Cleveland Browns (2008 Season)

[OSUBasketballJunkie]

Dispatch

NFL
Bob Hunter commentary: Browns made right move, but far too late

Wednesday, November 5, 2008 3:26 AM
By Bob Hunter


THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH

ASSOCIATED PRESS
Whether Brady Quinn will star or struggle the rest of the way is hard to predict.


When the Cleveland Browns announced they would start Brady Quinn at quarterback Thursday night against Denver, I thought of an e-mail I received from a relative the day after American International Group stock plunged and the company submitted to a government bailout.
"I just found out that (an elderly relative) has a lot of AIG stock," the e-mailer wrote. "Maybe we should try to help her sell it."
Nice sentiment. Smart move. Last week.
That pretty much describes the Browns quarterback situation. The coach, general manager or owner -- whoever the adventuresome swashbuckler is who finally decided to plunge ahead with Quinn against the Broncos -- hung onto that erratic, underperforming Derek Anderson stock too long. He hemmed and hawed and waited until the season was effectively over before finally selling, which is a pretty good indication why the franchise aimlessly drifts and descends like a sinking lifeboat on Lake Erie.

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[osugrad21]

ABJ

Quinn says debut game will be fun Crennel expects quarterback to make most of opportunity
By Marla Ridenour
Beacon Journal sports writer

Published on Thursday, Nov 06, 2008
BEREA: When Notre Dame coach Charlie Weis claimed Brady Quinn was the quarterback most prepared for the NFL in the 2007 draft, Weis never dreamed Quinn would sit on the bench for his first 24 games.
So it's not hard to imagine their conversation Monday after Quinn was named the Browns' starter for tonight's prime-time home matchup against the Denver Broncos.
''He gave me some words of wisdom, as did everyone else, my mom, my dog . . . ,'' Quinn joked.
A fan favorite since the Browns traded for the 22nd overall pick to select him, Quinn will try to rescue a 3-5 Browns team that has failed to live up to expectations. He'll try to spark an offense that ranks 28th in the league and a team that is averaging just 17.8 points per game after ranking eighth offensively and scoring at a 25.1 clip a year ago.
It will be Quinn's first start since Notre Dame's 44-14 loss to JaMarcus Russell-led LSU in the Sugar Bowl following the 2006 season. Calling the signals since the final nine games of his freshman year with the Irish, he went 29-17 there.


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[osugrad21]

CPD

Weis' Irish eyes will be keeping a close watch in Quinn's debut with Browns

by Tony Grossi Wednesday November 05, 2008, 6:57 PM

Michael Conroy/Associated PressIn their time together at Notre Dame, coach Charlie Weis and quarterback Brady Quinn built a close relationship. "I live vicariously only through a couple players," Weis says. "Tommy (Brady is) one and Brady's one."
Browns vs. Broncos, 8 p.m. Thursday, NFL Network and WUAB Ch. 43

For the year-and-a-half it has taken the Browns to turn to Brady Quinn as their next great quarterback hope, Charlie Weis has preached one gospel to his star pupil at Notre Dame. "We talk all the time," the Notre Dame coach said in a telephone conversation on Wednesday. "We've talked the last two nights. Let's just say there have been several conversations like this: 'Wait your turn. Wait your turn. Wait your turn.'"
Quinn's turn comes Thursday night. He makes his NFL starting debut under the lights of Cleveland Browns Stadium, in front of the NFL Network cameras, against the Denver Broncos, one of the great nemeses in Cleveland sports history.
It was the Broncos of a different era that tormented the Browns in the late 1980s. Led by John Elway, the Broncos three times ousted Bernie Kosar's teams in the AFC Championship Game, one victory shy of the Super Bowl.
It's the closest the Browns have come, of course.

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[osugrad21]

CPD

Bud Shaw's Sports Spin: Necessity of Quinn's promotion outweighs its origin

by Bud Shaw Wednesday November 05, 2008, 6:20 PM


Analyzing the Browns' vote for change
Not everyone believes Romeo Crennel made the call to start Brady Quinn Thursday night against Denver.
OK, almost nobody believes it.
In fact, respondents to a recent poll thought it more likely Crennel would be the next runaway winner on "Dancing With The Stars" than believed he pulled the plug on Derek Anderson.
Nationally, the move is surprising only because the country's last peek at Anderson showed him to be more Eli Manning than Eli Manning in a Monday Night dismantling of the Giants. Locally, though, you know better.

Sure, there are many who question whether Romeo Crennel was the main decision-maker when it came to sitting Derek Anderson for Brady Quinn. But it's not like Crennel has never made a dramatic move at quarterback before with the Browns.
The decision to bench Anderson isn't so bold as to cast doubt toward the conservative head coach's active role in it. What's more, Crennel made a far more forceful move not that long ago. Somebody looking strangely like the head coach started Charlie Frye in the 2007 season's first game, agreed to trade him two days later and thus installed the untested Anderson as the starter.

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[osugrad21]

Canton

Quinn gets his shot
Broncos' QB switch has failed so far; others have met with success
Thursday, November 6, 2008
By STEVE DOERSCHUK
[email protected]

CLEVELAND Right before their eyes tonight, the Browns will see one ominous example of changing quarterbacks and getting worse.

But what is suffering to Browns fans? They knew it acutely after those infamous Denver playoff games in the 1980s. Denver also knows something about switching QBs midstream.

Mike Shanahan's bagged Jake Plummer for Jay Cutler with five games left in 2006, when the Broncos were 7-4.

"I really felt at that time that we were as good as we could possibly be offensively with the quarterback that we had," Shanahan said this week, opting not to call Plummer by name. "We were averaging about 20 points a game, and I just felt that for us to get to the next level, Jay would be the guy that could get us there."

Should he mention that the Broncos have gone bust since the change?

They went 2-3 behind Cutler in '06. They were 7-9 in 2007, when the former No. 11 overall pick out of Vanderbilt started all 16 games. They arrive in Cleveland in a 1-4 slump, including a 41-7 loss to the Patriots in their most recent road game.

Maybe "The Snake" wasn't so bad.

Maybe Browns fans don't care. Who among them doesn't want to see Brady Quinn shoot for the stars starting tonight, when he makes a moonlit first NFL start against Denver?

Who among them would rather see Quinn follow the standard example of a team struggling to win with a hyped young quarterback, sometimes for a painfully long while?

Aren't there examples of young quarterbacks who have operated way ahead of the curve
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[osugrad21]

DDN

Broncos' furious rally spoils Quinn's night

First start stellar for the Browns QB, but Denver scores 21 fourth-quarter points to pull out a 34-30 win.


By Tom Withers
Associated Press

Friday, November 07, 2008

Jay Cutler turned Brady Quinn's big night into his own prime-time showcase.
Cutler passed for a career-high 447 yards, throwing three touchdown passes in the fourth quarter Thursday night ? the last an 11-yarder to Brandon Marshall with 1:14 remaining ? to rally the broken Denver Broncos to a 34-30 win over the Cleveland Browns that spoiled Quinn's highly hyped debut as an NFL starter.
The Broncos (5-4) entered the fourth quarter trailing 23-13, but Cutler, borrowing a page out of John Elway's comeback playbook, brought Denver back. He recorded his fifth career fourth-quarter comeback victory despite losing two more running backs to injuries and only having his fullback to carry the ball.
"It was a big, big win for us," Cutler said. "To be down 13 and have an empty backfield and to come back like this, it means a lot."
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[osugrad21]

ABJ

New Guy, Same Result Quinn is solid, but Browns melt against Broncos
By Marla Ridenour
Beacon Journal sports writer

Published on Friday, Nov 07, 2008

CLEVELAND: Until the fourth quarter, the short week didn't matter. Quarterback Brady Quinn's lack of reps with the Browns' first team didn't matter.
The 22nd overall pick in the 2007 draft from Notre Dame, Quinn seemed calm and in control in his NFL debut. But he couldn't make up for his teammates' meltdown in the final 15 minutes as the Browns fell 34-30 to the Denver Broncos on Thursday night.
The Browns (3-6) held a 23-10 lead with 10:21 left in the third quarter. It followed the same script from Sunday, when the team fell 37-27 to the visiting Baltimore Ravens, blowing a 14-point, third-quarter lead.
''A 93-yard touchdown pass should never happen, ever,'' Browns coach Romeo Crennel said. ''Missed tackles, letting them throw balls over our head, tight ends in the middle of

coverage. We didn't make any plays. It's unfortunate, it really is.''
Browns running back Jamal Lewis said the Browns' failures in the past five days left him ''as frustrated as I've been in as many years as I've been playing. . . . I've never seen anything like it in my life. I'm just not cut from this kind of cloth. I play physical football; I come out here and give it my all ? all week.
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[osugrad21]

ABJ

Quarterback can't win game all by himself Quinn does his best, and he does quite well
By Patrick McManamon
Beacon Journal sports columnist

Published on Friday, Nov 07, 2008
CLEVELAND: This city by the lake has the art museum and the orchestra and a football team that week in and week out finds ways to blow a game.
The way the Browns lose has almost become a higher art form than the other cultural icons in the area.
The latest was a Thursday choke job against the Denver Broncos, a 34-30 defeat that saw a 23-10, third-quarter lead frittered away to a stink bomb of a loss.
Consider these facts: Six minutes into the game, Broncos quarterback Jay Cutler had thrown for 120 yards, a 20-yard-per-minute pace. In the fourth quarter, Cutler did better, throwing for 204 yards and three

touchdowns.
Those numbers are mind-boggling.
And on a night when quarterback Brady Quinn had a grand opening as the Browns' starter, the team left the field an embarrassed loser with twice as many defeats as wins for the season.
Can anyone say 2009?
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[osugrad21]

CPD

Browns (again) are defenseless to prevent collapse as Broncos rally, 34-30

by Tony Grossi Thursday November 06, 2008, 11:36 PM

Chuck Crow/The Plain DealerIn what turned into a disastrous night for Browns cornerback Brandon McDonald, he lets a potential interception slip through his fingers during one of the Broncos' three fourth-quarer TD drives Thursday night. It was McDonald's second drop of the game, and he was victimized by two Denver TD passes in the fourth quarter.
CLEVELAND -- All the hoopla surrounding Brady Quinn's NFL starting debut detracted attention from the Browns' crumbling defense. Thursday night, the defense didn't just bend. It snapped like uncooked spaghetti. Denver quarterback Jay Cutler -- playing without the benefit of a tailback the entire second half -- lit up the Browns for 447 passing yards and three touchdowns to wipe out Quinn's rather impressive first game at quarterback.
The Broncos piled up 564 yards and wore down the Browns, 34-30.
The Browns fell to 3-6 in blowing a 23-10 lead four days after blowing a 14-point lead to Baltimore. Both games were on their home field.
Denver, which had only rookie fullback Peyton Hillis available in the second half, secured first place in the AFC West and improved to 5-4.
Cutler picked on Browns cornerback Brandon McDonald much of the night, beating him for a 93-yard touchdown to Eddie Royal and finally one of 11 yards to towering Brandon Marshall for the game-winner with 1:14 to play.
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[osugrad21]

CPD

Slicing and dicing, Cutler ravages Browns defense in furious fourth-quarter onslaught

by Dennis Manoloff Friday November 07, 2008, 12:54 AM

Joshua Gunter/The Plain DealerDenver quarterback Jay Cutler threw for 447 yards Thursday night, but this draw play late in the fourth quarter eluded the grasp of Kamerion Wimbley and the Browns defense and set up the Broncos on the Cleveland 11. Cutler threw a TD pass to Brandon Marshall two plays later for the winning points in the 34-30 victory.
Broncos quarterback Jay Cutler lost two of his running backs to injuries in the first half and still threw for 447 yards Thursday night. Now that takes talent.
Cutler went 24-of-42 and had three touchdowns as the Broncos defeated the Browns, 34-30, in Cleveland Browns Stadium. He was intercepted once.
"Jay threw for 447?" receiver Eddie Royal asked. "Wow. I had no clue it was that much. But I'll tell you what: He's certainly capable of it. He's a great quarterback with a great arm."
Cutler and Royal hooked up on the biggest play of the game. It came on first down from the Denver 7 with 13:43 remaining in the fourth quarter and the Broncos trailing, 23-13.

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[osugrad21]

CPD

Browns Insider: McDonald haunted by Broncos' big plays -- and the ones he didn't make

by Mary Kay Cabot Friday November 07, 2008, 12:42 AM

Joshua Gunter/The Plain DealerBrandon Marshall gathers in what became the winning touchdown catch Thursday night, leaving Browns cornerback Brandon McDonald sprawled on the turf.
Brandon McDonald put his head in his hands and sat facing his locker. An assistant coach came over to console him. When he turned around to speak, he apologized for the Browns' 34-30 loss to Denver.
"I had a horrible night," said McDonald. "I let myself down, I let my team down and I let my family down. I wish I could bring it back, but I can't."
McDonald gave up two touchdown passes and dropped two interceptions. He surrendered an 11-yard TD pass to Brandon Marshall with 1:14 left that produced the final margin and 93-yard catch and run by Eddie Royal that pulled Denver to within 23-20 earlier in the fourth quarter.
He also dropped an would-be pick on a pass intended for Royal with 12:26 left in the game. The Broncos went on to score a touchdown on that drive.

"I want to apologize to the fans and to the team for the performance I put in," said McDonald. "I wish I could take some of those plays back, but I can't."
McDonald said he slipped on the 11-yard TD to Marshall near the end. The Broncos ran the same play two times in a row, but he had tight coverage the first time.

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[osugrad21]

CPD

Tony Grossi's edge for Browns-Broncos

by Tony Grossi Friday November 07, 2008, 12:08 AM


Offense: If Brandon Marshall had not dropped three passes, Jay Cutler would have thrown for over 500 yards and four touchdowns. As it was, 447 and three were enough. Since when does not having a tailback work to an offense's advantage? Brady Quinn was good in his debut, though he found Braylon Edwards only one time for a 15-yard pass. EDGE: Broncos.
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[osugrad21]

CPD

Bright start for Winslow ends bleakly with fourth-quarter errors

by Mary Kay Cabot Thursday November 06, 2008, 11:57 PM

Joshua Gunter/The Plain DealerDenver's Jamie Winborn can begin the post-game celebration a minute early as Kellen Winslow walks away after dropping Brady Quinn's fourth-down pass to end the Browns' last chance Thursday night.
CLEVELAND -- Kellen Winslow blamed himself for letting the last pass of the game slip right through his Pro Bowl hands. "I can't get that last play out of my head," he said. "The great ones make that catch and that's what I want to be. I let my team down."
With 54 seconds remaining, the Browns trailing, 34-30, and facing a fourth and 1 at their 42, Brady Quinn fired a pass to Winslow in the left flat and it sailed right through his hands. End of game.
Never mind that Winslow caught 10 passes for 111 yards and two touchdowns, a 5-yarder and a 16-yarder. He also fumbled in the fourth quarter to set up a Denver touchdown that put the Broncos up, 27-23, with 9:50 remaining.
"Dre Bly just made a great play on the ball," said Winslow. "I was trying to protect the ball and get extra yardage. I knew it was going to cost us, and it did."

Winslow redeemed himself some on the next drive when his 30-yard catch and run took the ball to the Denver 24. The catch led to a Jamal Lewis touchdown run that put the Browns back up, 30-27.
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[osugrad21]

CPD

Quinn's impressive debut can't overcome another example of '08 Browns failure

by Bud Shaw Thursday November 06, 2008, 11:49 PM


Supposedly, the definition of Irish luck was that Brady Quinn got to face the Denver defense.
The tallest clover, we know now, would have been getting to face his own.
Starting Quinn in a short week wasn't a risk after all. It was prescient head start on a quarterback-in-training program, the kind that often dot landscapes of barren NFL seasons.
Quinn had already proven he deserved the rest of this season's starts based on his performance Thursday night -- leading scoring drives on five consecutive possessions with frequent assists from Josh Cribbs. Now, though, after this mess of a loss to Denver left them 3-6, there's not a single reason for the Browns to reconsider even if he backslides.
"The kid did a nice job," head coach-for-now Romeo Crennel said after the 34-30 defeat.

Yep. In fact, the only disappointment concerning Quinn was the means of his arrival to his NFL debut. It did not entail a white steed or a maritime-themed entrance on a Viking ship. Gentleman's Quarterly will have to stage that for itself some day.

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[osugrad21]

CPD

Final: Broncos 34, Browns 30

by Dennis Manoloff Thursday November 06, 2008, 11:23 PM


What happened: Jay Cutler connected with Eddie Royal on a 93-yard pass to pull Denver within, 23-20, with 13:30 remaining. Broncos took 27-23 lead on Cutler's 28-yard pass to Daniel Graham with 9:50 left. ... Jamal Lewis scored from 1 yard to give Browns a 30-27 lead with 4:57 remaining. ... Cutler found Brandon Marshall from 11 yards to give Denver a 34-30 lead with 1:14 left.
Browns nuggets: On third-and-6 to open quarter, Kellen Winslow Jr.'s interference penalty nullified Brady Quinn's completion to Braylon Edwards that would have gotten the first down. ... Dave Zastudil pinned Broncos at 7 with 13:43 left. ... Shaun Rogers returned early in quarter. ... Cribbs had 43-yard kickoff return after Royal's TD. ... Kellen Winslow caught 8-yard pass on third-and-6 from Denver 46 at 12:48, but he fumbled. ... Brandon McDonald narrowly missed a pick at 12:26. ... Kamerion Wimbley sacked Cutler at Cleveland 46 with 11:40 left. ... At 8:25, Winslow turned short pass into 30-yard gain to Denver 24. With seven minutes left, Quinn avoided pressure and dumped to Jamal Lewis for 18 yards to Denver 6. ... Lewis's second effort picked up the TD with 4:57 left; Denver challenged the
call that he scored, to no avail. ... D'Qwell Jackson narrowly missed pick off tipped pass with five minutes left. ... Willie McGinest broke up pass itended for Nate Jackson at 4:29. A completion would have resulted in first down in Cleveland territory. ... Winslow dropped a fourth-down pass with less than one minute left.
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