Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Sam, it's time time for the Burning River Sportscast. Another very special live edition of the Burning River Sportscast here on Sunday night.
New England Patriots 32, Browns 13 Browns fall to 2 and 6. Ronnie Jams.
[00:01:12] Speaker B: You sound excited to be here.
[00:01:14] Speaker A: I'm not. I'm not excited.
[00:01:16] Speaker B: Oh, we already got comments. Rolling in. Go ahead.
While you're doing that, you can find our podcast wherever you get your podcast. I'm talking Apple Podcast, Spotify, stitcher, Amazon Music, YouTube Music, Pandora, iHeartRadio podcast, Castro Good Pods, re number one ranked football podcast and so many more. While you're at it, please leave us a review on your preferred podcast app of choice. It really preferred podcast app of choice. That's the redundancy department of redundancy or whatever you call it. But it really helps us grow and get seen. So make sure you leave those reviews and don't forget to subscribe on YouTube. The only place you can find our video podcast and check us out on Facebook, Instagram and Tick Tock. Our handle for all those is at Burning River Sportscast. We're on X as well at the handle at Burning River. Pod Pod.
While you're at it, check out our merch www.thetab media.com backslash shop all kinds of stuff in there. Before we get started, shout out to some of our sponsors. Topaz Distillery, Topaziller and award winning craft distillery located in Akron, Ohio. Topaz focuses on high quality spirits carefully made in small batches. Topaz Distillery, handcrafted, award winning small batch, local and family owned in prime time sports and framing. With locations in Hartville, Streetsboro, Belden Village, Great Northern and Kent. They are easily accessible wherever you are in Northeast Ohio. With the best selection and autographed collectibles and world class framing operation. They're your go to for officially licensed memorabilia, prime time sports and framing.
[00:02:31] Speaker A: You name it, they frame it.
[00:02:33] Speaker B: There you go.
And they provided the Miles Garrett game poster, autographed game day poster that we're going to be giving away today. So we got a winner. We got a winner. We'll talk about that in just a minute.
But on today's show this week, you look forward to a recap of today's Week 8 loss to the Patriots.
Did the offense do anything at all? How did the defense look? Our nominees for dog of the week. What changes we expect if any, during the bye week? Desean Watson continuing to throw hate Stefanski's way via social media.
What are we even doing here? I don't know and I'm sure there's going to be a lot more. So let's get things started by reminding everyone to call the burning sportscast hot.
[00:03:12] Speaker A: Take hot take hotline.
[00:03:14] Speaker B: Call and leave your hot takes on the hot take hotline. Remember these.
These are hot takes. We want hot takes. 3-30-2278-0813-3022-7808-133022781.
All right. And so, as I just mentioned, the autograph. Miles Derek. Miles Derrett, Miles Garrett game day poster. We have a winner for that. If you haven't heard, we've been running this giveaway for the last. What has it been, like, six weeks.
[00:03:43] Speaker A: For a while now?
[00:03:44] Speaker B: Five weeks, something like that. If you didn't get entered, I don't know what you were waiting on, but it was a partnership in partnership with Prime Time Sports and framing. It's an autographed Miles Garrett game day poster. I don't think you name it.
[00:03:55] Speaker A: They frame it.
[00:03:56] Speaker B: They do.
I don't think you could pick it up. I think you're still a little broken.
[00:03:59] Speaker A: Yeah, I'm gonna not do that right now.
[00:04:01] Speaker B: Yeah. So in case you didn't see him get hit by John Hughes, that was just one of them that we posted on our social media, so make sure you check that out. But like I said, the entry period closed earlier today, and we do have a winner for the autographed Miles Garrett game day poster. And the winner is at bald bearded barbecue and dad.
[00:04:25] Speaker A: So well done.
[00:04:26] Speaker B: Yeah.
The winner came from our Instagram pool of entries.
We'll be in touch with him to work on the logistics for receiving his prize. But that is the winner, if you entered. Thank you so much. We appreciate it. And make sure you don't. You know, I know a lot of people like to. They, like, follow and then unfollow when they. If they don't win, we're gonna be doing a lot more giveaways, so make sure you. You stay followed.
[00:04:49] Speaker A: Yeah. Stay followed.
[00:04:50] Speaker B: Yes. Keep following us. Stay.
[00:04:53] Speaker A: We'll kick you in the jimmies.
[00:04:55] Speaker B: We'll kick you in the Jimmies. But keep following us. We'll have more to come. So let's go ahead and get into it. Kenny, I know it's your. Your favorite time of the show. It's time for the Week 8 recap.
[00:05:03] Speaker A: Watching the Browns every week feels like being kicked in the jimmies.
[00:05:08] Speaker B: You mean it's. That's. Is that not being kicked in the Jimmies?
[00:05:13] Speaker A: No, it just feels like it.
[00:05:15] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:05:16] Speaker A: So I guess let me start with apologies. If I sound raspier underwater, you sound awful, man.
[00:05:23] Speaker B: Explain.
[00:05:24] Speaker A: I went from being injured by our good friend John Hughes immediately into some kind of, what I'm guessing is a foodborne illness where I was, I spent about, oh, 36 hours basically living in my shower because I was vomiting and.
[00:05:48] Speaker B: Don't, don't give graphics. Come on.
[00:05:50] Speaker A: And just leave it there. Basically. It was basically coming out both ends. I couldn't vomit without it coming out the other side.
I just was standing or laying naked in the shower, just covered in bodily fluids. And I.
[00:06:03] Speaker B: It probably helps you lose a bunch more weight, though.
[00:06:05] Speaker A: I did lose about 10 pounds over a 30 hour span. So you be for me.
Lost 85 pounds but still fat.
[00:06:14] Speaker B: Still.
[00:06:16] Speaker A: But anyway, that's the story behind my voice. So I'll try and speak into the mic here as best I can, but I know that my, my voice is about shots. So.
[00:06:24] Speaker B: Are you so excited for the day when we can say you're no longer fat?
[00:06:28] Speaker A: Yeah, I'm always on ways away from that.
[00:06:30] Speaker B: But you're like, what, what will it be like 400 pounds down, not fat anymore.
[00:06:34] Speaker A: Can we get there?
[00:06:39] Speaker B: Everybody's probably like, why are they so mean to him?
[00:06:42] Speaker A: It's just me.
[00:06:45] Speaker B: Yeah. So let's talk about.
[00:06:47] Speaker A: Those are really good.
[00:06:50] Speaker B: Where do we start here? I mean, this. The whole thing was just a complete mess. Now let's start with the opening drive, because we'll say this.
I will give Kevin Stefanski one thing. His entire tenure with the Cleveland Browns. He is fantastic at scripting an opening drive for the Cleveland Browns.
[00:07:10] Speaker A: Oh, yeah. When this inevitably does not work out here in Cleveland, he should just get a job as a consultant in the NFL scripting opening drives.
[00:07:19] Speaker B: That's all I do, is script the.
[00:07:21] Speaker A: Opening drive place for him.
[00:07:25] Speaker B: He has, yeah, Bone actually text us. We all have a group text going during the game, just chatting back and forth about what's going on. And Bone text us and he says, did we get a new offensive coordinator? And I immediately texted back and said, no. This is the only thing Kevin Fansky's good at. I promise you it's going to go off the rails from here. And boy did it.
[00:07:43] Speaker A: Boy did it.
[00:07:46] Speaker B: Yeah. I mean, we spent the entire game running gimmick plays, trying end arounds, flea flickers, double passes. And the double pass was funny because we had a conversation last week about we went wildcat twice inside the five yard line because the last thing we want to do inside the five yard line in the red zone is trust our quote. Unquote. Franchise quarterback. The guy that, that our front office brought in as their guy to run this offense. We don't want to trust him with the ball. So we give it to Quin on Judkins in the Wildcat twice. And so this week we, we follow that up with you. You think it can't get worse? No, it got worse.
[00:08:23] Speaker A: We ran a double down.
[00:08:25] Speaker B: Huh.
[00:08:26] Speaker A: Obvious passing down.
[00:08:27] Speaker B: Yeah. Obviously.
[00:08:27] Speaker A: Let the quarterback throw it.
[00:08:29] Speaker B: Yeah. We're gonna. We're gonna. We trust our quarterbacks so much that we'd rather have a wide receiver throw it.
[00:08:35] Speaker A: Yeah. Makes a lot of sense.
[00:08:38] Speaker B: And it didn't work. I mean, it obviously didn't. It never works.
[00:08:42] Speaker A: No, no. Look, and what's funny and I guess not funny, it's just sad at this point is you kind of have back to back weeks now. Right. Where Mike Tomlin was talking in the media about how, you know, much smarter Andrew for trading Joe Flacco inside the division. Who was your opening day starter to this week after the game, Mike Vrabel literally said, you know, paraphrasing here. You know, basically once they stopped running gimmick plays, our defense played pretty well. We were pretty good.
[00:09:16] Speaker B: So basically caught him out. Like you guys were desperate and you were trying everything you could.
[00:09:21] Speaker A: The lack of respect from peers.
[00:09:24] Speaker B: None.
[00:09:25] Speaker A: Look, we can say whatever we want. We're clowns for your entertainment. And there's a lot of other shows like us. You can listen to the radio all week long and you'll hear people that aren't in the building and. And aren't close to it but are observing from the outside.
The greatest indictment about what is going on right now inside of Berea is when literally former colleagues and peers have zero respect for what you're doing as a football team.
[00:09:55] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:09:56] Speaker A: In back to back weeks are called out by guys that have been there, done that and won NFL football games.
[00:10:02] Speaker B: Seriously too. And Dewey, you got a point here. He said Stefanski was out coached by a real coach and a leader of men. I mean that's exactly it. Like these guys come in and they command respect everywhere they're at. The only person apparently that has that Kevin Stefanski commands the respect of is Jimmy Haslam.
Coming out today or yesterday, whenever that was and saying he's got full confidence in him now. We could get into that a little bit later on. I don't know if that was a. A. He's our coach now. So it's just like I gotta. I gotta say the right thing right now or if he actually believes that. But we'll talk about that soon.
We did get another nickname for Dylan Gabriel just now, and James Frank on Facebook called him Dollar General.
So.
But yeah, I mean, it was. I mean, that's all we did on offense. We ran gimmick plays all day. Our wide receivers literally had two receptions today, like our widers, which they had.
[00:10:55] Speaker A: Two receptions in four weeks. That's the same offense that you've seen. And I think that has to be. Again, I, like, I've talked about this for a month now. Like, I hate to write a guy off after four games, but that's all you do. You hope that you can see some sort of progression.
And his best start was his first start. He has regressed since then.
And the offense looks the same as it did four weeks ago. It hasn't gotten any better. So especially, I would argue it's gotten.
[00:11:25] Speaker B: Worse, to be honest with you.
[00:11:26] Speaker A: That's what I'm saying. He has regressed. And if you look at. Statistically, the numbers have gotten worse. If you look at analytics, the. The efficiency numbers are very poor. So for an organization that prides itself on analytics, I don't know how they can be looking at this going, yep, we're doing the right thing. Things are making sense here. This is what we expected to see. It can't be.
By every, by every measure, this is not working out in any significant way.
[00:11:52] Speaker B: Yeah, no. And it's just wild to see because again, I pointed out in the comments here, we were going to get to this, but Kevin Stefanski coming out and basically saying, yeah, we'll see Dylan Gabriel after the buy. Now, I don't know. I will say this. That doesn't necessarily mean that we won't see Shador immediately after the buy. I think that that leaves the door open to the fact that you could see Dylan Gabriel down the road, which is something we've talked about a lot, is you should switch to Shador immediately and whoever you like the best, that's who you should go with the rest of the season. Yeah, but the fact that he even came out and said that just to make sure fans knew, like, this quarterback sucks ass. But guess what? We're going to keep playing.
It's just classic Kevin Stefanik. It's just like, I have no idea what I'm doing here. I hope we're gonna play better. We need to play better.
I need to coach with me. I need to coach better. And we will. We'll be better.
[00:12:47] Speaker A: You know, on that point, you know, it's been so hard listening to this since camp that Dylan Gabriel is. Is so much further ahead than Shador, and Shador has all this ground to make up. And you keep hearing these reports and seeing and. And I've had a hard time convincing myself that this has anything to do with the playing. We've heard about Dylan Gabriel's supercomputer processing power. Well, I guess AI doesn't know that you're not supposed to intentionally ground the football in the end zone.
I mean, that's day one stuff, right? Like, this isn't. This isn't complicated. Like, veteran quarterback should know better. Like, that's day one stuff. First off, you can't throw it to nobody.
[00:13:37] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:13:37] Speaker A: Anywhere on the field, you can't throw it to no one. And second off, you definitely can't do it. When you're in the end zone, you can't do. You just can't.
Any quarterback, anybody who's ever played the position at any level knows you can't do that.
[00:13:55] Speaker B: And it's literally like one of the few times. It's one of the few times where it's like, no, you. You'd rather take a sack trying to make something happen than throw this into the dirt to nobody.
[00:14:04] Speaker A: Yeah, I'm just going to give away two points here.
And so again, I go back to. I don't think this has ever been about playing or skill.
Shador was just as accomplished or if not more than, than Dylan in his six years in college football. He was highly rated as a prospect. Coming out like, he can play the game.
Now, does he fit in Kevin Stefanski's offense? That's a whole nother.
It's a whole nother conversation. But here's the thing. Here's today. It all made perfect sense to me, and here's why. Because, you know, obviously we listen to the post game press conferences every week, but what I heard today solidified everything I needed to know about this quarterback farce of a Converse competition. And what it is is that if you listened to Dylan Gabriel in the post game, his exact comments were, it starts with me. I've got to play better. He deflected every other question. Yep. Losing socks. We don't want to. We got to win. We got to. We got to do better. We got to change things. They asked him specifically, what are the things you can improve on? He just said, you know, it's just everything. I got to improve. I got to be better. It starts with me. He was Kevin Stefanski 2.0. And that, yeah, that is where he is. Leaps and bounds ahead of Shador Sanders. This Browns, this Browns organization knows they can't contain Shador Sanders if this offense plays poorly and they keep losing games. That he's the kind of guy that's going to speak the truth in front of a media microphone. Sure. He's had all the media training that more media training than most guys have because of who his dad is and he's been in front of big programs before. So he's, he's not stupid. He's not going to go out and say reckless things. But I think that there's more chance that he's going to leak something unintentionally or tell the truth than.
Than Dylan Gabriel is going to. Dylan Gabriel is going to tow the company line every day, all day and say exactly what is supposed to be said in front of the microphone. That's where he's ahead of Shador Sanders in the Browns mind.
[00:16:17] Speaker B: Yeah. And if this whole narrative leading up to this thing, right. This, this whole he's leaps and bounds ahead of store Sanders, if it was anywhere other than what you just said.
Here's a question.
Everybody's talking about how good of a draft Andrew Barry had this time around. If you're telling me that Dylan Gabriel is that far ahead of Shador Sanders and you still drafted Shador Sanders, like, why?
[00:16:44] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:16:45] Speaker B: Then, like that throws the whole draft out the window because now it doesn't matter what these rookies are doing. You literally drafted a second quarterback that, that brings. I don't think it's. It's his fault, but brings controversy just because of what his name is.
That apparently doesn't deserve to be on an NFL roster according to you guys. So.
Because that's where Dylan Gabriel is. I don't. I'm done with this whole Dylan Gabriel experiments. Like, Dylan Gabriel, I, we had talked about. We said, yeah, he could be a serviceable, serviceable backup. I don't even think he could be that.
Like, he's not good. He sails everything. He f. The, the. The bad decisions finally caught up to him today. And he threw two picks. Like, let's not forget the, the Pittsburgh Steelers just a couple weeks ago. Like literally. And I'm not using the word literally like you hear people use the word literally. No, it's like literally, they dropped six.
[00:17:32] Speaker A: Interceptions, at least three that should have been in interceptions.
[00:17:36] Speaker B: I think six of them touched defenders hands where it was like there was a good chance that could have been intercepted.
[00:17:41] Speaker A: Statistically, he looks better on paper than he's played in person.
[00:17:45] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:17:46] Speaker A: Because he's had a Number of balls that were dropped that he's just put in harm's way. Even the the past to in Joku for the touchdown in the end of the game was not a good. A well thrown ball. That ball was behind him, it was high and Joker made a hell of a play to come down with it. I mean it was I guess a 5050 ball, but I don't how many 50, 50 balls are jump balls at the front of the end zone in the middle of the field.
That's not a usual place for that. But yeah, I mean every ball that he's thrown downfield is. Is a miserable experience to watch.
[00:18:19] Speaker B: Oh, his second interception was so bad. Like the dude had a step on him and he underthrew him by like 10 yards.
[00:18:25] Speaker A: It was like everybody is all over Isaiah Bond for not catching the ball. But I can tell you there were at least three times today that is a. Bond took the time top off the defense and Dylan Gabriel either couldn't get it to him or just didn't throw it to him.
[00:18:36] Speaker B: Probably didn't see him.
[00:18:38] Speaker A: And. And the one time, the one time that he did through, I mean, he put so much air under. Isaiah Bond was 10 or 12 yards behind the nearest defender and there was so much air under that ball you could have drove a cruise ship underneath.
And. And then the second one obviously was a pick. So that looked like just sheer frustration out of Dylan Gabriel. That was like, I'm tired of being told I can't throw the ball deep and. And just chopped one 60 yards in the air. And that didn't go well either. So.
[00:19:06] Speaker B: No, no.
Dewey just called him Windows 98.
[00:19:14] Speaker A: That's my new favorite Dylan Gabriel nickname.
[00:19:17] Speaker B: Yeah.
Yeah. And then we got a few more. We'll come back to our conversation there, but we got a few more comments here.
Browns baggage in North Jersey is on here asking why, you know, why change that? We don't know Shador's injury status for post by. I don't even know that he's injured, to be honest with you. I mean, that was pretty weird what all happened. We won't get too far into that today. We'll save that for our regular show. But.
And then they just said, you know, we could change before the jets game.
Yeah, I just.
James Frank comparing him to dtr. I. I'm gonna apologize to you, James.
Last week I said you can't compare him to DTR because statistically DTR is literally the worst quarterback in the history of the NFL.
Dylan Gabriel's not much better.
[00:20:05] Speaker A: He's way shorter.
[00:20:07] Speaker B: He's way shorter.
And then just one more.
We got somebody watching here that is bummed that the Browns didn't win this this evening. I, I agree. I, I was bummed too. But I honestly, I picked them to lose 31 to 13, so I was pretty close.
[00:20:24] Speaker A: Not far off.
[00:20:25] Speaker B: Yeah.
But anyways, back to the offense here. Yeah. I mean, here's the other thing.
The Browns, Kevin Stefanik just abandoned the run and you might say this was a blowout. It wasn't a blowout till the third quarter. Like, don't forget it was nine to seven at halftime.
[00:20:41] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:20:41] Speaker B: And we completely abandoned the run. Quinshawn Judkins had nine carries today. Nine, nine carries. A dude that back to back just carried the offense and, and last game basically single handedly won it by himself.
I just. Why would you abandon the run? Why?
[00:21:01] Speaker A: Well, I, I, part of that probably was Quinton got hurt. So Quinton did leave the game with a shoulder injury. But still, to your point, I, they, they stopped running the ball altogether.
[00:21:12] Speaker B: You can't, that's my point is like you can't, you just can't stop running. You got to continue to run the ball well.
[00:21:19] Speaker A: And what was funny to me too was the, the, the, the blueprint was said. Right.
[00:21:25] Speaker B: Because they were like a live show because everybody has such good comments that it just makes me laugh this whole time.
[00:21:31] Speaker A: By the time that they reach that point after the third Drake made touchdown pass and the commentators were like, all right, this is not a good situation for the Browns to be in because they're going to have to pass a lot here. That was actually almost the perfect time for like the Kevin Stefanski reverse psychology. Like, let's do what no one's expecting because here's the thing. If they're going to just pin their ears back and rush your young quarterback and they know you have to throw the ball, why not run a couple screens and draws and run the ball a little bit? Because they're not playing defense for that. Right. They're pinning their ears back going, hey, it's heavy rush time. We're going to bring extra guys. We're going to like, that's when you use misdirection and timing and run the ball. You break, you snap off a couple 15 or 20 yard runs. All of a sudden that defense has to go, okay, look, we got to get back on our heels a little bit because we're going to lose, we're going to lose this momentum here if we don't do something to Change it. So I. It was. It was perfectly set up for them to try to run the ball a little bit. And Dylan Sampson is a capable runner. I know he only had three carries today for. For. I don't think he had yards, but. No, but they just completely abandoned the run altogether and. And just again going back to Kevin Stefanski's offense and clock management and game.
[00:22:39] Speaker B: Legitimately like he has a clue again. I understand Quinshawn Judkins got hurt. He had nine carries though.
The rest of the running backs are rushers combined, I should say, because they're not all running backs. Most of them are actually tight ends, receivers. And a quarterback had seven carries as a team.
[00:22:58] Speaker A: Malachi Corley was the team's leading rusher on one carry.
[00:23:01] Speaker B: On one carry for 31 yards. Dylan Gabriel had one. Gage larva Kate, his last name, Larva Dane. He had one.
Harold Fannin had one. Dylan Sampson had three. Like, what are we doing?
And if that's the case, if you're that thin at running back, I am glad to see that Jerome Ford got none.
But if you're that thin at running back, like, what are we doing here?
[00:23:26] Speaker A: I've had Jerome Ford. Oh, you're right. He didn't have any carries. He just had a catch for negative yards.
[00:23:31] Speaker B: Yes, Dewey. Yes, I said it. I. We tech again. We have a group text going. I texted about it when it happened. I said Dylan Gabriel is so short that that literally hit the dude in the chest.
[00:23:41] Speaker A: He almost. He almost shovel past a guy, the ball right in his gut. Like I don't know what he's doing.
Look, I've reached. I've reached the point of apathy here this season. Like this was. This was how we felt last year. We said it was the worst Brown season and we couldn't remember how long. And this year is an extension directly of last year. And I reached a point of apathy here. The right thing to do. If the Browns were trying to win games right now and trying to evaluate talent accordingly, knowing you have two first round picks coming up in this year's draft would be to play Shador Sanders this upcoming week. Not this week, but two weeks from now against the Jets. The jets are lowly. It's a chance that he could play well. You have two weeks to prepare. Now is the time to pull the trigger. The Browns won't. Dylan Gabriel will play. And you know what?
I'm tired. I'm tired because I've telegraphed this entire season. I said at the moment Joe Flacco arrived that he had no business being here when there were two rookie quarterbacks. I said it. When they were trying to make Kenny Picket the starter. There was no reason to try and make Kenny Picket the starter. And this whole time and now he's shipped out Joe Flacco and he's gone. And now I've been saying for weeks, Dylan Gabriel, as much as I think he deserves a fair opportunity for his crack at the NFL, hasn't shown any progression and is not a franchise quarterback. I don't know that Shador is, but I think we at least deserve the chance to find out. Yeah, but the Browns aren't going to go there and there's still a fair amount and it's. And it's dwindling week by week. I'm starting to see more fire Stefanski, you know, outside of the small group that we have here that kind of knows and understands where we're coming from, but more and more people every week are going, who is this coach? Why is he so bad? Dylan Gabriel's not good, but there is still a strong contingent of Browns fans that are Kevin Stefanski defenders, Dylan Gabriel believers. And you know what? I don't even want to see Shador in this offense this year because I don't want to see Shador play for Kevin Stefanski. You guys should ride out Dylan Gabriel and enjoy losing the rest of the year. He's the quarterback you deserve and the coach you deserve. Let's ride this thing out and lose the rest of these games so we can put a. An exclamation point on how suck of a season this is so we can make a clean break at the end of the year and finally, finally rid ourselves of this travesty that is a coaching staff and a front office start over and maybe Shador gets a chance next year to battle whoever they draft in the first round. But I don't even. I don't even want to see him like.
[00:26:10] Speaker B: No. Because it doesn't.
[00:26:11] Speaker A: Dylan Gabriel and ride till wheels fall off. Which, which isn't very far off. But. But just do it. Enjoy it. Enjoy your guy. Enjoy the third round guy. Enjoy the supercomputer. Enjoy Windows 98. Like I'm. I'm done with it. I'm done telling you what's going to happen because no one seems to care.
[00:26:28] Speaker B: No. And. And, and a couple things to say about that. So first of all, I love to. Today was actually a very good day for just, just ammunition against the Stefanski lovers out there that want to keep this guy because stability for Stability sake. All that bullshit that we.
Here's the deal.
When. When they came out in the first drive again, even Bone texted about it and he said, you know what, do we have a new oc? What's going on here? If you went on X, pretty much every Stefanski lover out there is like, oh, it's really good drive. Really good drive. This is peak Stefanski. This is Stefanski at his best.
Again, the wheels fell off real quick. We didn't have long to wait to find out what Stefanski actually is all about. And that's gimmick plays. That's terrible quarterback play.
It's just a terrible scheme altogether.
Being aggressive when you should be conservative. Being conservative when you should be aggressive, like his offense is.
If you can't figure that out yet, you got problems.
[00:27:33] Speaker A: I want to touch on this comment here. Clean break. You trust Jimmy to get it right? No, I don't trust Jimmy to get it right. But, you know, what I do know is that you're in a hole. And if you're in a hole, the first thing you need to do is stop digging the hole. You can't get out of the hole if you continue to dig it deeper. So I don't know what Jimmy will do next, but I can promise you that what you're doing right now is not a path to success.
[00:28:00] Speaker B: No.
[00:28:00] Speaker A: And it ha. You have to change it. You have to change it.
[00:28:03] Speaker B: The second part of what I was going to say was just.
I think we're going to find out pretty quick.
I think this all comes to a head in two weeks. I think the jets are going to beat us and they might beat us handily. And at that point you're kind of forced to make a decision.
Like after that game, you. You'll know if they truly intend to. I know Haslam came out this week and like back Stefanski and all that stuff. We already talked about that. If he truly intends to stay in Stefanski's corner when they get the brake speed off them by the New York jets in two weeks and lose by two scores. Plus, if Stefanski is still your coach, everybody just strap in because we got at least a few more years of this.
[00:28:46] Speaker A: He will be. He's not going to get fired this year. I don't. I don't think Jimmy would have come out and gave him the vote of confidence right now if he didn't intend on keeping him all year. So, like, that's what I said. It's going to be like this all year long.
And like, look, for all The. All the people that have been slow to the take here, like, this is the team you deserve to watch then, because we've been saying for far too, too long this isn't the direction they need to make a change. And. And it just rings hollow across the board. So, I mean, until everybody can. Can get on board here and go, like, hey, like, what are we doing?
Including ownership, including the front office, like, this is going to continue to be a dumpster fire.
[00:29:24] Speaker B: Yeah, here's.
[00:29:25] Speaker A: Here's the final thing, too, that I'll say about Dylan Gabriel and Stefanski is I want to take. I want to jump in the time machine real quick, and I want to go back to the day Deshaun Watson got hurt.
You remember that day?
[00:29:40] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:29:40] Speaker A: I was there and he was on the field and fans were cheering, and there was a lot of blowback because they were like, oh, you know, he can't be, you know, cheering injured players. Miles and a lot of other guys in the press conference afterwards said it was, you know, distasteful and a bad look by Browns fans.
Here's. Here's the thing. We are in for a redux of that exact same scenario playing out because Kevin Stefanski doesn't have the fortitude to do what's in the best interest of this football team and let Shador see what you have in Shador Sanders. And it will come down to Dylan Gabriel, probably, unfortunately, not being able to finish a game. And the fans will rightly cheer, not because Dylan Gabriel is hurt, but because fate finally stepped in and made that decision for Stefanski and for this Browns organization so that we could at least see what you have in Shador Sanders. That's not to. That's not to, you know, put any kind of hex on Dylan Gabriel or say, I hope he gets hurt. I'm just saying don't be surprised when that happens again. And we have to go through that whole scenario again of, oh, I can't believe fans were cheering when a guy got hurt. They weren't cheering that Deshaun Watson was hurt. They were cheering that they didn't have to watch him play anymore in a broken offense.
And we're in that same position right now with Dylan Gabriel where people will be excited for change and it will manifest itself in a poor way.
[00:31:07] Speaker B: Yeah. And I will say this. It's funny that you bring that up, because fast forward now, because you went in the time machine and went back. Let's come back to current day and time. And now you have to. Again, it's just Another knock on Kevin's defense. You have to. All the same arguments are happening right now.
So at what point does. Do you walk in every single room and it smells like that? You don't stop and say, maybe it's me.
And that's exactly what Kevin Stefanski is.
[00:31:35] Speaker A: He is the common denominator.
[00:31:36] Speaker B: Yeah, he's the common denominator in this whole thing. And the fact that people are still defending this and we're having. It's like four quarterbacks later and we're having the same exact discussions over and over and over again. Like Kevin Stefanski. This is the only way. He's like the Burning river sports cast. He is the same.
[00:31:53] Speaker A: Takes over and over and over and over again.
[00:31:55] Speaker B: Yeah. I mean, unbelievable. Like at what point does everybody wake up? I just don't get it. How are there so many people that still think this isn't him? This is the like. Yeah. Don't get me wrong, the Browns organization is.
I love the Browns. They're. But Kevin Stefanski is not doing anything for himself either. He's terrible.
[00:32:16] Speaker A: No, no. I mean we were just, just this week like fighting people in the comments on our videos about that. That, you know, Kevin Stefanski being bad. The take. He's two time coach of the year. Kevin Stefanski. All right, How'd that work out for you today? How'd that, how's that going to work out for the rest of the year? You want to keep riding this Kevin Stefanski wagon, go ahead. You know, you deserve to be on.
[00:32:36] Speaker B: He's. That this is probably a bad example because he's, he is a decent coach, but a guy that won coach of the year not too long ago was across the field today. And you know what happened the year after he won coach of the year? He got fired.
Yeah. So I mean, and not to mention you look at the la. The list of the last probably seven or eight coach of the years, like none of them are that good. Maybe like two Maggie Day Ball.
[00:32:59] Speaker A: Stefanski.
[00:33:00] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:33:01] Speaker A: Fired. Yeah.
[00:33:01] Speaker B: Pretty much all of them are either on the hot seat or fired. So the coach of the year doesn't mean as much as all you people think it means.
But yeah, so let's, let's move on from the offense. I think we beat that horse to death.
[00:33:15] Speaker A: Is it dead though?
[00:33:16] Speaker B: Is it? No, it's. We're probably going to talk about it for another. How many weeks we got left. Yeah, that's how long we'll talk about it. But let's talk about the defense and by the defense, I Mean, Miles Garrett.
I mean, the. The defense, the rest of the defense, some of the guys had some good plays. We'll throw out Carson. Carson Swezinger had his first career interception.
[00:33:37] Speaker A: He was playing really well until he got hurt.
[00:33:39] Speaker B: Yeah, that's gonna.
[00:33:40] Speaker A: That's gonna be a real bummer because that looks like a high ankle sprain. That's gonna be four to six weeks.
[00:33:44] Speaker B: High ankle sprains, never good. Ronnie Hickman.
[00:33:47] Speaker A: I mean, frankly, with the high ankle sprain, I don't know that I even want to see him back this year. Like, Right.
[00:33:53] Speaker B: Because he comes back, it's going to be weak.
[00:33:55] Speaker A: I mean, what's. What's six weeks out from today? Eight. 14. Week 14, week 15. Like, hey, highlight that comment.
If he comes back, Like, I don't. I don't need to see him because I know that he's good, and I want him healthy for next year. And he'll. He's playing in meaningless football games.
[00:34:10] Speaker B: Yeah, I agree with that, Hippie. And, yes, I'm just calling you hippie because that's your name on here.
Yeah, I mean, yeah, absolutely. We're still here to root for the team. I'm going to root for this team till I die. But I'm also going to be very critical of this team because I want them to do better.
[00:34:25] Speaker A: We want them to win.
[00:34:26] Speaker B: But, yeah, so a couple of guys on the defense had good games, but Miles Garrett, career day, five sacks.
I don't know if it's ever happened in the history of the NFL where a guy has five sacks and their team loses by 30.
[00:34:40] Speaker A: No, I don't think it has.
[00:34:43] Speaker B: Like, what the.
[00:34:44] Speaker A: No, I think I saw that exact stat, that it was the first time a guy had five sacks in a game and their team lost, like, ever.
[00:34:51] Speaker B: In general, just lost.
[00:34:52] Speaker A: It may have been. There may have been a qualifier on there, like, lost by more than three points or something, but it was.
[00:34:59] Speaker B: It's.
[00:34:59] Speaker A: It's highly unusual that you would have a career day from a guy like that. That.
And lose the game in the fashion that you did.
I would say this. And look, Miles, tremendous. We've been through this all year. Like, I'm done criticizing Miles as a player. I know every week we get people that are saying, oh, where was Miles? Miles disappeared. Miles is taking plays off.
The guy had five sacks again today. Like, he's. He's. He's phenomenal. He's the best defensive player in the history of the Browns, and I can't criticize anything that he's doing now. Here's what I don't like about Miles right now.
The manufactured frustration. And I'm not saying that he's not frustrated, but the manufactured show of frustration on the sidelines, throwing your helmet that you're, you know, losing games in the midst of a five sack performance.
Miles, you took the bag, man.
You had your chance. You. You wanted to stand on business. You had your chance to get out of here and you didn't take it. You took the money instead. So, like, you're. You're kind of stuck laying in, in the bed that you made. I love you, Miles. I want you to be a Brown until you retire. I am in awe every week watching you play. But the frustration rings hollow with me because you knew what you were signing up for. I mean, you can't tell me that you had a conversation with, with Kevin and Andrew in the off season and then he said, miles, we got a plan at quarterback. It's Joe Flacco and Kenny Pickett and you were like, done. Sign the dotted line. That's going to fix everything.
[00:36:34] Speaker B: Well, that goes back to what I said last week, like, what conversation he had because his quote before the season was like, I heard the plan.
What the hell was the plan? Because whatever you heard, like, if, if that caused you to sign the papers, maybe you've had too many concussions.
Like, I don't know, I just. What?
[00:36:54] Speaker A: I just. I can't. I can't.
You took the money and you're here and you're stuck living it with the rest of us. And, and you know what? If you truly are that frustrated, then maybe it's time for you to step away from the company line and your post game pressers and actually call out what's going on here. You want to keep saying out, Dylan, Dylan, Gabriel's doing great. And this offense is fighting. This offense is fighting for 12 points a week. That's what they're fighting for.
[00:37:21] Speaker B: So, yeah, scoring average stayed about the same.
[00:37:24] Speaker A: You want to take the safety off and start throwing shots and shade and, and let people know that you actually are frustrated, that's one thing. But to then get in front of a microphone and go, hey, look, it's frustrating to lose like this every week. And, you know, I know everybody's out there trying and coaches are doing what's best for the organization and we're just trying to figure this out like it's bull. It's bull.
So I, I can't feel bad for you there.
[00:37:49] Speaker B: No. But I will. I will go back to the beginning of what you were talking about here and just say, I mean, the dude is a certified dog. Like, on the field where it counts. I mean, he makes.
He's the. He may be the best defensive end that's ever lived.
[00:38:06] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:38:07] Speaker B: And it just is a damn shame that we got to watch the Browns waste Joe Thomas's career, waste Joel Batonio's career, because he's about at the end, too.
We're well on our way to watching them waste Miles Garrett's career, Denzel Ward's career. They wasted Nick Chubb's career.
Like, how many guys do I have to name before something happens? Like, what in the world? And I know, you know, everybody's gonna be like, well, those are before Stefanski, and those are before Barry. Like, I understand. I agree.
My point is.
So why do we keep putting up with it? Like, we got a guy here that's proven over six years now with Stefanski and Barry that they're like two guys that have proven that they can't get the job done, but yet we're just stability for stability sake.
[00:38:52] Speaker A: What are you going to do?
[00:38:53] Speaker B: Yeah, what are you going to do?
[00:38:54] Speaker A: What are we going to do besides keep watching this team fail every week?
[00:39:00] Speaker B: That's what we do.
[00:39:02] Speaker A: That's Browns fans.
[00:39:03] Speaker B: Yeah. So, huge game by Miles Garrett, though. We'll get back to him here in a little bit.
[00:39:08] Speaker A: I would say this as good as the defensive line played today with, you know, six sacks, I think, total.
The secondary did not have a good day.
I think Tyson Campbell got hurt early, but I thought Denzel had a really tough time with Matt Collins, and there were a number of plays where he just. I don't know, he lost his footing, was getting pushed around out there a little bit. I know Mac Hollins is a big guy and he's a physical receiver, but. But Denzel has always played up to those challenges. Denzel has always taken on the number one and played really well against them. And Matt Collins certainly is no Jamar Chase or even a certified number one wideout. So that was a little concerning.
You know, Drake May threw three touchdowns in a quarter.
[00:39:58] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:39:58] Speaker A: You know, he. And. And I think, you know, he may very well be a great quarterback he. His second year and. But. But he's doing the things that you expect out of a young quarterback that is progressing every week. Right. Like, he looks good as a young quarterback, so no wonder they're able to. To, you know, do well and keep winning games with him.
[00:40:17] Speaker B: Yeah.
And then just kind of moving along here a couple more points.
Andre Schmidt. Another missed kick.
Didn't really matter. So I'm not really gonna hate on him too bad. But it was 47 yarder. It's not like it was like a chip shot.
Yeah, I was gonna have you come back to that.
Yes, you can have us.
Let us give you a shout out there. So how do I say that? Eric Saul.
[00:40:40] Speaker A: Saul.
[00:40:41] Speaker B: So shout out to Eric Saul from. From Hippie.
You introduced him to the Browns 15 years ago and he's been a die hard fan ever since.
That's how it goes. I feel bad for you, Hippie. I'm sorry you had to. You have to endure this again. Like you said earlier, we're all here for it. Like we know.
We know any. Anybody that's just joining. We got a couple comments on here. You think they'll get rid of the coach? Not right now, but yeah, I just.
Like I said, Andre Schmidt missed a kick. Not a big deal.
[00:41:18] Speaker A: His name is Hippie Corey Bajoraquez.
[00:41:21] Speaker B: He just keeps punting it. That's all we do is punt.
And I had one more note here that I just wanted to talk about is everybody said I was crazy when I. When I highlighted the quinn Sean Judkins vs. Travion Henderson Battle because Trayvon Henderson hasn't done much yet this year. But Trayvon Henderson looked pretty damn good today.
[00:41:42] Speaker A: Good today.
[00:41:43] Speaker B: So. And. And like you said, Quinn Sean got hurt. So I mean, it is what it is. But I just.
That's why it was a matchup. A matchup. That matter?
Yeah.
[00:41:53] Speaker A: Look again, this Browns defense is a good defensive unit in the NFL. And. And Drake May and Treveon Henderson, they balled out. I mean, tutors to those guys.
[00:42:01] Speaker B: Yep.
So let's go ahead and let's move things along. I don't think we could talk about how bad this game was anymore.
Let's do our nominees for Bernie Sportscast Dog of the Week. We'll start with Bone. In case anybody out there doesn't know we nominate.
Each of us nominates a dog of the week candidate. We put it up for a vote on our socials on Mondays so everybody can vote on it. And then we announce the Dog of the Week Tuesday. And then we talk. It'll be on our show on Thursday. So we'll start with Bones. Since he's never here on Sundays anymore, he doesn't want to hang out with us on Sundays anymore.
[00:42:35] Speaker A: Mailed it in.
[00:42:36] Speaker B: He specifically told me all the fans suck and he doesn't want their reactions anymore.
[00:42:42] Speaker A: Is the most beloved person on the show you're just trying to throw some.
[00:42:46] Speaker B: Definitely did not say that. If anything, I'm the only one that's a big enough dick to actually think of that, but, yeah. Bone nominated Miles Garrett. No. No surprise there. So we'll. We'll go to me. Now, I'm gonna go next.
I'm gonna nominate Miles Garrett.
He had a Pretty good game. 5 sacks. Broke his own single game sack record.
So that's. That's pretty good.
No help whatsoever, but he did pretty good. Kenny, who's your. Who's your dog of the week candidate?
[00:43:17] Speaker A: Yeah, you know, obviously we nominate these guys so the fans can vote, but honestly, in this game, there was one guy that played really, really well and deserves to be the dog of the week, and it's Miles Garrett. So I'll go Miles as well. I know we don't usually nominate the same guy across the board, but if you're going to vote for anyone else this week, like, you're just wrong. So, yeah, I'll go Miles Garrett, you know, fastest player to reach the number of sacks that he has.
[00:43:42] Speaker B: This first one under 30 or. Yeah, you know, he's most sacks under 30. That's what it was.
[00:43:47] Speaker A: You know, now, I think part of a rare. A rarefied group of just three guys in the NFL, in the history of the NFL, that have 10 sacks over their first eight consecutive seasons.
[00:43:58] Speaker B: So he basically did it just in this game.
[00:44:01] Speaker A: Yeah, I mean, you know, we go back and forth on the T.J. watt thing. Well, you know, Miles Garrett had five sacks today, and T.J. watt has, you know, four and a half sacks, I think, over the last 300 days. So case rested.
[00:44:15] Speaker B: So. Yeah, so Miles Garrett. Yeah, so Miles Garrett for you, Miles Garrett for me. Miles Garrett for Bone. I'll have that graphic up tomorrow. Let everybody vote on their dog of the week on Monday, per usual.
So, yeah, make sure you get your vote in.
It's. I. I feel like it's gonna be a tight race tomorrow, so just. Just make sure you make sure.
[00:44:36] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:44:38] Speaker B: Final thoughts here today? Uh, I'll start, Kenny. Uh, my final thought is the bye week could not have come at a better time.
There's lots of injuries in this game today, and I don't know how many of them are serious or how many of them are just guys banged up. But between that, just how the season looks in general right now, like, I feel like not just the players, the fans, all need a break at the moment.
So between injuries, a break mentally for everybody, and just the fact that, like, who knows Maybe a miracle will happen in the bye week. I know it's not going to, but maybe a miracle will happen in the bye week and these guys will just come to their senses and say, you know what, we got to start Shador. We have to. Because we have to see what we have. And then from there we can decide if we like him or DG better.
Dollar General and Windows 98, little coconut, little lava lamp, Hawaii 59, whatever you.
[00:45:35] Speaker A: Want to call it.
[00:45:37] Speaker B: Yeah. So we could decide who we like better and run with them for the rest of the season. But yeah, just the buy is much needed right now, so I'm happy it's here.
Kenny, final thoughts.
[00:45:48] Speaker A: Before I get into my final thoughts, one final thing I just wanted to talk about here.
Bye week, trade deadline coming up. I mean, do you have a move that you'd like to see made or.
[00:46:01] Speaker B: Jerome Ford gone.
[00:46:04] Speaker A: Just cut?
[00:46:05] Speaker B: No, if they could get anything for him, like, I'd take a seventh rounder for him, like, just get rid of him.
If they can't, then, yes, cut him.
[00:46:16] Speaker A: Yeah, I, I think for me personally, like, I think everything has to be on the table here, and I think that includes guys like David and Joku.
[00:46:25] Speaker B: I think David and Joker will be gone.
[00:46:27] Speaker A: You know, I know Miles has the contract now, but like I, you know, a team like Dallas, my, you know, could. Could really use a guy like Miles on their defense. And that's a team with a quarterback, you know, so that could be the difference for a team like that. I think everything should be on the table. This team's not going anywhere this year. Like, I would like to see them move some of this talent and you know, hey, let's, let's get crazy. Let's go into next year with three or four first round draft picks. Like, let's just, let's just keep this rebuild.
[00:46:58] Speaker B: Rebuilding Solly. That's how you say his last name. It's in the.
[00:47:02] Speaker A: Yeah, I posted that earlier.
[00:47:03] Speaker B: You missed it. I just saw it. But yeah, I mean, I'm, I'm with you. I mean, everything has to be on the table. But the ones that I think will happen, I think Jerome Ford will be gone. And I think David Ajoku is going to be gone. The emergence of Harold Fannin just makes him. And I hate to say that I love David Njoku. He's. He's awesome, but it kind of makes him expendable at this point. You have a guy that's David Ajoku 2.0, but like six years younger.
[00:47:25] Speaker A: So it's just a Matter of like, where is this team going and you need assets.
[00:47:29] Speaker B: Yeah. And can you imagine like a, like a. I'll throw out like Kansas City coming to you and saying we have a chance to win it all again. You guys don't.
Travis Kelsey is not what he used to be. We could use a dominant tight end. Like that's a team that you give them. David Ajoku. They're going to do something with him.
[00:47:46] Speaker A: Right.
[00:47:47] Speaker B: And they'll probably pay for him too, because they know they might win a Super Bowl. So.
[00:47:50] Speaker A: Yep.
[00:47:52] Speaker B: That's your. That's. That's. Yeah, he'll be gone.
But with that. Kenny, you got any more comments or anything you want to throw. You want to talk about before we, before we sign?
[00:48:01] Speaker A: I'll save the rest for this week's show. So my final thoughts tonight at 2 and 6 after the Browns lose another one in embarrassing fashion, it's 12 straight road losses, my friends. The longest active streak in the NFL.
Help's not coming.
So those of you that schedule your Browns vacations every year, you know that vague that time may be coming more quickly than you anticipated. I don't blame anybody at this point for, for tuning out because this is just not going to get better anytime soon with the vote of confidence this week from Jimmy Stefanski. Just doing Stefanski things, you know, again at the press conference today, you know, not, not immediately just saying, hey, everything's on the table and sticking with that kind of going back that like you were going to see Dylan again coming out of the buy like it's just a fancy doing Stefansky things. This team is not.
This season is not going to get any better. So I don't blame anybody for tuning out. We'll stay tuned in. So if you do tune, tune out. You can find your updates and Brown's news here on the Burning River Sportscast going forward.
[00:49:19] Speaker B: Yeah, it's funny that you said the vote of confidence. I wrote this down while you were talking. It just says vote of confidence this week. And then he does that.
You get a vote of confidence and you come through and that's how you follow it up.
[00:49:33] Speaker A: That's how you reward Jimmy.
[00:49:35] Speaker B: Yeah, Jimmy's got to be himself right now.
And thank you, hippie. We won't be on. We won't be live next Sunday because there won't be a Browns game during the bi week, but we'll be live again the following Sunday.
[00:49:49] Speaker A: So we're taking a Brown vacation next week.
[00:49:51] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, yeah. We aren't. We aren't live when the Browns don't play. We'll be on Thursday. You can check out our bye week show on Thursday.
And with that, let me remind everybody to call the burning of a sportscast hot take hotline. That means you, hippie.
Call this call the burning of a sportscast hot take hotline. Leave your hot area on the Hot Take Hotline. 3302-278808-13302, 2780-8133-0227-8881 row.
[00:50:17] Speaker A: You screwed up the hot take hotline. You've never done it before.
[00:50:20] Speaker B: Yeah, I never have, but yeah, call it. Call the hot take hotline. We want, we want to hear your hot takes. And be sure to check out our gear. Www.thetappenmedia.com backslash shop had had a few more T shirts go out this week. So that was cool.
[00:50:33] Speaker A: Nice.
[00:50:34] Speaker B: And that'll do it for us. Kenny, what can we expect this week?
[00:50:37] Speaker A: What can we expect this week? We will be recording our normal show Monday. We'll be out on Thursday. We'll be recapping the season.
Man, this is gonna be a fun show this season up to this point. Another Browns backers interview. I think we'll hear from a number of friends this week. Probably we'll fill that.
[00:50:53] Speaker B: Yeah, we're working on putting together a good show. I should have probably worked harder though because it's tomorrow that we record.
[00:50:58] Speaker A: So put together a lot of conversations and all the other things you listen to the Burning river sportscast for. Including the same takes over and over and over and over again every week.
[00:51:06] Speaker B: That's what we do until the Browns change something. What can we change?
You know, I don't know. And check us out on social media. Tapping media is on Facebook X and Instagram at the tapping media and Burning ever Sportscast. That's this podcast is on Facebook, Instagram, tick tock and YouTube @burning sportscast. And on X at Burning or pod. You can find our podcast. Review each podcast I'm talking to Apple Podcast, Spotify, YouTube Music, Amazon Music, Stitcher, Pandora, Hirt Radio Podcast, Castro Good Pods. We were number one ranked football number one. Number one and so many more. And please, please, please leave us reviews on your podcast app of choice. Help us continue to grow and keep bringing you the best damn Cleveland Browns pod in the land.
That's it.
[00:51:44] Speaker A: That's it.
[00:51:45] Speaker B: That's what we got for you.
[00:51:47] Speaker A: We'll catch you next week. Tune in. Don't be part of the problem. Be the whole damn problem.
[00:51:51] Speaker B: I was gonna say the Browns are part of the problem to lead you into that, but didn't need to.
[00:51:55] Speaker A: They are. They're a problem.
[00:51:56] Speaker B: They're the whole damn problem.
And only you can prevent river fires.
Burning River.
[00:52:04] Speaker A: Sportscast Burning River.
[00:52:06] Speaker B: Good night, Cleveland.
[00:52:07] Speaker A: Good night, Cleveland.
[00:52:08] Speaker B: Good night, Akan.
[00:52:29] Speaker A: Sam.
