Cleveland Browns vs. Bengals a Top-10 all-time rivalry

Dan Parzych of NFL Spin Zone released his top-30 NFL rivalries of all-time and the Cleveland Browns made the list three times including the top-10 for their in-state battle with the Cincinnati Bengals

Cleveland Browns fans understand just how important their team is to the history of the NFL. Then again, the league gets it as well. That’s why they made sure that the Browns stayed in Cleveland, even though the worst owner in sport’s history — Art Modell — took them to Baltimore to become the Ravens.

We also see how much hype they can generate when they’re a competitive team. Last season, the Browns improved from a 0-16 franchise to a 7-8-1 club and everyone took notice. Their 5-3 finish has them becoming a new ‘destination team‘, with free agents signing and rookies asking to be drafted by them.

What’s crazy is, even though they haven’t been great since returning to the league, they still have generated enough buzz to have been mentioned three times in a recent piece ranking the 30 greatest rivalries of all-time.

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Dan Parzych of NFL Spin Zone released the rankings and had the Browns and Ravens rivalry coming in at No. 23 as well as their battles with the Pittsburgh Steelers falling in the middle of the pack at No. 15.

However, it was their in-state rivalry with the Cincinnati Bengals that came in as the 10th greatest of all-time.

"“In-state rivalries playing in the same conference are always fun to watch, but the Cleveland Browns and Cincinnati Bengals are fortunate enough to play in the same division as well.From a contender standpoint, these two teams don’t exactly stand out like some of the other teams in the AFC, but their meetings always seem to be intense each time they battle during the regular season.” —  Parzych, NFL Spin Zone"

Parzych does go into detail on the drama from last season, which surely helped the rankings. After Cleveland fired head coach Hue Jackson, the Bengals brought him in to be a special assistant to the head coach. Jackson, who was a former offensive coordinator in Cincy, was there to help the defense this time — and we all know it was due to the Browns being on the schedule two more times that season.

Cleveland ended up winning both games and embarrassed Jackson along the way. Of course, it led to some criticism of Baker Mayfield because he wouldn’t hug Hue. (Fear not, we at Dawg Pound Daily started a ‘Hugs for Hue‘ campaign to make up for Baker’s shortcoming in this area).

The Browns continue to improve under the leadership of John Dorsey, so it wouldn’t be surprising to see these rivalries become even more popular. Especially if they can knock Baltimore out of top spot this season in the AFC North and prevent Pittsburgh from reclaiming the crown as well.