00:00Browns get a win that I feel like not many people thought that they were either going to get,
00:04or if you thought they were going to get it, you maybe didn't believe in as much of Bryce Young
00:08as what we've seen Bryce Young so far this year, but it's a good day to be a Browns fan.
00:11Yeah, I'll say this. I kind of wavered all week because I didn't know that I really trusted the
00:16Panthers were all that good. I was like, yeah, these first two weeks, the offense has been really,
00:19really good. But do I really think the Browns can't potentially hang with them? And do I really
00:24trust Bryce Young after two games of looking like an MVP candidate? And I still picked against the
00:29Browns because I just didn't, I trusted the Browns less than I trusted the Panthers, I guess.
00:33And then two teams that we didn't really know what either one was. Yeah. Gave you like a slog of
00:37a
00:37game that then ended kind of epically when you really, when push came to shove, like that fourth
00:41quarter was pretty awesome, all things considered. But yeah, totally unexpected. I cannot tell you,
00:46now I didn't know I was going to be filling in on the afternoon show way back when, but I
00:50can't sit
00:51here and tell you that I thought I'd be sitting here the Monday after week three of the season
00:55talking about a Browns team that's 2-1. Yeah, no doubt about it. And I feel like we just
00:59got to start today's show ripping the Band-Aid off. Listen, I didn't think Deshaun Watson was
01:02good yesterday. I don't think the Browns solved their quarterback problem yesterday either,
01:06but I'm not going to move the goalpost every time he goes out there and wins a game. And I'm
01:09not
01:10going to move the goalpost and tell you that all of a sudden style points are everything. If I told
01:14you what I wanted out of a quarterback was someone that would give the young players a chance,
01:18Deshaun Watson did that. If I told you I wanted a quarterback that if the ball was in his hands
01:22in the
01:22fourth quarter can get the job done, Deshaun Watson did that. And so although he had 67 passing yards
01:27through the first three quarters and maybe it wasn't the prettiest thing, Deshaun was impressive
01:32in the idea that he got the job done when it mattered the most. So I'll tip my cap to
01:35Deshaun
01:35off the rip here.
01:37JP, we are a win over the Pittsburgh Steelers on Thursday night away from those chants we heard
01:47at the end of the game yesterday for his name. I think it was Let's Go Deshaun or Let's Go
01:51Watson.
01:51Whatever it was, Let's Go Watson. They went Thursday night. He might be running off the
01:57field a chance of five more years.
02:01No, stop it.
02:01Five more years.
02:03Stop it.
02:03Five more years.
02:04Let's go.
02:05Where did you come up with that? No, stop it.
02:06And so again, this is maybe on Tuesday we can have a different convo that we can have today
02:12in the idea that...
02:14He's on his way, JP.
02:15People are getting carried away.
02:16He's on his way.
02:17People are getting very, very carried away.
02:19Right. And the idea that I spent a lot of the morning figuring out Watson restructuring
02:23and whether or not we can have an extension that actually works, not because I wanted
02:27it, but because I knew we'd get a lot of phone calls on it. It's not...
02:31Listen, again, I can only say it so many times today. Do I think the Browns solved their quarterback
02:35problem yesterday with that win? No, I don't. Do I think Watson is playing good quarterback?
02:41No, I don't. But I'm not going to keep moving the goalpost on him. What we wanted was a quarterback
02:46that would give the Browns a chance to win games. And if you have a dominant defense,
02:50which is the story of yesterday, a dominant defense, do they have a chance to win that
02:54game? Deshaun delivered on that. And that's where I say, good job, Deshaun Watson.
03:00Five more year chance, maybe not.
03:02Maybe, maybe not.
03:03So, I mean, obviously, like the five more year chant thing, like, there is a big picture
03:07part of this that's like, if they win too many games, they're going to have...
03:12Like, what are they... We don't have to go down that road right now.
03:14Yeah, but winning too many games sounds like...
03:16That's like down the road.
03:17Yeah, that's my lobster's too buttery and my steak is too juicy problems. I'm willing...
03:22I'm prepared to have those conversations if we get there.
03:24You understand what we're getting at, though, right? Like, if they win too many games and
03:27they're out of them running for one of these quote-unquote great quarterbacks coming out
03:31next year, then it's like, they're going to have to figure out what they're doing to quarterback.
03:35And maybe that does look like bringing back Deshaun if he plays well enough that you win
03:38like nine games. I don't know. Again, we'll get there when we get there.
03:40But no, like, ultimately, Deshaun played like we all expected Deshaun to play for most of
03:47that game. But where he deserves credit is for what he's done in the fourth quarter
03:51these last two games. I think the official stats were like 20-22, 253 yards, three touchdowns,
03:59no interceptions, and he has like 50 yards rushing in the fourth quarter of each of the
04:02last two games. And to boot, two game-winning drives that have the Browns at 2-1.
04:06So as much as I do sort of think the chance of his name were a little over the top
04:13to
04:13a degree, I also do understand where it's like all this team really wanted was for him
04:18to win, for their team to win. And he's doing that right now. So he deserves credit for that.
04:23Like what Todd Munkin told Deshaun, where it was like, hey, all these people want is to
04:28win. If you go play good football, if you go win football games, everything will be fine.
04:33No one's going to boo you. It's coming to fruition. Like what we all said from the
04:37beginning is coming to fruition to a degree. It doesn't forgive the last four years or make
04:41you forget the last four years, but it does, at least in the moment, create this kind of
04:44nice situation where there's at least some breaking of bread between Browns fans and
04:48Deshaun Watson, because he's playing well enough to have the team with a winning record, getting
04:52ready to play the Steelers on Thursday.
04:53Well, and so I always thought in the offseason, the question was, is Deshaun Watson good enough?
04:57And it's turned into, can you win with Deshaun instead? And I think that's an important
05:01clarification and distinction. And so I was still playing in my head of, well, is Deshaun
05:04Watson good enough? I thought we were trying to get a top 10 quarterback or try to get somebody
05:09that even is league average, something that is competent, something that you can put out
05:13there consistently. And turns out like, it's just a lot of people gave up on the idea that
05:19he'd ever be Houston Deshaun again. And they really just kind of want him to be, even in
05:23a game like yesterday, I think it's a perfect example of Deshaun at this point where Deshaun
05:26was not good. 67 yards through three quarters is abysmal. That's laughably bad. In the fourth
05:31quarter, he did what he had to do, and he came up with a nice throw and a nice touchdown.
05:35Hell, the touchdown drive he had in the first touchdown drive, they didn't throw a single
05:41pass up until the actual touchdown pass itself. They got great field position. Moving the ball
05:48down the field, so to speak, was done by everyone but Deshaun Watson. And then he obviously capped
05:52it off with the touchdown drive. So it is the perfect encapsulation of why win-loss record
05:58is not a quarterback stat for the regular season and why it's a little misleading in
06:02many times. But ultimately, all Browns fans have been seeking is somebody that you could
06:05win games maybe with and not because of. And I was always thinking we were playing in
06:10the because-of territory.
06:11It's honestly like, I do think Deshaun, I guess the tip of the cat to him, whatever you want
06:17to say. He deserves a lot of respect in that, given everything that's transpired here and
06:23how bad we thought it was to the point where after he made those comments after the Bills
06:27preseason game, it was like, dude, this guy is broken mentally. How can Todd Munkin possibly
06:31put this guy out there? For him to somehow block all that out and still play relatively
06:38poorly for most of that game. But then, hey, when it mattered most, he found a way.
06:43That takes some level of resolve for anybody to sort of pull that out of your you-know-what
06:50basically to make that happen. So again, he deserves credit for that. I'm with you. I
06:55mean, you talk about his numbers. JP, there was one catch by a wide receiver in that game
07:03going into the fourth quarter. It was Casey Concepcion in the first quarter. He caught
07:08a very short pass on the right side. And it was like, that was it. That was the only catch
07:12a wide receiver had in that game. All the other passes he had completed to that point
07:14were like running backs in the flats and Harold Fenn and Jr. over the middle. Like
07:18that was it. So that tells you the level of offense that they're playing right now. It's
07:22still not great. It's still not good. But in a game like that, that becomes a slog and
07:27that this defense kept you in, you give Deshaun a chance and he delivered. So yes, I tipped
07:33the cap to him. I didn't, as much as I don't think Houston Deshaun's ever coming back.
07:38And I don't think what we saw yesterday was even remotely close to Houston Deshaun. Sure.
07:41Were there some remnants of that? Yes. But he's running to the sideline trying to get
07:45a first down and like a defensive tackle is chasing him down. Like that wasn't happening
07:48in Houston about seven years ago, whatever the hell it was. Like, so there's remnants
07:52of that. He's never going to be that guy again. But when it matters most, if he's going to
07:56play like that, like maybe that works for this season.
07:58So can you live with flashes of Deshaun in the off season? We, anytime we explored that
08:03question, it was, well, you have to have an awesome run game, which the Browns don't
08:06currently have, but we'll see what happens there. And then you have to have an awesome
08:09defense. And that's, that's where, when we talk about this game from yesterday, instead
08:13of people going around talking about it, being a Deshaun Watson win, again, we give
08:16them credit for what happened in the fourth quarter, but that was, that was a defensive
08:19win. The amount of pressures that they had making Bryce Young look like he'd never played
08:24the sport before. Like there were stretches where Deshaun was pretty awful in this game.
08:28And for a large majority of this game, I was still able to say he was a better quarterback
08:32than Bryce Young. That's, that's credit to the defense. That's credit to what Rutenberg
08:36had dialed up. That's credit to the pressure that they had. I mean, did Bryce Young set
08:40like an NFL record for throwaways yesterday? I've never seen a quarterback just, just,
08:43just give up on plays as quick as he did. Cause he wanted to, he wanted to live to fight
08:47another day and didn't want to throw an interception. Like I, I really think yesterday
08:51and I know what you guys are saying, Jonathan, you don't like Deshaun. You're never going
08:55to give him credit. I just gave him credit. I'm dumping a bucket of credit on his front
09:01lawn. Okay. Like he's getting all the credit in the world, but that was a defensive
09:04game. Like let's, let's put it in proper context. That was a defensive win more than
09:08it was anything else. Well, JP, you remember going into last year, the comments we all
09:12kind of made were like, well, Hey, if this defense is going to be this good, like we
09:16expect it to be with miles Garrett and everybody, then all you need is competent
09:20quarterback play to win some more games than you won the year before when you had
09:24three wins. Right. And competent quarterback play wasn't possible because we didn't have
09:27the wide receivers or the offensive line or even the run. Exactly. And this year, I think
09:31you are getting some level, at least in spurts of comp of a competent quarterback
09:37play from Deshaun Watson. Most of his coming in the fourth quarter, which just so happens
09:40to be the most important point of the game, obviously. And I do think the schedule helps
09:44you a bit. Like you haven't played other than the Jaguars, like juggernaut teams or teams
09:48that are expected to be like juggernauts at this stage. You played two NFC South teams.
09:51We know what the NFC South right now is a mess. Like it always is the Falcons are leading
09:55the division and they got blown out the first two weeks of the season. Like we it's a mess.
09:59So, and I'm not trying to disparage what the broads did. Like a win is a win.
10:03You got those done. It's obviously great that you're two and one, but I'm just saying like
10:07for how the schedule is laid out for where you're at, like they're getting the competent
10:10quarterback play they need in the key moments. And that's, what's kind of led to this point.
10:14So for once you feel like the offense has some juice to it, it's not quite the level you
10:18need it to be. You're right. I with Deshaun Watson under center, there is a limit to what
10:23this offense can still accomplish and do. And I think you've seen that the last two weeks
10:26your scoring range is somewhere in the, in the range of like 19 to 24 ish points, right?
10:32Like that's kind of the cap it feels like for this team. And you'll run into some teams
10:35that can score more than that and beat you. So there's some limitations, but yes, for
10:39now we can, we can sit here and tip the cap to Deshaun Watson for what he's accomplished.
10:43That's all. And I still don't believe in Deshaun Watson, but my takeaway after three
10:47games, I'm starting to believe in this Browns team and I'm starting to believe in what
10:50Munkin is building. It's more of a testament to Munkin. That's what it is. And at the
10:53penalties we can talk about later on in the show, he's got to clean that up, but
10:56it's, it's a belief of that game yesterday. Stefanski blows without question. They lose
11:00that game yesterday. Once the Panthers took the lead there that, I mean, that is a, I
11:05watched that game a million times under Stefanski. They don't win that game. Munkin got them
11:08to win that game. At least, at least the Browns players got them to win that game.
11:12So fourth down touchdown play that ended in a touchdown for, for Todd Munkin. Does that
11:17just get completely snuffed out and they, they don't score there? The, the, you know, what
11:20happened is the idea that so Munkin, he bungled the end of possession or the, the
11:24final, uh, which should have been, and we'll talk about the fourth and one play
11:27and everything that, but he bungled the second down is what he bungled in a bad
11:30way. And it gave the Panthers back with a minute left. I'm at the touchdown before
11:33the half where they went for it on fourth and two, like Stefanski would have done
11:36that too. Or, and then, but I guess it was fourth and goal, but it was like
11:39Stefanski would have done that too. But does the, is he run like wildcat? And then
11:41like the guy fumbles or something? I don't know how he would have blown it, but we
11:43watched enough games to know Stefanski would have blown it. He wouldn't have lost that game
11:47with Stefanski. I could bet my house on it.
Comments