May 24, 2013

Browns receiving corps ranked fourth in their division by Jamison Hensley

May 8, 2013 by 25 Comments

Jamison Hensley of ESPN is ranking all the position groups in the AFC North and he has decided where they all fall when it comes to receivers. The Cleveland Browns, despite a recent trade for Devone Bess and despite the exit of Anquan Boldin from Baltimore, are last in Hensley’s mind. The Steelers take the top spot and the Bengals with the league’s very best receiver, A.J. Green, finish second.

The Browns feel more comfortable with their receivers after watching what Josh Gordon and Greg Little did last season. But you don’t know if Cleveland’s top two receivers are going to reach their potential this season because they have a combined three seasons of NFL experience. Gordon flashed big-play ability and Little showed signs of developing into a complementary No. 2 target. The Browns have more established depth than the Ravens after trading for Davone Bess and signing David Nelson. Bess will prove valuable on third down. Travis Benjamin provides speed on the outside. This group will be even better next season.

There’s no doubting that the Browns receivers have a lot to prove, but it still seems a little bit odd that the Ravens could be ranked ahead of them without Anquan Boldin. Torrey Smith is a dynamic, young receiver who I definitely think is on an upward career arc, but he’s only entering his third season in the NFL. He’s caught nearly 50 balls in two straight years. He’s covered 841 yards and 855 yards while catching seven and eight TDs. All that being said, he accomplished that playing with Joe Flacco and alongside Anquan Boldin.

We’ll obviously see how it all plays out on the field this year, but Gordon didn’t start the entire season for the Browns and had 50 catches for 805 yards and five touchdowns as a rookie with no established veteran anywhere to be found on the Browns roster. Greg Little added 53 catches for 647 yards and four TDs as he seemed to get over his butter fingers in the second half of the season. The Browns also add Davone Bess who caught 61 balls a year ago for 778 yards from rookie QB Ryan Tannehill.

[Related: Browns thoughts on Armonty Bryant, Jimmy Haslam’s apology and Garrett Gilkey]

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Banner Report: Wide Receivers/Tight Ends

March 12, 2013 by 10 Comments

You may remember back in 2010 (you know the last time there was a complete overhaul in Berea) we wanted to give incoming President Mike Holmgren a hand evaluating the roster. We are nothing if not equal opportunity. The Browns have a completely new group in charge this year. Joe Banner, Mike Lombardi, Rob Chudzinski, Norv Turner and Ray Horton take over a 5-11 team. They have plenty of important decisions to make about the roster between now and the 2013 NFL Draft. WFNY wants to offer our assistance with The Banner Position Reports. Previous reports:LB, QB, RB, DBs, DL

Not since the “The Season of Dreams” back in 2007 have the Browns had real playmakers catching the football. That year Kellen Winslow and Braylon Edwards each topped 1000 yards and 80 receptions before seeing their numbers drop off significantly in 2008. Then, the next three years the Browns’ pass catchers were led by Mo Massaquoi (34 rec, 624 yards), Ben Watson (68 rec, 763 yards), and Greg Little (61 rec, 709 yards). It became something to celebrate when a receiver caught a pass instead of the usual dump off to backs and tight ends. The Browns’ inability to get the ball out wide has been as much on the receiving corps as it has been on the revolving door of quarterbacks coming through Berea. It’s the old chicken or the egg conundrum. Have the struggles passing been the result of poor quarterback play, or lack of weapons catching the football? The short answer is yes. But in 2012 with Weeden throwing to Little and Gordon the Brownies started to show signs of a real passing attack. While far from a proficient one, there was now a passing attack to speak of.

[Read more...]

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Browns “impressed” with Greg Little’s maturation

March 4, 2013 by 8 Comments

The Cleveland Browns appear to be pretty pleased with one of last season’s big question marks in wide receiver Greg Little.

In his latest Sunday column, Terry Pluto of The Plain Dealer describes Little and teammate Josh Gordon as integral parts of the team’s future, but it is only little who appears to have calmed nerves regarding his maturity and work ethic.

“Reviewing the tapes from last season, the coaches were very impressed with the improvement of Greg Little,” writes Pluto. ”In the first five games, he had 11 catches and six drops. In the last 11 games, it was 42 catches and three drops. Little receives high grades for blocking and toughness. He seems to be a significant part of the plan for 2013.”

Meanwhile, with regard to Gordon, despite a head-turning middle of the 2012 season, the team appears more concerned about the bookends that yielded very little.

“Former coach Pat Shurmur and his staff were not thrilled with Gordon’s approach during the 2012 training camp,” writes Pluto. “The coaches taught him how to prepare for practice and film work. He seemed to believe his immense natural talent was enough. By mid season, they thought Gordon had made enormous progress, with former offensive coordinator Brad Childress praising Gordon for “always carrying his notebook” and taking notes.”

During his rookie season after having not played football for a year, Gordon hauled in 50 catches while being among the league’s best in yards after catch — 80 percent of his receptions were for first downs. Essentially serving as this year’s second-round pick, the Browns insists that Gordon must make the leap to a high-impact player in his second or third season. Pluto added, at least in the print version, that the team is monitoring Gordon’s use of social media.

[Related: The Browns’ dive into analytics will be a subtle revolution]

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Cleveland Browns lead AFC North in dropped passes for 2012

January 15, 2013 by 10 Comments

For the second year in a row, the Cleveland Browns led the AFC North in dropped passes, allowing 27 catchable passes to hit the ground.

The silver lining: According to ESPN Stats & Information, the Browns were the only team in the division whose drops decreased from the previous season with the team dropping 33 balls in 2011.

Cincinnati Bengals wide receiver A.J. Green led all players in the division with nine dropped passes on 158 targets.  Greg Little led the Browns with seven drops on just 85 targeted passes, the majority of which came within the first six weeks of the season, drawing the ire of many including former Browns coach Sam Rutigliano. Little, who led the AFC North with 11 dropped passes in 2011, was second in the division this year behind Green.

The other players in the Browns with at least four drops were wide receiver Josh Gordon (five) and fullback Owen Marecic (four). Marecic was made inactive for the majority of the second half of the 2012 season as the team opted to use tight end Alex Smith and H-back Brad Smelley in his place.

[Related: Pat Shurmur puts Greg Little on notice]

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Browns drop final game to Steelers and start off-season of change

December 30, 2012 by 6 Comments

The Browns and Steelers is usually a much-anticipated matchup, but this time it seemed as if the end of the game was the most intriguing part. With the end of the game comes the end of the charade that Pat Shurmur and GM Tom Heckert will keep their jobs. Gone is the last bit of the Mike Holmgren era, but more importantly the Randy Lerner era for all practical purposes. 1 In the end, the Browns had a chance to tie it up in the fourth quarter but turnovers caught up with them as they dropped their final game 24-10. The Browns finish the season at 5-11.

Despite my looking ahead to the end, there were still decent enough reasons to watch. Thad Lewis was getting his first start and honestly, even if the team is bad, you only get 16 chances to watch them play meaningful football a year so most people like to try and make the most of it. It’s not exactly fighting for a playoff spot, but most Browns fans barely remember that feeling if they’ve even been alive long enough. So the Browns and Steelers went at it, neither having anything real to play for. [Read more...]

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  1. Lerner will own a small portion of the team for a while still, but it’s really over. [back]

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Browns place Mohamed Massaquoi on IR

December 25, 2012 by 4 Comments

Add Mohamed Massaquoi to the list of Cleveland Browns players that might have seen his last action as a member of the team. Mohamed Massaquoi is on injured reserve and the Browns signed Thaddeus Lewis from the practice squad Monday night.

According to the Browns’ news release, Massaquoi started five of nine games in which he appeared this season and caught 17 passes for 245 yards. For comparison’s sake, Josh Gordon has 46 and Greg Little has 50. With those kinds of numbers and difficulty remaining healthy it remains questionable as to how much interest Joe Banner and whichever general manager is working for the Browns, will have in the soon-to-be free agent.

If MoMass is truly done with the Browns it closes the chapter on one of the most disastrous second rounds quite possibly in NFL history. The Browns traded down a few times and ended up with three picks in the round. They selected Mohamed Massaquoi, Brian Robiskie, and David Veikune.

[Related: NFL Rumors: Banner to “clean house” as soon as season ends]

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Cleveland Browns Game 12: Winners and Losers

December 3, 2012 by 60 Comments

Who caught your eye? Did someone stand out? Who blew it? That’s what were interested in this morning. Winners and losers.

What’s this? Consecutive weeks in which we get to run this feature after a win? Interesting. A guy could get used to this…

WINNER: Josh Gordon. Before we get too crazy, we all agree that Oakland’s defensive backfield is pretty bad. That said, this was a really nice game for Gordon. Six catches for 116 and a very nice TD. Should have had a second as well, but a badly under thrown ball prevented it. Gordon has been solid and getting better. He is well worth the second round pick the Browns used on him in the supplemental draft, at least early on. Given an offseason to further develop should help make Gordon a real weapon next year. If he can stay out of trouble. [Read more...]

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Animated: Jimmy Haslam doesn’t like overturned touchdowns

November 4, 2012 by 8 Comments

A Browns receiver was covering up a tight end and it negated a Josh Gordon touchdown. Jimmy Haslam’s reaction says it all.

 

[Related: Shaky decisions haunt Browns as they lose and say hello to the bye]

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Cleveland Browns Game 8: Winners and Losers

October 29, 2012 by 44 Comments

Who caught your eye? Did someone stand out? Who blew it? That’s what were interested in this morning. Winners and losers.

Good win for the team. It was a confidence builder and another shot for young players to get valuable experience. Not to mention, it didn’t seem like any of our players were injured, which is always a plus…

WINNER: Trent Richardson. It’s a good thing Richardson didn’t listen to sports radio last week. He may have sat until the bye week or just figured his running style doesn’t translate to the NFL and hung ‘em up. Good grief. All the rookie did was average 5 yards a carry against one of the better defenses statistically against the run. He scored the game’s only touchdown. Good for Trent. Looks like someone may have been right about him last week. [Read more...]

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Pro Football Focus Report: Greg Little Drops 30% of Catchable Passes

October 17, 2012 by 29 Comments

Cleveland WR Greg Little is among the league leaders in dropped passes. Depending on where you get your stats, Little has dropped five or six passes this year. (The dropped pass stat is way to open to interpretation by the way.) Browns fans will tell you either of those figures seems a bit low.

Regardless, Pro Football Focus tweeted an interesting stat concerning Little and his receiving prowess-

Thirty percent. That just can’t happen. Not on any level.

Here’s another interesting stat, also from Pro Football Focus-

Joining Greg Little on the ‘leader’ board in dropped passes is FB Owen Marecic with 4 official drops. At least Little can say that he has caught 14 passes compared to his 6 drops. Marecic still hasn’t caught a pass in 2012.

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Weeden: lack of Greg Little targets “coincidence”

October 11, 2012 by 5 Comments

During media sessions today Brandon Weeden was asked about the lack of targets for Greg Little this past weekend against the Giants and was overall very supportive and dismissive of the notion.

He had one game where he was target twice. It was a coincidence. I talked to him about it. He’s a guy who’s capable of making a bunch of plays. I’d be crazy not to throw to him.

Maybe Weeden is just being supportive of Little, or maybe it is just coincidence. More likely it had to do with Greg Little being thrust into the primary receiver role and most likely ending up with much more difficult matchups with Mohamed Massaquoi and Travis Benjamin both missing time in the last game. Jordan Norwood caught nine balls on nine targets and was on crutches today.

So, chances are good that Little will get more than two targets this week against Cincinnati by default if not by the coincidence pendulum swinging back the other way.

[Related: WFNY Podcast – 2012-10-10 – Browns, Tribe and Obama on sports talk radio]

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Browns vs. Giants – Reader Survey

October 5, 2012 by 3 Comments

The Browns go on the road for the second straight week to a paved-over swamp in New Jersey to face the Giants. Here’s your chance to stand up and be counted to help us try and figure out what’s going to happen and how.

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Easterbrook: “Don’t cover Greg Little”

October 3, 2012 by 33 Comments

One of the things that every offense seeks is balance in order to keep the defense honest. Play too much blitz? The offense wants to gash you quickly or with draws. Play too run heavy? Offense wants to gash you at the sidelines. Etc. If the Cleveland Browns receiver problem is as bad as Gregg Easterbrook from ESPN seems to think, it could be very difficult for the Browns to find any balance.

TMQ noted in my preseason preview that the Browns were going nowhere until Greg Little stops dropping the ball. At Baltimore, he dropped four passes, including a strike in the end zone; Cleveland had to settle for a field goal. Little dropped a dozen passes in 2011 and already has six drops in 2012. The obvious move for defensive coordinators is to leave Little uncovered and hope Brandon Weeden throws to him.

Certainly there might be a bit of hyperbole in there from Easterbrook, but if Little’s issues are even a percentage as bad as he indicates, it makes the opposing defense’s gameplan much simpler.

[Related: “Cleveland ’95: A Football Life” will be mandatory viewing for me]

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Cleveland Browns Game 4: Winners and Losers

September 28, 2012 by 131 Comments

Who caught your eye? Did someone stand out? Who blew it? That’s what were interested in this morning. Winners and losers.

Ugh. Another week, another loss. Once again, the Browns had the opportunity to win a game- but it slipped through their fingers…

LOSER: Joe Haden and Dimitri Patterson. He led the team in tackles with 11. There’s a good reason for that. The Ravens picked on him constantly. Baltimore did a good job of getting him matched up on Anquan Boldin, who finished with 9 catches for 131 yards. Of course we all remember why Patterson was on the field so much in the first place. [Read more...]

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Weeden, Browns trying to maintain positive locker room despite outside negativity

September 26, 2012 by 15 Comments

Browns fans don’t generally want to be negative. They’ve rarely been given opportunity to be positive so far this season, though. Brandon Weeden knows that the record isn’t good enough, but he and the rest of the Browns players seem intent on maintaining a good attitude just the same.

… There’s so much negative vibe outside this locker room. It’s everywhere. In this locker room, my goal and I think the rest of the guys’ goal is to keep the positive vibe in here. It’s good right now. Yeah, we’re all frustrated, we all want to be 3-0, but any time you let all the outside frustrations come into this locker room, it starts breaking guys apart. That’s a recipe for disaster.

It’s good to hear, actually. While you don’t want the guys to be satisfied or cocky in the face of failing to win games to start the year, it’s simultaneously hard to figure it would create an environment conducive to getting off the losing streak if they were getting down inside the locker room.

“Fake it ’til you make it,” and the rest. Just as long as we’re not talking about on-field celebrations involving world-champion sprinters, I’m good. There’s that outside negativity creeping up again.

[Related: Just 50 Carries in, Trent Richardson is a Leader in Cleveland]

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Browns vs. Ravens – Reader Survey

September 26, 2012 by 30 Comments

It is a short week for us too, so here we go. Gotta get those surveys filled out today and early tomorrow before the Browns do battle against the Ravens. I noted this morning on Twitter that the NFL Network was promoting the game with a highlight video of Greg Little dunking the football over the crossbar of the goal posts. Not to pick on Greg Little, because he’s taken enough this week, but that’s just sad. NFL Network production employees had to go to a guy who has scored three career regular season touchdowns for a slow-mo highlight to try and hype up the game?

Sorry. I feel like I just skewed the survey results. Please disregard that last part of the first paragraph for survey taking purposes. [Read more...]

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While We’re Waiting… What’s Holding the Browns Back?

September 26, 2012 by 28 Comments

While We’re Waiting serves as the early morning gathering of WFNY-esque information for your viewing pleasure. Have something you think we should see? Send it to our tips email at tips@waitingfornextyear.com.

“With the hopes of a competitive team, potentially one approaching the .500 mark, the Browns have yet again pulled the rug out from under a fan-base believing progress would be something viewed in the 2012 season. The early issue is, the Browns are a more talented team than a season ago. Added were potential dynamics with the names of Richardson, Weeden and Gordon, the remaining problem is there are issues within the roster and/or coaching staff which leaves much to be desired on game-day.

The youth of the team is an easy scape-goat for what ails the Cleveland Browns. But, when I look at the performance of the team, I see something other than the youth being the issue holding back the team.” [Lane Adkins/The OBR]

[Read more...]

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Just 50 Carries in, Trent Richardson is a Leader in Cleveland

September 25, 2012 by 27 Comments

While Greg Little is preening and posing amidst a 14-point deficit and a shower of hashtags, Browns running back Trent Richardson stands mostly stoic and calculated. Certainly, when Richardson crosses the goal line — as he has three times in his very young career 1 — he exudes a level of energy that is matched only by Cleveland fans watching the plays as they unfold. But until that moment when the ball crosses the goal line, Richardson, beneath that orange helmet with dreadlocks flowing, displays a workmanlike attitude previously unseen by his predecessors.

On an otherwise tough day in the trenches with Richardson managing to gain a mere 2.3 yards per carry, when the rookie back out of Alabama was finally able to turn a busted play into a six-yard touchdown, bouncing the play to his immediate left after running right into the backs of the men who were to create a hole just to the left of center Alex Mack, it was those very men whom Richardson tracked down, one by one, on the Browns sidelines following the play.

A seated Mack got a fist bump to the shoulder pads. Then came Shawn Lauvao and Jason Pinkston and Mitchell Schwartz. The final moment of gratitude was reserved for Joe Thomas. A group of men who have underachieved individually and as a unit, being appreciated by the man whom they have largely let down. Three games in, two of them underwhelming by statistical standards coupled with the fact that his team was entertaining their third-consecutive loss, but Trent Richardson is already becoming a leader on a team in dire need of such a role.

[Read more...]

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  1. Twice on the ground, once on a pass reception [back]

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Pat Shurmur puts Greg Little on notice

September 24, 2012 by 34 Comments

Pat Shurmur was pretty blunt with the media today. After watching it, he still somehow seemed to come off defensive too, which is ponderous after a game like the Browns played yesterday. Still, he seemed to intimate that Greg Little’s spot on the active roster on gameday could be in jeopardy if he continues to drop the ball.

After talking about Greg Little and his posing antics and indicating that he’d talked to Little, Shurmur spoke a little bit more generically when he said, “We can’t play a guy that’s going to drop footballs.”

Little dropped one officially yesterday, but two if you count that weird play where Weeden’s pass went through Little’s hands and into the arms of Josh Gordon. Little has also struggled holding onto the ball much of the time since the beginning of last year.

Although slight of frame, Jordan Norwood is probably one of the more polished receivers on the roster. While his ceiling isn’t thought to be as high as Greg Little’s with the larger, bruising frame, there is very little question about Norwood’s route running or catching abilities.

You can take our Facebook poll on the topic. Would you support Pat Shurmur benching Greg Little?

[Related: Browns the day after – Even worse than losing is losing worse]

 

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Coach Sam on Greg Little: “Get the Job Done and Stop the BS”

September 24, 2012 by 42 Comments

Guys like Greg Little who drop the ball yet do a dance while we’re 0-3? I would sit his ass down and tell him, ‘listen my friend, there’s no I in team, but there’s two I’s in “idiot.” Get the job done and stop the B.S.’

– Fomer Cleveland Browns head coach Sam Rutigliano, in an interview on 92.3 The Fan, when asked what he would do with wide receiver Greg Little. Little, on Sunday, dropped multiple passes but proceeded to celebrate when converting a first down with the Browns down by 14 points. He was involved with celebratory-based issues with fans just one week earlier.

[Related: Browns lose as a team to Bills 24-14]

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