Cleveland Browns: Johnny Manziel should apologize, not point fingers

Rather than placing any blame at all on the Cleveland Browns, Johnny Manziel should be apologizing to the only team in the NFL that’s ever believed in him

Former Cleveland Browns first-round pick Johnny Manziel continues his journey at making an NFL comeback. For what it’s worth, the bust of a player is handling most things correctly in his attempt.

Manziel is going through the Spring League in which he’s humbled himself in an attempt to gain attention for his play. He’s also said he will play in the CFL if neccessary and admitted that he chose partying over football — which of course we all already saw so that’s really like admitting the sky is blue.

All of that is great, but there’s one huge hole in Manziel’s attempt to clear his name, he won’t admit that he completely screwed the Cleveland Browns.

Not only will he not come out and apologize for setting the franchise back, but Manziel recently went on the Dan Patrick show and deflected some of that blame he had been taking and put it on the Browns. He made the following asinine comment that the Browns have some blame for believing in him.

"“If Cleveland did any of their homework they would have known I wasn’t a guy who came in every day and watch film. I wasn’t a guy who really knew the X’s and O’s of football.” — Manziel on the Dan Patrick Show via Andrew Perloff"

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That’s just ridiculous. Manziel wasn’t exactly forthcoming about his desires to never try. In fact, he went all-in on trying to convince teams he was all about being the best just ahead of the draft as he tried to prove he was the X’s and O’s guy he now claims he never was.

The error in his statement is perhaps summed up best by Mike Florio of Pro Football Talk in the following quote from his take on Johnny Football’s trip to the DP Show.

"“How is the phrase “if Cleveland did any of their homework” anything other than a slap at Cleveland for not figuring out that Manziel was lying to them? Does anyone think that Manziel, when meeting with the Browns (or anyone else) in the pre-draft process said, “I’m not a guy who came in every day and watched film” and “I’m not a guy who really knows the X’s and O’s of football”? He surely said the opposite, which definitely means he was saying what he needed to say in order to get drafted as high as possible.” — Florio, Pro Football Talk"

Florio is dead-on with his assessment. Many teams passed on Manziel and felt he was a waste of time. The Browns, however foolish they may have been, believed in the kid out of Texas A&M and he failed them in the worst way.

Since being released by the Browns, Manziel has seen his life spin out of control, but thankfully he’s on the way back up again. No matter what anyone’s feelings are about a person on the field, no one should take joy out of watching a young man struggle like he has. Here’s to hoping he stays on the straight and narrow and gets himself back on track for the long haul.

Next: PFF mock draft may not please some Browns fans

However, it would be nice to see him apologize to the one and only team to ever show him he mattered rather than hear him tarnish them. That could go a long way towards helping him restore his image as well, because surely other teams see how quickly he threw the Browns in front of a moving bus.

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