Cleveland Browns: Let’s not judge Baker Mayfield’s ‘revenge’ comments

Did Cleveland Browns quarterback Baker Mayfield really mean to say he wanted “revenge” on Hue Jackson?

Oh, those crazy kids. I feel comfortable calling Baker Mayfield a kid because I’m old enough to be his father.

As a parent of teenagers, one of my constant struggles is the way the English language is misused. One of my favorite comments is:

Me: “(Child) why are you doing that?”

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Child: “Stop judging me Dad?”

Me: “I wasn’t judging you, I was asking a question.”

Child: (eye roll) then back on the electronic device

In a recent article in Pro Football Talk, Baker Mayfield was quoted as saying he wanted to take “revenge” on Hue Jackson. As Cleveland Browns fans remember, Hue Jackson was fired after their Week 8 game against the Steelers. After doing a farewell, “scorched earth” tour with Cleveland and national media, Jackson found a comfortable landing spot with the Browns in-state division rival.

At the time, Mayfield described Jackson as “fake” and has not retreated from those comments. It is evident that the quarterback who is the face of the franchise is just putting a public face on what the team felt behind closed doors.

Still, revenge is a pretty strong word. It implies that Hue did something personal to Baker. He didn’t. What Jackson did was not illegal. It was, perhaps, unethical. It violated one of those “unwritten” rules in sports. But Hue does have a friendship with Marvin Lewis. If anyone should be getting questioned, it’s Lewis.

Plus, with the way the Browns dispatched of the Bengals, it’s hard to say that Jackson provided any critical intelligence that gave the Bengals a competitive advantage.

But Baker is the guy that remembered how Ohio State whooped up on his Sooners in Lincoln. He chewed on that for a year and then made sure he planted a flag in Columbus to celebrate the Sooners turning the table on Ohio State.

That’s revenge. What happened with Hue was not. I think of what Baker did against the Bengals was an example of showing off. And it wasn’t just Baker. It was Freddie Kitchens and Gregg Williams, and every Cleveland Browns player that was underutilized or misused or ignored by Hue Jackson and his system. They set out to show Hue the real potential of the same players that he had piloted to a 2-5-1 record.

So while I may quibble with Baker’s use of the word “revenge”, I’m pretty sure I know what he meant. And I’m all for it. After all, it’s not bragging if you can back it up.