Baker Mayfield has started a Browns civil war

If you made it to this point that means you didn’t just get mad at a headline and leave a hateful comment on the post – so you deserve a pat on the back. Let’s check out how Baker Mayfield is exciting a Browns civil war.

The Cleveland Browns fan base has touted itself as one of the best in the NFL and fans have endeared themselves as the most loyal and patient group of people maybe on the face of the earth. However, their patience has come to an end.

Cleveland fans have experienced awful football for the better part of the past two decades since the Browns have been back in Cleveland. It has bonded them and given them an “us against the world’” mentality.

Then along came Baker Mayfield, a player who has also been doubted and has the same underdog mentality as the fans in the city he was drafted to.

Mayfield helped bring Cleveland its first 11-win season and first playoff berth in almost 20 years. Most fans were enamored with Baker and had even crowned him the new king of Cleveland.

Baker has also had his struggles in Cleveland and has created another group of fans who don’t believe he’s the quarterback who can lead the franchise where every team strives to be – in the Super Bowl.

So Browns fans are now either on the “Baker is our guy” side, or the “Baker Mayfield is holding the Browns back” side. The once tightly bonded fan base is now torn into two sides.

Like most things in life, walking down the middle gets you brushed under the rug. You’re either on one side or the other and that’s where this fan base is with Baker Mayfield. It’s caused a civil war between Browns backers and has seemingly turned them against one another. It could be buddies arguing in a bar or two mobs going at each other online.

How is it possible is that one player could cause this and even more importantly how does this civil war end?

The main reason the Browns fan base is divided on Mayfield and each other goes back to the Browns awful quarterback history. Fans have seen names like Charlie Frye, Brandon Weeden, Johnny Manziel, DeShone Kizer, and so many more come through their city and take their team absolutely nowhere.

Browns fans have been the laughing stock of the league and the butt of every meme account on Twitter for as long as Twitter has been a thing.

Baker came to the Browns and they started acquiring other talented players to play with him and they achieved things some Browns fans had never seen in their lifetimes. These fans don’t want to go back to the times before Mayfield (the pre-B.M. era?). Fans are scared and scarred from the last 20 years and rightfully so.

The unknown is almost worse to fans than the known commodity that is Baker Mayfield. Fans of other teams say that Browns fans should “just be grateful Baker isn’t Johnny Manziel,” or that “remember when you were 0-16, just be happy.”

Not only are those awful reasons to accept average to below-average quarterback play, but it’s also a loser’s mentality. Browns fans have to get out of their own fears of being bad again or they’re destined to be stuck in average. Browns fans have just as much of a right to have a great team and quarterback as any other team in the NFL. Because Cleveland hasn’t been good in the past doesn’t disqualify them from being able to have a great team now.

“It could be so much worse’” has to stop being used within the fan base and has to stop being used against the fan base from the outside.

Baker is a fourth-year quarterback who hasn’t really improved since he’s come into the league. His inconsistency has driven fans and analysts mad. Mayfield’s a roller coaster of a quarterback who has had more drops than climbs, unfortunately. The waiting around for Mayfield to turn the corner wait may be over.

Do fans want to watch their team hoist the Lombardi or watch them get bounced by a dynamic team in the playoffs every couple of years like the Andy Dalton-led Bengals?

Wherever fans come down on Baker Mayfield, the player shouldn’t matter in this civil war. Most Browns fans just want the team to win and they’re divided on who best can lead them to those wins.

This civil war is about not settling out of fear of being bad again. Be afraid to be average Browns fans, don’t be afraid to be great.