Cleveland Browns Flashback Friday: Paul Brown returns to Cleveland, 1970

Paul Brown was the face of the Cleveland Browns for several years, but he had to face his old team in 1970 when he returned with the expansion team Cincinnati Bengals.

The merger of the National Football League (NFL) and the American Football League (AFL) led to Paul Brown bringing his Cincinnati Bengals expansion team to Cleveland in Week 4 of the 1970 season to play the Cleveland Browns.

When I was growing up in Berea, Ohio, I was too young to remember the incredible Browns teams of the 1940s and 1950s. But I read about how head coach Paul Brown started the team in the All-American Football Conference and won all four championships that the league ever had. Then the team came to the NFL and continued to win championships.

At the same time, the players seemed to be always quality individuals, like Lou Groza, who lived in our town and was universally respected and loved. So how could the man who started this incredible team get fired by Art Modell? Just who the heck was Art Modell?

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The firing of Paul Brown rocked not only my little world, but the Ohio football universe. Paul Brown was not just a coach, but the greatest of all-time. Later, I came to understand that it wasn’t just about football. There were millions of dollars involved. The previous owners of the Browns had an understanding with Brown that he would have an increasing ownership role of the franchise. Not everything was in writing, and thus it is hard to say how much obligation Modell and the team had to its only coach. Even today we may not know the full story, but in order for Modell to get out from under that commitment, he felt that he needed to fire Brown.

Brown felt that the team was stolen from him and that Modell had broken promises worth millions of dollars. Brown took it very hard, and never forgave Modell. In fact, Brown did not merely dislike Modell, he exuded hate for Modell from every pore of his body.

By 1968, the temptation to get back in the game had become too strong. Rather than taking a ready-made job in the NFL, he would become coach and owner of an expansion team in Cincinnati. He would redo what he had done in Cleveland. Hence the Cincinnati Bengals were born in 1968.

In Cleveland, nobody that I knew was upset there was a new Ohio team in the AFL. It was more like, hey great! Our former coach has a new team! Twice as much football for us! We loved Paul Brown, so there was no need to choose between the Bengals and Browns until the two leagues merged.

In addition, Modell was riding high in Cleveland. Aided by his new coach, Blanton Collier, the Browns ascended to the World Championship in 1964 and they made it to the title game four more times in the next five years.

However, 1970 was the first year of the new NFL, formed by the merger of the old NFL with the American Football League. The Browns would be in the AFC Central with Cincinnati, and Paul Brown would have his opportunity for revenge against Modell twice a year.

Nobody really knew how the two leagues compared. The prevailing view was that the AFL was made up of a bunch of amateurs, but then they won Super Bowls III and IV by convincing margins. Suddenly the NFL realized that the AFL guys knew something. Coordinators went into the film room to learn about the bump and run, zone coverages, seven-man blitzes and hot reads to pick up the blitz.

Still, the Bengals were just in the third year of their existence. How good could a minor league expansion team be? Well, pretty good, it turned out. The two teams met in Cleveland Municipal Stadium on October 11, 1970 before a packed house of 83,520 screaming maniacs.

The Bengals got off to a scary good start. Quarterback Virgil Carter hit on his first nine pass attempts. German soccer-style kicker Horst Muhlmann connected for three points to open the scoring, and the Bengals extended their lead to 10-0.

The Browns first points were scored on defense as defensive tackle Walter Johnson bullied his way through the Cincinnati offensive line to sack Carter in the end zone for a safety.

Browns halfback Leroy Kelly was playing on a sprained ankle, but nevertheless took a three-yard pass from Browns quarterback Bill Nelsen to score the Browns first touchdown. However, the Bengals were able to extend their lead again by sacking Nelsen and causing him to fumble. Royce Berry scooped up the ball and 58 yards later, he was in the end zone.

The Browns were able to retaliate with a brilliant 55-yard screen pass from Nelsen to Kelly, capped by a four-yard touchdown pass to Milt Morin and conversion by Don Cockroft which allowed the Browns to close to 17-16.

In the third quarter, the Browns moved the ball to midfield, but the drive self-destructed when Nelsen tried to throw a bomb to Fair Hooker. Kenny Graham of the Bengals jumped the route and took the ball back 31 yards.

After a Muhlmann field goal, Nelsen and the Browns drove again. Kelly pounded the rock into the end zone to pull ahead 23-20. Later, fullback Bo Scott added another rushing touchdown after an interception by Erich Barnes, who returned it to the six-yard line. A few plays later, Scott hammered the ball into the end zone behind Gene Hickerson and Joe Taffoni, to extend the lead to 30-20.

The Bengals then drove down the field, with Carter connecting to Speedy Thomas to pull within three, but Nelsen and the Browns were able to grind it out until only a few seconds remained on the clock, hanging on for a 30-27 win.

The Browns won the game because they controlled the line of scrimmage. Although Bengals quarterback Virgil Carter was impressive with 20 completions on 28 attempts, the Browns sacked him five times for 36 yards.

The Browns also shut down the running game, holding the Bengals to only 54 yards. Meanwhile, led by Kelly and Scott, the Browns piled up 130 yards on the ground.

After the game, there was no handshake between Brown, and his former protege, Collier. The fans booed as they saw Brown heading to the dressing room to avoid having to shake Collier’s hand.

Modell was presented with a game ball in the locker room. That little move probably gave Brown a bad case of the hives.

But though the Browns had won the game, it was clear that the Bengals were way better than an expansion team should be. In fact, that year the Bengals righted themselves mid-season and won seven games in a row (including a victory over the Browns) to win the first AFC Central Division Championship.

Next. Baker Mayfield will make history on Sunday. dark

The Browns would falter, finishing at 7-7, in second place behind their former coach and the new Cincinnati Bengals.

From then on, it was a rivalry.

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