Cleveland Browns: 3 Overreactions after 3 Weeks of play

First Overreaction – The Cleveland Browns have a top defense in the NFL

After a dominant defensive performance against the Justin Fields-led Chicago Bears, this defense looks legit. The unit only allowed 1, yes you read that right, single net passing yard and 46 rushing yards which is the lowest total yardage allowed in franchise history.

Without taking sack yardage into account, the factor that makes the net passing yardage so low, the Bears had a measly 68 yards through the air on 6-of-20 passing from Fields. The Browns secondary held an arguable top-10 receiver in Allen Robinson to a pair of catches for just 27 yards.

The pressure that the defensive line put on the offense was incredible, to say the least. The defense forced nine sacks which is the most by the Cleveland Browns since their 10-sack game against the Pittsburgh Steelers on October 28, 1962.

Browns edge rusher Myles Garrett launched himself to the top of the sack leaderboard with a franchise-record 4.5 sack performance. Garrett now has 5.5 sacks on the season, just ahead of Arizona Cardinals pass rusher Chandler Jones who had held the lead since his 5 sack Week 1 performance against the Titans. Garrett’s monster game broke the Browns single-game record of four which was previously held by Andra Davis since 2003.

Rookie linebacker, Jeremiah Owusu-Koramoah, also had a big game in his second career start. JOK tallied 4 total tackles, a tackle for loss, one QB hit, two pass breakups, and half a sack on only 51 percent of defensive snaps and 59 percent of special teams snaps. After his big game, JOK was a finalist for the Pepsi Rookie of the Week honors for Week 3.

The defense showed out against the Bears and showed that this unit if they can continue to play at that level, makes this team a legitimate Super Bowl contender.