4 Takeaways: Cleveland Browns practice featured a struggling passing game
By Randy Gurzi
1. The passing game is slow going
While we already talked about Case Keenum and his struggles in the passing game, the rest of the Browns offense really hasn’t looked a whole lot better when it comes to throwing the ball. Odell Beckham Jr. has been making some circus catches, and Austin Hooper has done well, but overall things just don’t look as sharp as they should outside of those two.
Jake Burns of The OBR pointed the struggles out, although he did have some good news as well. He says despite the struggles in the passing game, the wide zone running game is going to be a problem for defenses — especially with the combination of Nick Chubb and Kareem hunt working together.
While the passing game is inconsistent in camp thus far as timing needs worked out, the Browns offense is definitely looking smooth in their wide zone approach. It is going to be a problem for defenses with these two backs.
— Jake Burns (@jake_burns18) August 22, 2020
Burns also later tweeted that the Browns will eventually get the passing attack together. He pointed to what happened in Minnesota last season when Kevin Stefanski’s system took a while to come together. For those who don’t remember, Kirk Cousins of the Vikings threw just 10 passes in the team’s first game of the year. They won because they’re running game is dominant, but the passing game didn’t look great until roughly midseason.
This isn’t to say that the Browns will take that long for everything to start clicking, but it does mean that there’s no reason to worry even if things don’t seem to be gelling right now.
The defense has made their plays and they’re doing well, but after some time the offense will get it figured out and once they’re on the same page with one another and Stefanski has his system working what he wants, they could be incredibly dangerous.
The best news is the running game is good enough to hold them over until that starts to happen.