Cleveland Browns 2022 off-season thread

[Jscc]

I've been a die hard Browns fan for 60 years. No more. And to those that pound their puds to Watson, have fun when the real dirt hits the fan. Because it will come out soon enough.

Yessir, that it will.

Right out of Watson's hand into Cooper's for their fourth TD of the game on Eli Apple.

 

[Sebastian]

 

[Mr. Orange]

@thestatman

You are gonna get roasted in here, but it’s fine how you feel. It’s fine if you never want to watch the team again. But there is no need to attack anyone who continues to support the other 52, or even to give DW a second chance.

Truly the best thing to do is vote with your wallet. Don’t watch them. Don’t read about them. Don’t post about them. Just remove the Browns from your life.

I could troll you, but I won’t. But nothing is going to change just because you are upset. We will put you on ignore. The media will eventually move on. DW is already loved by his teammates, and I guarantee you by mid season, or whenever the suspension is over, that fans are going to go bananas for the Browns. It’s just how the world is.

For your own well being, probably just push them out of your life forever if this is how you feel.

In summary, I’m sorry you have lost your team, but the show goes on. You’ll just have to accept it or else you are only causing yourself pain, anguish and suffering, not DW or any of the fans who are staying.

 

[AllforOne]

So no one wants to hear it but the chances of this trade being a bust for the browns are significantly higher than to work out (super bowl win). From a historical aspect it's not even close. Only 1 team has ever traded multiple first round picks for a player and won a Superbowl with that player and it was this year's Rams. Thats it. That's the list.

1. If your metric for success is "did they win a Super Bowl?," then damn near every strategy is going to look like a failure.

2. The "this has happened only one time, so the strategy isn't going to work!" argument falls flat. The key point here is that proven, top-level quarterbacks with their prime years ahead of them never become available. It just doesn't happen. Watson is truly a unicorn in that regard. There is no precedent for a 26-year-old three-time Pro Bowl QB being available in a trade. None.

Let's look at the times teams have traded multiple picks for a player. We're not going to include the trades where teams traded multiple firsts to move up in the draft to select a rookie (e.g., Julio Jones, RG3, Ricky Williams; this also includes Jim Everett, for while he had been selected, he had never played a down in the NFL when the Rams traded multiple firsts to acquire him). We're looking only at players who had a body of NFL work when they were traded for multiple FRPs.

Here's the list: Eric Dickerson, Fredd Young, Herschel Walker, Jeff George, Keyshawn Johnson, Jay Cutler, Khalil Mack, Laremy Tunsil, Jalen Ramsey, Jamal Adams, Matthew Stafford, Russell Wilson.

We can/should eliminate the non-QBs. QB is far and away the most important position in football; the trades for non-QBs are just noise in this analysis.

That leaves us with George, Cutler, Stafford, and Wilson, along with Watson.

Wilson was just traded this offseason as well, so we have no idea yet how that one will work out. So we can exclude that one.

Stafford, as you said, won a ring in his first year for the Rams. I'm thinking LA is happy with the trade.

Cutler and George didn't work out as well. But neither one of them were in Watson's zip code as a QB. George had played four middling seasons for the Colts when they somehow convinced Atlanta to deal two FRPs for him. Cutler was probably the closest comp to Watson - he was coming off his third season with the Broncos (a Pro Bowl season, his first/only one) when Denver traded him to the Bears. Again, though, Cutler simply was not as good as Watson has been.

So you can try to point to past trades and yell "see?? it's probably not going to work out well!!!" But (a) there have been very few prior trades that are remotely comparable; (b) even those did not feature a player of Watson's caliber; and (c) in the most recent example of such a trade, the QB won his team a Super Bowl (using your own sky-high standard for success) in his first season.

It's a risk. We may be here in ten years saying "whoa, that one didn't work out well." But that doesn't make it a bad risk.

 

[FrontPageNews]

Andrew Berry king of the cap

 

[Bob_The_Cat]

What you are saying here is 100% dead nuts accurate. And if people would take their blinders off and do a little research they would agree. Again, Terry Pluto went into great detail as to why no draft capital and no fricking cap money is an absolute recipe for disaster. And disaster is exactly what this trade was.

I was at the 64 title game. I will never root for this sorry franchise again until Haslam is booted out of football.

Look, I respect that you’ve been a fan for this long and you have every right to decide who you want to cheer for, but if you feel this way about Watson, why were you cheering for a team with Jim Brown on the roster when he was charged with significantly worse things than Watson? I’m just trying to understand the stance because I’ve not had an older Browns fan be able to explain it to me.

 

[Vee-Rex]

Yeeeeah there's a problem with holding an individual transaction against the "Super Bowl or Bust" argument. It assumes that every move is bad if you don't win a Super Bowl, and every move is good if you DO win a Super Bowl. I'm not sure that's a fair way to evaluate each trade/draft/FA signing etc...

 

[CBBI]

Andrew Berry king of the cap

Jack Duffin absolutely nailed it. Here’s his guess from yesterday.

 

[ShawnKempIsMyDad]

So no one wants to hear it but the chances of this trade being a bust for the browns are significantly higher than to work out (super bowl win). From a historical aspect it's not even close. Only 1 team has ever traded multiple first round picks for a player and won a Superbowl with that player and it was this year's Rams. Thats it. That's the list.

Are you even a fan of this team?

 

[Cement]

 

[macbdog]

Thanks Tony Grossi!!!!

 

[PIP]

Hehe….. Whenever we have him we still have our QB…

 

[Urban]

So no one wants to hear it but the chances of this trade being a bust for the browns are significantly higher than to work out (super bowl win). From a historical aspect it's not even close. Only 1 team has ever traded multiple first round picks for a player and won a Superbowl with that player and it was this year's Rams. Thats it. That's the list.

A few points

No, it's not only Stafford. Off the top of my head Jalen Ramsey and Keyshawn Johnson were traded for multiple 1sts and won Super Bowls with the team that acquired them

If you're going to say it is "Super Bowl or Bust", I think including "any player" like a Jamal Adams or Khalil Mack has to change the expectations. The Adams trade is a massive bust but I think the Khalil Mack trade was overall good. We know a franchise QB is the ultimate difference maker. If you want to make this argument, think it should be only focused on QBs. And namely ones that has some sort of established base level (disqualifying an unknown commodity, like a Trey Lance)

So if we only focus on veteran/established QBs traded for multiple 1st round picks, we get the below. Apologies if I missed any

-1972 Roman Gabriel. Rams to Eagles. Noting the Eagles were a 2-11-1 team when trading for Gabriel

-1975 John Hadl. Rams to Packers. Hadl was 34 and is apparently deemed one of the worst trades in NFL history

-1976. Jim Plunkett. Patriots to 49ers. 5 pretty mediocre seasons with NE prior to being traded, likely living off his college name. 2 more mediocre seasons with 49ers before ultimately being released. Goes to Raiders and win 2 Super Bowls

-1994. Jeff George. Colts to Falcons. 41 TD to 46 INT prior to being traded to Atlanta.

-2009 Jay Cutler. Broncos to Bears. 1 playoff appearance in 8 seasons. Not great

-2021. Matt Stafford. Lions to Rams. Super Bowl Year 1



I think Stafford is the only guy here who measures up to Watson's talent and what he's shown in the NFL thus far. Maybe you argue Cutler who was coming off a Pro Bowl season prior to being traded to Chicago

 

[Kbiz]

I'm a STAT MAN

skippy-dibby-dee-bom-bom-bom-bom.

**this thread is currently giving me aids.

 

[adam81king]

Emily and/or her family have every right to post here to defend Baker if they want, there is no need to witch hunt them out. Frankly, defending Baker is pointless, as there is no way he stays even if the NFL hands Watson a groundbreaking suspension coming up, but they are free to do so.

Literally never said they couldn't...

I think you missed the very tongue-in-cheek joke.