And then there are the Cleveland Browns.
Oh boy oh boy the Cleveland Browns.
Or the GPODAWUND as I would like to call it.
This has to be a trending hashtag: #GPODAWUND pic.twitter.com/EwiXnDqEKT
— Mike Klauss (@thatmikeklauss) October 30, 2016
A team formed in 1999 after their original iteration moved to Baltimore to become the Ravens. That team would eventually become 2-time Super Bowl champions. Where does that leave for the new one? Well, let’s just say they’re not equally successful as their divisional counterparts. How could this be? Well, if one looks deep as to why this team is not good, then they’ll see a chasm of problems that have nullified any chance of competitiveness. This entails everyone from the front office to the players. Heck, in their first regular season game as the new Browns, they were blown out to smithereens at home to the Pittsburgh Steelers 43-0. That result served as a bad omen for their impending ineptitude. From then on up until the end of last year, the Browns held a record of 88 wins and 216 losses. Clearly, it’s not a good record to look at, but it shows just how bad the Browns have been since their resuscitation.
Obviously, it wasn’t supposed to be this way. Upon the announcement of the Browns’ arrival to the NFL, everyone around the city was buzzing about what this team could do. The energy was ecstatic. The optimism was at a maximum. When the Browns drafted Tim Couch, a quarterback from the University of Kentucky, with the first overall pick in the 1999 NFL Draft, they felt they landed a highly skilled player who would lead them to a bright future. He was the 1998 SEC Player of the Year and a Consensus All-American, so why would they not be excited over his latent abilities. However, they forgot to look for good players outside of the quarterback position, most notably the offensive line. And it was there that the Browns’ flaws were shown as the young starter was sacked 56 times, by far the most for any quarterback that year. Although the resiliency shown by Couch on the field after taking all those hits was certainly valiant, they eventually took a toll as he suffered injuries that essentially sidelined his career in the long run.
The most legit Browns QB jersey out there. #Browns pic.twitter.com/aB7z8fYzYR
— Hayden Grove (@H_Grove) November 25, 2018
As a result of Couch’s exit from Cleveland, the quarterback carousel that the football world would soon come to ridicule miserably began as the team fielded 29 different starters in the position over the years. From names that one would find in a trivia to ex-college darlings to wandering journeymen, the Browns played host to a variety of players. Some would stay for years while others a couple of games. Nonetheless, the list grew and grew. Over this period, Browns fans would rejoice whenever their team signs or drafts a hot-shot player into their ranks. Hype then builds surrounding said player which prompts onlookers to see if he can actually back up the talk behind him. Though some managed to play well in their first few games, they ultimately floundered to nothingness, which prompts the team to cast them off to the abyss, thus repeating the vicious cycle of finding the perfect quarterback for Cleveland. Plus, when a team routinely changes head coaches once every 2 years, things don’t necessarily turn out for the better.
When the Browns drafted Baker Mayfield with the first overall pick in this year’s draft, fans were excited over his potential as a good player. He was a bona-fide star in the University of Oklahoma. He dismantled secondaries at will. His gunslinging form of play earned him numerous collegiate honors that culminated in a Heisman Trophy in 2017. In addition to that, he led the Sooners to 3 Big 12 conference titles and 2 College Football Playoff appearances. He was without a doubt a winner, and his fans treated him as such. But what granted him even more fame—or, in other words, notoriety—was his antics off the field.
His robustious personality gave way for his unapologetic approach towards anyone that came his way. If he offended anyone thanks to his actions, he simply didn’t care. If he’s having a good time doing it, why would he stop? He’s not trying to appease everyone.
Ask Ohio State if he cared when he pierced the “O” logo in the middle of Buckeye Stadium after he defeated the hosts 31-16 in 2017.
Baker Mayfield plants the OU flag in the Ohio State logo at midfield pic.twitter.com/Ovas203PqP
— Bryan Fischer (@BryanDFischer) September 10, 2017
