We are now into the second week of the summer break for the Cleveland Browns and all is quiet with nary an inflatable swan in sight.
But that doesn’t mean there are not plenty of people ready to offer up an opinion on second-year back-up quarterback Johnny Manziel.
To see what people are saying, check out our post at Dawg Pound Daily.
Cleveland Browns cornerback Joe Haden came in at No. 23 on the NFL Network’s list of the Top 100 players of 2015.
The results are from voting by the league’s players, who moved Haden up 13 spots from his ranking in 2013.
Haden has been the Browns’ top cornerback since entering the starting lineup midway through his rookie season in 2010. Since then, the two-time Pro Bowler has grown into the best player in the secondary and one of the best cornerbacks in the NFL. In 2014, Haden had three interceptions (giving him 16 in his NFL career) and had 20 passes defended.
To read the rest of the story, visit Dawg Pound Daily.
Cleveland Browns left tackle Joe Thomas came in at No. 25 on the NFL Network’s list of the Top 100 players of 2015.
The results are from voting by the league’s players.
The longest-tenured player on the roster, and without question former general manager Phil Savage’s best move while he was in charge, Thomas is the first offensive lineman in NFL history to earn Pro Bowl honors in each of his first eight seasons. He has also been a First-Team All-Pro selection five times.
To see the rest of the story, visit our post at Dawg Pound Daily.
We had the opportunity over the weekend to check out the 1964: When Browns Town was Title Town exhibit and it was a fun time.
The Western Reserve Historical Society exhibit features large informational posters of Jim Brown, Lou Groza, Gene Hickerson, Leroy Kelly and Paul Warfield, all Hall of Famers who played on the team; as well as video from the season; radio calls from former team broadcaster Gib Shanley; a recreation of a locker from the old Stadium; and playbooks complete with multiple offensive and defensive diagrams from the season.
Like many Browns fans we are familiar with the history surrounding that season, most notably from reading Terry Pluto’s 1997 book, When all the World was Browns Town, but for someone who was born shortly after what to this day is Cleveland’s last championship, it was still a fun afternoon of nostalgia.
To learn more, visit our post at Dawg Pound Daily.
Cleveland Browns safety Tashaun Gipson may have signed his second-round tender with the club, but that doesn’t mean he will still be with the Browns after the 2015 season.
While the Pro Bowler is willing to listen to the Browns on a long-term contract, Gipson said he is just as willing to play out his one-year contract and hit the free agent market as an unrestricted free agent come next year.
It’s an interesting position for Gipson to take, albeit one that has its risks.
To see what it means for Gipson and the Browns, visit our post at Dawg Pound Daily.
They gave everything they had for as long as they could, but in the end it simply wasn’t enough.
So now their watch has ended.
After a franchise-record 102 games, four rounds of playoffs and the second trip to the NBA Finals in franchise history, it finally came to an end on Tuesday for the Cleveland Cavaliers, who ended the 2014-15 NBA season the way they began it – with a loss on their home court.
As disappointing as it was to watch the Cavs miss out on the first title in team history and, in the process, end Cleveland’s ongoing title drought, it’s hard to see how this could have turned out differently. Because of injuries to Kevin Love and Kyrie Irving, too many players were forced into roles where they were asked to do too much as head coach David Blatt simply ran out of options along with healthy bodies.
The Philadelphia Eagles and head coach Chip Kelly made more news on Thursday as the team released two-time Pro Bowl guard Evan Mathis.
The 11-year veteran graded out as Pro Football Focus’ top guard from 2011 through 2013 and was the second best last year. He was also a First Team All-Pro selection as recently as 2013 and started 56 games for the Eagles after being signed as a free agent in 2011.
Cleveland Browns general manager Ray Farmer is on a mission to drive competition across the roster, so adding one of the top guards to an already talented offensive line has to at least be tempting.
So should the Browns take a look at Mathis? Find out in our latest post at Dawg Pound Daily.
When the Cleveland Browns selected Washington State wide receiver Vince Mayle in the fourth round of the 2015 NFL Draft, it left fans scrambling to find out who he was.
Which is befitting a player that one scout called “the best-kept secret on the West Coast prior to the draft.”
But once he gets on the field this summer, the secret could be out of the bag.
To learn more, check out our latest post at Dawg Pound Daily.
Ever since they first arrived in town, general manager Ray Farmer and head coach Mike Pettine have been working to overturn more than a decade of incompetence that has enveloped the Cleveland Browns.
With two NFL Drafts and two free-agency periods under his belt, Farmer has built up the team’s depth and given Pettine and his coaches a solid foundation to work with. In turn, Pettine has shown that he is not afraid to put the best players on the field – regardless of where they were drafted or how much they count against the salary cap. One has to only look as far as undrafted free agent K’Waun Williams receiving considerable playing time last season at the expense of Justin Gilbert, only the eight overall selection in the 2014 NFL Draft.
Competition not only makes the team better, but also means that some familiar faces may not take the field this fall wearing the team’s new uniforms.
When the NBA Finals tip off tonight at 9, it will mark the beginning of the end for the Cleveland Cavaliers.
The Cavs entered the 2014-15 NBA season with raised expectations after the return of LeBron James, but even the most hardcore Cavs fan knew that tonight was far from a certainty. The team had a new coach who, while not a rookie in the true sense, was new to the NBA, and a roster full of players who had never been tested in the meat grinder of the NBA Playoffs.
“Anybody talking about us winning it all, I think they’re being unfair to those great NBA teams that are out there that have either won it or have been there to win it, and also to us as a team that’s talented but new,” head coach David Blatt said a few days before the season opener. “We have a lot of work to do before we can start claiming anything before it’s time.”
A large part of why the Cavs are one of the two teams still playing is due to the changes the squad made during the season.
There is probably no way the Cavs would be in the finals if Dion Waiters was on the team rather than Iman Shumpert and J.R. Smith. And while general manager David Griffin may still have made the trade for Timofey Mozgov if Anderson Varajeo hadn’t suffered a season-ending injury, there is no way of knowing for sure. As good as Varajeo is, Mozgov brings a different dimension to the defense and the post-season may have played out differently if Varajeo was on the floor rather than Mozgov.
Even with a dominant presence like James on the roster, the Cavs are a team in just about every way you want to define that word, which is part of why the looming end of the season is a touch bittersweet.
Red Right 88 