Baker Mayfield, Freddie Kitchens’ improvements in divisional win encouraging

The Cleveland Browns unexpectedly stale offense has taken a lot of heat to begin the season. But with Baker Mayfield and Freddie Kitchens on the same page again, this season could get fun.

The Cleveland Browns went on the road to play the divisional rival Baltimore Ravens, while staring 1-3 in the face. The Browns have not historically had success at Baltimore and the Ravens were 18-2 at home in September under John Harbaugh coming into this game. With history and a staggering offense against the Browns, this was a game that was going to be tough to win.

Adversity has struck early this season, with the offense stalling, multiple injuries on both sides of the ball, and a 1-2 start. Freddie Kitchens, however, looked forward to this adversity. Kitchens wanted to see if he has players “running towards one another or running away” when adversity hits. He got his answer.

The Browns marched into Baltimore and took care of business. A prior stagnant offense exploded for 530 yards of total offense, 40 points, and ran much smoother than the previous three weeks. After three weeks of criticism, the offense hummed to 40 points, propelled by three turnovers caused by Steve Wilks’ unit. The two most exciting aspects of this win? Baker Mayfield and Freddie Kitchens both had their best weeks of the young season.

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Mayfield was criticized for many things coming into this game. He gets antsy in the pocket, leaves clean pockets, he was fading away when he throws, and his accuracy seemed a bit off. Mayfield came into this game with doubts about who he is as a player by many analysts. In the first three weeks, all the above issues jumped off the screen watching Mayfield play. However, Browns fans should be ecstatic about his Week 4 performance.

Mayfield was hanging in the pocket, stepping into his throws and was accurate. The fading and leaving pockets still happened on a couple of plays, sure, but Mayfield is made gradual progress in this game. He seemed more confident in his line, hanging tough in the pocket and stepping up to throw a dart. Mayfield was surgical against the Ravens zone, and Browns fans can breathe a sigh of relief after watching Mayfield’s main issues get remedied.

Speaking of remedies, Kitchens’ play calling was drastically better than the first couple weeks. Judgments of Kitchens calling long-developing plays, putting too much stress on his below-average tackles, and not getting the ball out of Mayfield’s hand quickly were cast aside after this game.

It had a 2018 feel, with Kitchens calling misdirection runs, pre-snap motion, and quick developing plays, which had the offense running wild. Mayfield had open receivers past the sticks all day and the offensive line executed their jobs very efficiently.

The Cleveland Browns main concerns should have been Baker Mayfield and Freddie Kitchens after last week. Now, the main concern is stacking wins and staying atop the AFC North.