Randomness from today's Browns home game:




















Special Guest: Gale. Jeezy creezy, it's cold today. Let's see if we can make it through this one. This is the first of the final three Browns home games. One next week against the Colts and the Sunday before Christmas against the Bengals.

Today's Opponent: The Houston Texans. The last team to enter the NFL. It seems this series goes like this: We don't play well in Houston and have lost some mind-numbing games there. The quality of play is not much better here, but the Texans always seem to save their worst for these visits. They come into the game with the league's fifth-best offense. Uh-oh. The running game is quite good with Steve Slaton and Ahman Green. The immortal Sage Rosenfels is at QB. The Texans' run defense is awful, but somehow rates several places above the Browns, which shows how bad they are.

Browns Version 2.3, however, is on a winning streak of one game. Once again, it is the dreaded short work week which hasn't treated the Browns very well this year. Brady Quinn comes in with a chip on his index finger. I don't expect that to be an issue, because we should run the ball a lot today. We have a GM who, hopefully, attends today's game, instead of paying attention to his e-mails. And we apparently have a coach-in-waiting ready to purchase a home in Strongsville.

It's the Texans, by God, and this should be easy. I repeat, this should be easy. Jamal Lewis should get over 100 yards today and we all go home deliriously happy, because the Browns are still in the playoff hunt. OK, that's for the delusional fan. You know, the 5:30 a.m. tailgating type. However, the Browns are 0-2 when favored at home and guess what? They are favored today.

Parking: East 6th northbound by the Federal Building. Outstanding.

Browns Player on Ticket: Joe Thomas, bigass arms folded.

Pre-Game Festivities: Walked in as the teams were lining up for kickoff. Sounded as if an opera singer had National Anthem duties.

At halftime, youth football. Baby Braylon, with a sense of irony or was it parody, dropped a pass as he was wide open deep in the secondary.

Worst Feature (For Me): "Hang on Sloopy" at the end of the third quarter. Especially after the U of M was debacled yesterday.

Then, later in the fourth quarter with the game in peril, the Browns decided to do this. During an interminable timeout, they played an organist's rendition of "Here We Go Brownies, Here We Go". Can't remember the last time they played it, but it was as if the white flag was being raised as this went on. And on. I estimate it repeated 20 times. People at Gitmo were confessing as it would not stop, citing waterboarding as less torturous.

The Weather: Hollie Strano on the mike again. No radar. It was a sunny day today with temps topping out around 40, I'd say. Cold, but not brutal.

Today's Giveaway: There wasn't any, as far as I could tell.

Section 345: Nothing happened. This has everything to do with the weather. Less visible opposing jerseys, applause muffled by gloves (my new gloves and hat were up to the test today), less beer drinking (ahem...during the game), and general non-action accounted for no threat of anyone being ejected.

Best Browns Play: OK, I think I found one. It was difficult or maybe it was obvious in a game with only one TD scored between the two teams. But it was the 42-yard pass from Brady Quinn (starring in "Dink 2 Throws Long", er, for one play) to Braylon Edwards in the second quarter to get to the Texans' 19. Of course, Quinn threw three straight passes, two incomplete, immediately thereafter. The Browns settled for a 32-yard field goal for their final score of the game. With 32 minutes of football remaining. Ugh!












Best Texans Play: By default, the Sage Rosenfels to Kevin Walter TD pass on their first drive. Over, as I keep saying, the height-challenged Brandon McDonald. That 8-minute drive to start the game promised a short game, timewise, today.

Worst Browns Play: The benching of Brady Quinn at the end of the third quarter. So unexpected, I didn't even notice Derek Anderson warming up. Let me tell you, it was shocking to see that move live. People gasped like they did at "The Crying Game". It was something to witness.

Second Worst Browns Play: Brady Quinn's second interception, the one that got him benched. An awful pass inside the Texans' 10-yard line. Both of his interceptions today were mystifying.

Worst Texans Play: Houston, who tried desperately to keep the Browns in the game, survived an incredibly bad field goal attempt by Phil Dawson with 7:34 left. They run once. Then inexplicably throw a long incomplete pass on second down. So, on third down, the Texans and Rosenfels, as they do, throw an interception to Sean Jones, who returns it to the Texans' 20. Seemingly strategy stolen from the pathetic Browns. Only, they escaped this one, as Derek Anderson fumbled two plays later.

Best Line from Me (after Quinn got benched): "Maybe it was his injured finger. I don't know, but I bet this finger still works." (as I extended my own middle finger).

Best Line from a Random: A guy, a few rows in front of us, almost had an aneurysm after the Browns failed on a third down, "The Browns Suck!!!". After Dawson kicked the ensuing field goal, he said, "OK, you're right, the Browns are going to the Super Bowl." On the next "Here We Go Brownies", he put his two index fingers to his head and shot himself twice on the appropriate beat.

Oddest Browns Jersey: 31 Bowling Green, 51 Paine were the highlights today.

Food Items: None at Cleveland Browns Stadium. I had a coupon for Great Lakes Brewing and we were going to go there after the game. Uh, who knew they were closed on Sundays? So, we went to Momocho (me with my hat hair) for their Sunday Night Dinner Special. You get chips and two types of salsa. We had the guac and the pico de gallo. We both had Enchiladas Pollo and shared a Vanilla Bean Flan. I loves me some flan. Price was $30. Terrific meal (I almost licked my plate clean) at a great price. Then throw in margaritas and it costs a bit more.

Best Fan Cam Feature: Shirtless man in cold weather. A standard this time of year.

The Fuckin' Run: The Browns gave up only 112 yards rushing today. That might be a season low. Today, they got torched through the air.

Worst Stat: The Browns defense, you know, the unit that breaks your heart all the time, gave up 259 yards today in the first half! I had visions of Denver floating through my head.

2nd Worst Stat: The Browns quarterbacks averaged 4.5 yards per pass attempt, threw no TDs and three interceptions. Quinn's QB rating was 21.3, Anderson's 17.3. Those are so bad, and really hard to comprehend.

Most Interesting Stat: Shaun Rogers, who most fans automatically assume played a solid game, had zero tackles. That's one less than Brady Quinn and Braylon Edwards, who had one each on turnovers.

Penalties: The Browns drive in the middle of the fourth quarter was a comedy of errors. Both the Browns and Texans had three penalties each on the drive. The Texans had 11 for the game, which helped the Browns immensely. It was the Browns best play for a while.

Each Browns season, you think to yourself, it can't get any worse. There's always been a game where you think they have reached the bottom. Two years ago, it was the Cincinnati shutout at home. Last year, it was the opener against the Steelers. Well, today's effort against the Texans was this year's game.

There is absolutely no way the Browns should have lost this game. This was the Houston Texans, the team that had given up the most rushing yards this month in the NFL and had not won a road game in over a year. A game in which they should have run the ball at least 35 times. The Browns ran only 20 times and had a 4.5-yard average. Clearly, this coaching staff has no idea how to prepare a team to win. Time to throw out the theory that many players propose, that this team plays hard for Romeo. Uh, they don't.

































The benching of Quinn and his subsequent quote, "I didn't know I was on such a short leash." surely signals the end for Romeo Crennel. He won't get the boot this week, but he won't be back in 2009. And I'm not on the Quinn bandwagon. Fans are rightfully asking, why did Andersen get to play through some really bad games, Cincinnati immediately comes to mind, and proceed to finish them. As I stated earlier this week, Andersen was pretty mediocre but he was not throwing many interceptions.

That's all I have to go on, that Quinn threw two interceptions today and the Browns had not had to overcome that amount of turnovers in at least two months. That's weak, I know, but I can't find any other reason for Quinn's benching, unless Romeo figured if he was going down in flames, he would prefer to do it with his own guy. It's pretty common knowledge when you make a move to a guy like Quinn, you have to stick with him, you can't go back to the other guy. I still believe Quinn will start, but now he'll be looking over his shoulder, much like Andersen did a month ago. What a mess.

And the crowd really turned today. Chants of "Cowher! Cowher!" were heard loudly in person and on a radio clip I heard. We even had a guy chant "Dorsey! Dorsey! in our section. Next week's Colts game could get ugly. We still have road games at Tennessee, Philadelphia and Pittsburgh. So, if the players quit (for real this time), it's gonna be tough sledding from here on out.

This one was really tough to take. Browns lose, 16-6.

Meal of Links

Let's buy a submarine. For grins. It'll be fun.

The GNR album. Available now.

Unhappy people watch more TV. Not watching "Deal or No Deal" makes me happier, because I yell at my TV less.

Exercise Yard

I sat through the boring Hatton-Malignaggi fight last night. Ricky Hatton winning on a stoppage in the 11th. What an incredibly boring fight. Paulie Malignaggi was on HBO for the first time and many found out what Showtime viewers already knew. He has no punching power and is not as much of a crowd pleaser as he thinks.

The best thing about the fight was Hatton's crowd, as usual.

Visitor

None, a sunny Browns Sunday.