Falcons or Bills over the next few weeks.”
I would say you’re right about the Falcons, but I disagree with the Bills. They have a top 5 defensive line and their sack rate is somewhere near 10%, which is easily best in the NFL. They get to the quarterback a lot, which as we know greatly affects Hoyer’s game.
Not just you. I noticed it and was screaming everytime we opted to run to the side where Watt was matched up with Schwartz instead of towards Thomas/Bitonio. Made ZERO sense.
Very impressive article. Well written and laid out. I must admit, I`m at a cross roads on the Brian Hoyer thing. Way too many overthrown and poorly thrown passes to anoint him the Browns savior Q.B. We still need to witness what Manziel can do, and we need to see this year.
If we wait until next season to see what we have in Manziel, then it will seem lik just another throw away year not expecting playoffs while the new Q.B. learns the ropes. Let him play out the season, next training camp the 2 can compete for starter and trade the loser ad have Connor Shaw be our #2.
That is very insightful.
Did we sell out the pass-rush in some sort of failed scheme to stop the run?
While I am not on the ledge, games like this make me insanely curious to see how Manziel would fair. Hoyer has all day to throw and our offense is built on roll-outs.
Hoyer was bad on a lot of passes too, not even giving the guy a chance. And he fell down several times when was taking his 5 step drop? Once maybe, twice, cmon.
Soo….. point out how lame it was that people used to make excuses for our poor quarterback play….. and then proceed to make excuses and random hypotheticals to excuse Hoyer’s play? Am I reading this correctly??
Somewhat related to CBS’s unseemly JJ Watt worship mentioned in the article, if we have to hear “The Steves” call one more Browns game I’m going to jump off a building.
I mean, it’ll be my garage or something, but still.
I think what he is trying to say, is that Hoyer wasn’t dealt a good hand this season, so he is owed next season when he should have everyone back and healthy and playing with pocket aces…
3 times he stumbled badly, but only once was his fault.
1st time – he stumbled but regained composure and completed the play. this one was his fault as it looked like he started to turn right, then realized he was supposed to turn left, which he did stumbling and missed the play-fake.
2nd time – McDonald was driven backwards so fast that he bumped into Hoyer. Not his foot to regain his stance (see next item), but his body. This is the one that Hoyer got back up and finished the play, but was wretched by McD.
3rd time – Bitonio threw his foot backwards as he lost leverage and needed to regain it, which is where he stepped on Hoyer and eventually caused that 9 yard loss sack. Always dangerous when OL do that as it causes injuries often too (either QB or other OL).
No way! I heard that Indy gave up a 1st round draft pick in a trade for a RB from a consistently national title contending college team and this guy was supposed to be the next coming of Earl Campbell!
He does have a wingspan of 82 1/2 inches
No, not at all. I am arguing that this is not poor quarterback play, given the game that Hoyer has been asked to play. The other quarterbacks’ evaluations were based completely on counterfactuals – there was only negative, and we were left to imagine what might be different. With Hoyer, there are actually positives, both as a QB (2/1 interception ratio, solid yardage stats, great YPA) and as the team leader (6-4). The question is simply how to weigh the negatives against that. It’s an entirely different exercise.
If you honestly thought the Browns were going to win that game yesterday, you haven’t been a Cleveland sports fan long enough. #factoryofsadness
And for the love of the Gods, why was Hoyer not in the shotgun all game with a defensive front as talented as the Texans and no Alex Mack?
And, by the way, it is hard to win games without Alex Mach, Josh Gordon, Jordan Cameron, Carlos Dansby, Phil Taylor, and Jabal Sheard. If the team doesn’t get healthy, they will not win more than they lose. 8-8 at best.
The Browns have not massively over achieved. By a long shot, they have the easiest strength of Schedule in the league. Look it up, our opponents have less than a .400 winning percentage, and we are the only team in the NFL with an opponents win percentage under .400; The Browns have played some pretty sad talent,
Mack & Taylor aren’t coming back. We’ve never been able to count on Cameron and I wouldn’t expect Gordon to light it up after not playing for 11 weeks (10 games).
We’ll know more about Dansby (didn’t look good) and Sheard (more likely short-term) this week, but every team gets brutal injuries through the season and the ones that respond best are the ones that make the playoffs.
We could go 8-8, but I like to think we can beat this Atlanta team (struggles on the run and stopping it), so that would be a 1-4 death march to end it. I at least like think this team is better than that.