The 2-5 Cleveland Browns head to Denver desperate for a victory. The 2-6 Broncos are a good opponent to play as a talented but tumultuous team like Cleveland.
Denver will start Brandon Allen at quarterback after Joe Flacco’s neck injury. It will be Allen’s first career snaps in the NFL. The Broncos, like the Browns, feature a rookie head coach who isn’t exactly proving to be an immediate asset. Last year’s top-5 pick, EDGE Bradley Chubb, is on injured reserve.
Opportunity doesn’t present itself so fortuitously very often. If the Browns want to take advantage of a chance to pick up a conference road win and interject themselves back into the AFC playoff race, they need to do at least three of these four things well.
Get out front quickly
Getting out to a quick lead would be a great way for the Browns to seize this game.
The Broncos are ill-equipped to pull off a comeback even when Joe Flacco was healthy as the starting quarterback. They’re a run-centric offense that lacks explosiveness and struggles to score. Denver has topped 16 points just twice in eight games, and they lost their highest-scoring game, falling 26-24 to Jacksonville on a last-second Josh Lambo field goal.
Now factor in a quarterback making his first NFL start. Heck, Brandon Allen will be throwing his first NFL pass. He’ll be facing NFL sack leader Myles Garrett, quietly forceful Olivier Vernon and a Browns defense that’s fifth in sack percentage and near the top in QB pressures. Denver’s offensive line is one of the worst at pass protection and ranks 28th in sack percentage (dropbacks per sack).
If the Browns offense — or special teams — can build a quick 10-lead, it would be very difficult for this Broncos team to rally.
Stop the (expletive) penalties
The lack of discipline has been bloody frustrating to watch. There are so many flipping pre-snap penalties, reflections of a lack of attention to detail and focus among Browns players on both sides of the ball.
Unnecessary bleeping penalties like this one on Adarius Taylor are plaguing the effort to win. Stop committing penalties completely irrelevant to the play at hand, please:
Coach Kitchens continually repeats his mantra, “We do not practice penalties.” Maybe they should…if only so they know what the heck they’re doing wrong. Stopping the cursed penalty plague in Denver would be a great way to lower blood pressures and reduce objects being flung in angry frustration at televisions across Northeast Ohio.
Get Odell Beckham Jr. more involved
Beckham has not had the kind of start anyone expected. That includes Beckham himself. It doesn’t mean that he’s lost any of the qualities that made him one of the NFL’s most productive and dangerous weapons during his Giants tenure.
He’s had two games topping 100 receiving yards. Denver’s pass defense is solid, and Beckham will likely spend most of the day going against top CB Chris Harris. He’s a good cover man, a four-time Pro Bowler and he confidently wants the assignment to battle Beckham.
These are the kinds of situations where a superstar talent like Beckham can stand out. He proved it time and again in his New York years. He’s your best and he can beat your best. Get him a couple of quick catches, show the Broncos he’s an integral part of the gameplan, and then exploit the extra defense they pay to Beckham and hit back with Jarvis Landry, Rashard Higgins and Ricky Seals-Jones.
Have the better rookie coach
Denver is struggling in its first season with a rookie head coach of its own in Vic Fangio. A defensive guru with an impressive résumé as a coordinator, the transition to head coach for the first time in his life has not gone smoothly for Fangio.
Specifically, Fangio was called out in last week’s postgame press conference by quarterback Joe Flacco for coaching afraid and lacking aggression. The offense is simplistic and predictable, running on first down far more than the league average. They throw on third down at an almost unhealthy rate; Denver has run the ball just 14 times on third down all season.
It’s a similar story to the Freddie Kitchens experience in Cleveland, albeit with much different pages in the book. The rookie coaching curve is real. This is the first game where the Kitchens Browns play another team helmed by a rookie coach. This is one Kitchens can win with a smart gameplan, attention to detail and creativity on the sidelines.
