BEREA, Ohio _ Browns left tackle Joe Thomas giggled and switched into professional wrestling mode when he heard about Buffalo Bills nose tackle Marcell Dareus guaranteeing a triumph Sunday in Orchard Park, N.Y.
"I hate that guy! Gonna kill him!," Thomas yelled Wednesday with a smile.
"That's great," Thomas continued after cracking his joke. "The mindset we're going to have is just the same way. We're going to make them the team we break the streak on, so I think that's, as a football player, our competitive nature, that's the way we train ourselves to think every single week because you want to go in on that Sunday expecting to win."
Dareus told the Buffalo News the Bills (6-7) simply wouldn't lose to the Browns (0-13).
"That's just a guarantee," Dareus said. "We ain't gonna be that team. We're not going to be the team that busts (the Browns' losing streak).
"Nobody in the league wants that to happen (to them), no."
Normally really good teams have a target on their backs and can always count on getting their opponent's best shot.
But the Browns, who have lost 16 consecutive games, have a target on their backs because no opponent wants the embarrassment of falling to a winless team.
"That's one of the challenges when you go this long without winning a game," Thomas said. "You've gone from maybe a team that other teams are going to overlook to the team that you're definitely not going to get overlooked because teams don't want to be the team that lost to you, and they are going to circle that game.
"They are going to elevate their emotions and their preparations almost like it is a playoff game, so that makes it tougher to get that first win. But that's OK. That's the challenge we've put ourselves in, and we've accepted it and we're going to do what we can to win on Sunday."
Browns quarterback Robert Griffin III agreed.
"No one wants to be that team that gets beat by us because we don't have any wins right now, and everyone knows it," Griffin said. "No one is just going to walk out there on the field and give us a win and say, 'Here you go. We feel sorry for you. We will give you guys a win.'
"Everyone is trying to kick us while we are down, so we are going to have to go take it. We are going to get everybody's best shot because nobody wants to lose to us. It is just a matter of us going out and putting a full game together."
