Sunday, October 18, 2009
It's Not Mangini - It's the Talent (or lackthereof)
First, after reading many of the postings today on the cleveland.com Browns forum, I have to shake my head in disgust that so many Cleveland fans seem genuinely angry that we lost today. Frustrated, fine. But angry? You're being ridiculous. Going into this game, did you think we'd win? No. Sure we're all frustrated, so let's talk about the foundation of the Browns' problems - talent. Or more specifically, the lackthereof.
In this league, it's the players that make the difference. Coaching can make a bit of a difference here and there, but it's the players who really determine wins and losses. And we simply don't have the players. As much as it hurts, we have to go back to the birth of the new Browns and look at our awful drafting. Couch, The Quiet Storm, Big Money, William Green, and Jeff Faine should all still be stalwarts for this team. Tack on other significant free agent and high picks like Brady Quinn, LeCharles Bentley, and Gary Baxter, and suddenly we've already lost out on double figure starters. So already at the start, our foundation is gone. Which leads to...
Savage drafted well in terms of players. Kam, K2, Braylon, Joe T, D'Qwell, and Eric Wright were great picks in terms of talent. As much as we slam K2 and Braylon, in our great 2007 season those two combined for 170 catches and 23 TD's. And we also had Jurevicious thriving well too. So just like we're missing 225 catches and nearly 30 touchdowns of production. So we rebuild again.
What worries me the most now is that Mangini, while trying to install "his way" (which I think will eventually be the right way) is playing with C- players. Other than Elam and maybe Barton, all the other guys he's brought in from the Jets are average at best. Why play Bowens, Mosely, Coleman, Poteat, etc. when we could start to get some experience for youngsters like Francies, Veikune, Maiava, and Robiskie? Obviously we're in the midst of a lost season, so why not just throw our picks into the fire? Unless, of course, Robiskie, Veikune, Francies, and Maiava are already clearly busts. Which is scary when we need our 2nd and 3rd round picks to step up. I don't know the contract status of the many of the ex-Jets on our roster, but I can only hope many of them expire at the end of this season. Clearly the current Jets aren't missing these guys, and only Barton and Elam seem capable of helping us (and Barton is only via leadership, not actual play).
It's scary that Mack and Massaquoi look to be our only producers from the 2009 draft. Who cares if we have 11 picks in next year's draft if 8 of them are in the 4th-7th rounds? We don't need 8 more average, untested players on our roster. We need to get playmakers. We only have about 10 guys who can compete at this level, and until the roster is overhauled - with TALENT - no coach, whether it's Mangini, Tom Landry, Bill Walsh, or Mike Shanahan could win with this team. Maybe Josh Cribbs can clone himself...
In this league, it's the players that make the difference. Coaching can make a bit of a difference here and there, but it's the players who really determine wins and losses. And we simply don't have the players. As much as it hurts, we have to go back to the birth of the new Browns and look at our awful drafting. Couch, The Quiet Storm, Big Money, William Green, and Jeff Faine should all still be stalwarts for this team. Tack on other significant free agent and high picks like Brady Quinn, LeCharles Bentley, and Gary Baxter, and suddenly we've already lost out on double figure starters. So already at the start, our foundation is gone. Which leads to...
Savage drafted well in terms of players. Kam, K2, Braylon, Joe T, D'Qwell, and Eric Wright were great picks in terms of talent. As much as we slam K2 and Braylon, in our great 2007 season those two combined for 170 catches and 23 TD's. And we also had Jurevicious thriving well too. So just like we're missing 225 catches and nearly 30 touchdowns of production. So we rebuild again.
What worries me the most now is that Mangini, while trying to install "his way" (which I think will eventually be the right way) is playing with C- players. Other than Elam and maybe Barton, all the other guys he's brought in from the Jets are average at best. Why play Bowens, Mosely, Coleman, Poteat, etc. when we could start to get some experience for youngsters like Francies, Veikune, Maiava, and Robiskie? Obviously we're in the midst of a lost season, so why not just throw our picks into the fire? Unless, of course, Robiskie, Veikune, Francies, and Maiava are already clearly busts. Which is scary when we need our 2nd and 3rd round picks to step up. I don't know the contract status of the many of the ex-Jets on our roster, but I can only hope many of them expire at the end of this season. Clearly the current Jets aren't missing these guys, and only Barton and Elam seem capable of helping us (and Barton is only via leadership, not actual play).
It's scary that Mack and Massaquoi look to be our only producers from the 2009 draft. Who cares if we have 11 picks in next year's draft if 8 of them are in the 4th-7th rounds? We don't need 8 more average, untested players on our roster. We need to get playmakers. We only have about 10 guys who can compete at this level, and until the roster is overhauled - with TALENT - no coach, whether it's Mangini, Tom Landry, Bill Walsh, or Mike Shanahan could win with this team. Maybe Josh Cribbs can clone himself...
Subscribe to Posts [Atom]
