Cleveland Browns studs and duds from Week 14 victory over Bengals

Dud: Freddie Kitchens’ play-calling

Freddie Kitchens has received a lot of criticism this season for how he has called the offense. Other than the opening, scripted drives, Kitchens has struggled to create a flow for the offense to move the ball down the field.

One of the biggest criticisms of Kitchens’ play-calling is how he has handled the rushing attack. Although Nick Chubb entered Sunday as the NFL’s leading rusher and at the top of the list in carries, Kitchens has misused the run game. At critical moments of the game, Kitchens will abandon the run game and instead rely on Baker Mayfield‘s arm.

Kitchens once again had a curious game plan for the rushing attack on Sunday. Facing one of the worst run defenses in the NFL, Kitchens only ran the ball with Chubb and Kareem Hunt six times. And the passing attack was struggling while Kitchens decided to not run the ball.

Once Chubb started getting the ball in the second half, he was breaking off chunk play after chunk play. That includes a 57-yard run where Chubb broke multiple tackles and almost finished the play in the end zone.

Despite having the best rusher in the NFL this season, Kitchens does not seem to know how to effectively give the ball to Chubb. Instead of relying on and distributing Chubb’s carries for an entire game, the run game will disappear for multiple drives, causing the offense to stall.

Had the Browns used Chubb and the rushing attack earlier in the game, there is a good chance the offense would have done better moving the ball down the field and building an early lead that could have taken Cincinnati out of the game early.