Week 4 Preview and How the Browns Will Win

This week’s opponent – Cincinnati Bengals

Alright,  last week’s game was closer than most people expected, but really being close only counts for a few things in life – horseshoes and hand grenades come to mind.  There were some positives and definitely some negatives, but we aren’t going to hash those out here, so onto the new week.

Making the trip up I-71 is the inter-state rival the Cincinnati Bengals, who are coming off back-to-back victories over Carolina and Baltimore respectively.  The Bengals made some big off-season moves on the offensive side of the ball adding WR Terrell Owens and drafting TE Jermaine Gresham.  However neither one has proved to be the “game changer”  they where advertised to be before the season.  Back though are the usual suspects in QB Carson Palmer, WR Chad Ochocinco, and RB Cedric Benson.  The two latter are having decent seasons to date and should be the Browns main focus when on defense.

On defense the Bengals are getting the job done, outside of week 1 when they faced New England.  Last week against Carolina the Bengals gave up only 267 yards of offense, the week prior against Baltimore they only gave up 259 yards – and won on the golden leg of K Mike Nugent.  Now by no means am I saying that either Baltimore or Carolina have a “staked” or even very good offense, but for the most part the Bengals defense held them.

So how will the Browns win this game, well that’s where I would like to borrow some of the good things from last week’s game.  What a difference a run game make, am I right? Peyton “THUNDERING” Hillis, was magnificent last week, by no means do I expect that every week – but if he can bring 3/4 of that I’ll be happy.  Don’t forget RB Jerome Harrison will be back soon too and those two will compliment each other nicely, at least in theory.  The running game alone won’t make it or break it for us this week, we need to get more involvement in the passing game too.  TE Ben Watson had a nice game, and hopefully can perform like that way week in and week out.  The Browns also need to get more out of the wide-outs though too.  Second year WR Mohamed Massaquoi needs to do a better job of separating from defensive backs and get more open (this also goes for all the other receivers – Massaquoi has just been the worst in my estimation) , hopefully a repeat performance of last year’s game is in store for Mo Mass.  And for the love of God, can RT Tony Pashos get the starting gig for the rest of the year over RT John St. Clair.

Up Next – Atlanta Falcons