Cleveland Browns drop finale to Steelers: 3 takeaways from another loss
By Thomas Moore
The Cleveland Browns finished another disappointing season with a loss to the Pittsburgh Steelers. Here are three takeaways from the defeat.
In as predictable a result as any Browns fan could have imagined, the Cleveland Browns dropped their season finale to the Pittsburgh Steelers on Sunday at FirstEnergy Stadium.
The game was the sixth time in the past eight seasons that the Browns faced the Steelers in the final game and, no surprise again, the Browns have lost each and every one.
The Browns close out the 2015 NFL season with a record of 3-13 – the team’s 11th double-digit loss season in the past 13 years.
Here are three takeaways – one for every win put up by the Browns this season – from the loss.
Joe Thomas has had enough of Johnny Manziel
Left tackle Joe Thomas – who has often been the lone bright spot for the Browns since 2007 – did not hold back when asked about quarterback Johnny Manziel, who was nowhere to be found on Sunday following reports that he was in Las Vegas on Saturday night and missed his Sunday morning appointment with team doctors.
“If that’s a true report, (it’s) obvious for him some things are more important than football and being a starting quarterback and that’s something that probably needs to be addressed in the off-season,” Thomas said in published reports. “(You want to see) a commitment to the game, that’s the biggest thing. I just want to know the Cleveland Browns are the most important thing in that person’s life.”
Hopefully someone in the Browns restructured front office is listening.
Gary Barnidge hits the mark, Travis Benjamin falls short
Tight end Gary Barnidge closed out one of the most unexpected years in franchise history by catching eight passes for 66 yards, pushing him past the 1,000-yard mark for the season.
Barnidge becomes just the 10th different player and third tight end in Browns history to go past 1,000 receiving yards in a single season. He finishes the year at the top of the team’s receiving list with 79 receptions for 1,043 yards and nine touchdown receptions. That is the ninth-most receptions, eighth-most receiving yards and eight-most touchdown receptions in a single season in franchise history.
Wide receiver Travis Benjamin just came up short in his quest for 1,000 yards, finishing the season with 68 receptions for 966 yards.
Benjamin seemed like a lock for 1,000 yards with five games remaining, but he only totaled 140 yards once Josh McCown was replaced at quarterback by Johnny Manziel and Austin Davis.
Still not a bad way to finish a contract year for Benjamin.
Mike Pettine takes the high road – for now
With speculation running rampant that head coach Mike Pettine had coached his last game for the Browns, it would have been easy for Pettine to let loose in his post-game press conference.
But Pettine took the high road in reflecting on his time in Cleveland.
“I feel like we’ve done a lot of good things, but I’m the first one to tell you – you’ve heard me say it a million times – this is a pass/fail league, and the results aren’t there,” Pettine said. “Nobody wants to hear it takes time. Nobody wants to hear it’s a process, but that’s the situation that we’re in. I feel there’s a good, young nucleus here. You don’t have to look any further than this past draft class. Especially as the year went on, a lot of those guys playing at a high level.
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“I was dead focused on the Steelers this week. Now that it is over, I am going to at some point tonight have an adult beverage of my choice and see where it goes. I just don’t get wrapped up into that. As I said, we preach to our players, control what you can control. Worry about the things you have control over. Staff wise, we are in that same boat.”
And what about having to deal with the Johnny Manziel experience for the past two seasons?
“(Manziel’s) issues have been well documented. You say, mess. Can I say, work in progress? If you look at our season and what I just said, we have gotten great production and some damn good leadership from that room. That started with the signing of Josh McCown. He has been outstanding. He was our starter. He got hurt, Johnny stepped in and I thought Austin (Davis) did some good things, too, under some tough circumstances.
“I get it, but I am not going to sit here and use an excuse that just because we drafted a quarterback high and he is maybe not where he ideally should be that it was the downfall of what happened here or that was the reason.”
Things didn’t work out for Pettine in Cleveland – and it is getting harder and harder to remember when it did work out for the Browns – but hopefully he’s right about the team having a “good, young nucleus” in place.