Show Notes
It's time! Time for Burning River Sportscast to go live again!
Join as we discuss another disappointing Cleveland Browns loss. This time to the division rival Cincinnati Bengals.
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Episode Transcript
[00:00:42] Speaker A: It's time. Time for the burning river sportscast. Bangles 21, browns 14. And we'll break it all down right now. Welcome into a very special gameday live edition of the Burning river sportscast, presented by the fine folks it's happened media. I'm Kenny Thunder. Joining me tonight, if ice cream were people, we'd call him soft vanilla. He's red hot Ronnie jams. And thankfully, it was just an achilles. And not the big bone man who is with us tonight as well. Gentlemen, good evening. Happy to have you both.
[00:01:12] Speaker B: Good evening. What's going on?
[00:01:17] Speaker A: Back to red hot. Where can the listeners find the dopest dope they ever heard on a podcast? A number one rated football podcast, all of good pods, as well as the unofficial podcast of Cleveland Brown packers everywhere.
[00:01:28] Speaker C: In the official podcast of some Cleveland brownsbacker somewhere.
[00:01:33] Speaker A: Yeah, we'll see if that stays after.
[00:01:35] Speaker C: Yeah. Yeah.
Listen, before we get started, I just have to say, everybody needs to bear with me. I was at the game today and I'm a little horse just busy cheering for Deshawn's injury. I was. I was not.
[00:01:48] Speaker B: You were. You were the loudest. I heard you.
[00:01:50] Speaker C: No, I wasn't just coming right through the tv. No, you guys could hear me from section 528, row 32, which, in case anybody knows the stadium, that's literally against the fence.
But no, I was not. I was yelling a lot, though. I was booing a lot throughout the game.
And I'm not ashamed to say that this team needs to be better. But anyways, 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, where we are a number one rated football podcast and so many more. And don't forget to subscribe to YouTube. The only place you can find our video podcast and check us out on Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok. Our handle for all those socials is at Burning river sportscast. And we are on x with the handle at Burning river pod.
And while you're at it, check out our merch, www.thetappenmedia.com. backslash shop. All kinds of stuff in there. Brook Park, Brown's gear. Now that it's official, we got a river gear. River gear, river gear and our chubb line. Make sure you go get some chub gear. He's back. Full chip.
Before we get started, I want to give a quick shout out to some of our sponsors. Topat distillery. Topaz Topat distillery and award winning craft still relocated in Akron, Ohio, they focus on high quality spirits, carefully made in small batches. Top hat distillery, handcrafted, award winning, local and family owned, and then true fan travel. They make away games, home games with all inclusive travel packages. We will be going with them to New Orleans next month.
Even though the team is not very good, I am still highly looking forward to this. It's going to be a good time. So if you haven't got your tickets to it, make sure you do. Come join us. We'd love to party with everybody down there, down there in the big easy. So they call you the big easy. Yeah.
What?
[00:03:43] Speaker B: Nola country.
[00:03:45] Speaker A: You're the big easy.
[00:03:47] Speaker C: Thank you.
And on today's show, this way, you can look forward to, you can look forward to me having no voice. Uh, it's probably pretty rough, but, you know, we'll get through this. We're going to recap the Browns game against the Bengals. Our initial reactions, how we're feeling about the Browns, how we feel about the big Watson injury, the return of Nick Chubb, and probably much, much more that I'm not even thinking about right now. So let's jump right into it and get things started by reminding everyone to call the burning over sportscast hot take hotline.
[00:04:17] Speaker A: Hot take line.
[00:04:19] Speaker C: Hot take hotline. Don't forget to call and leave your hot takes on the hot take hotline. Remember, these are hot takes.
We want hot takes.
[00:04:30] Speaker A: Should be hot takes after today.
[00:04:32] Speaker C: The number to call there. And I know you got a lot of head hot takes right now. The Browns nation is just ablaze right now.
So I know everybody's got something to say. Everybody kind of falls on the side of what's, what kind of went on today, you know, when Deshaun Watson got hurt. So check in with us. The number to call 3302-2780-8033-0227-80 and, Kenny, thank you for putting that at the bottom of screen for everybody to see.
[00:05:05] Speaker A: Yeah, because I can't hear you.
[00:05:07] Speaker C: Thank you. Thank you.
[00:05:08] Speaker A: You're welcome.
[00:05:09] Speaker C: But, yeah, so, guys, let's just jump right into it. We got the week seven recap here.
Browns. Bengals. Browns looked bad.
[00:05:19] Speaker A: Dumpster fire.
[00:05:20] Speaker C: I mean, they looked bad. And we'll get to the big news that came out of this game in a minute.
But they just, I can't tell you how many times I just wanted to bang my head against the bleachers sitting up there because of just unforced errors, things like how many, how many illegal shifts can we get in one game? How many illegal legal motion illegal formation. Like, those are coaching mistakes. You should have your team ready to play and they should know how to run plays.
[00:05:54] Speaker A: And it's not week one or two or three. I mean, we're into the season now.
[00:05:58] Speaker C: I'll even give you week four because we didn't, yeah, we didn't have any preseason. We didn't have. Some of these guys missed a bunch of training camp. I'll give you week four and week five. It's, it's neither of those. We're week seven.
We're week seven.
[00:06:11] Speaker A: This is not really the offensive line. Especially, like, you had most of your starters back. Like, outside of Wyatt Teller. Like, you have guys that have played regularly on that line today.
[00:06:20] Speaker C: No. You could have fooled me.
Yeah. I mean, that was the most frustrating thing is I'm like, these are easy things to fix.
[00:06:30] Speaker A: Like, they must not be that easy.
[00:06:34] Speaker C: Kevin Stefanski can't figure it out, that's for sure. Stefanik is.
Don't get me started on Stefanic because having a team week in and week out, just not a, not ready to play. Like, they come out every single weekend. They, they just look flat. They look like they don't want to be there. They look like they're going through the motions. And the only thing that they've rehearsed is their choreographed dances after every, every pass breakup or every play that goes their way, and then we get a penalty and brings it back anyways.
[00:07:05] Speaker A: Oh, yeah. Denzel Ward had a great celebration after he had that near pick off when they were down 14.
[00:07:10] Speaker C: Yeah. And I, that's part of the reason why I sound like this is because by that time in the game, I was literally yelling. I'm like, you're down 14.
Like, what's the point? And they, and that wasn't the only one on special teams late in the game.
They had Majorquez kicked a punt inside, like the five, and they downed it. And they did, like a team celebration. I'm like, you're down 14 points at the end of the game and you're celebrating getting the ball down there. Like, like, and this was before they got to the point where it was an onside kick and they might have a chance. You know, the air quotes might have a chance. They didn't have a chance. But this was before that. That was, this was when the game felt out of reach because, you know, we had just thrown another pick and we had done this or that or whatever it, like, I mean, the game.
[00:08:01] Speaker A: Felt out of reach even after Nick Chubb scored his touchdown because we couldn't an extra point through what is.
[00:08:07] Speaker C: Yeah, there's. I didn't even think to add that to our outline here. Dustin Hopkins, what are you doing?
[00:08:13] Speaker A: I'm almost wondering, like, like, how big of, like, how big is losing Charlie Hewitt?
[00:08:20] Speaker C: Yeah, I was wondering that today as well.
[00:08:22] Speaker A: Seems like as soon as he left, like, all of a sudden, Dustin Hopkins can't kick a field goal.
[00:08:26] Speaker C: Bone, he's your boy. What do you think about this?
[00:08:29] Speaker B: Yeah, I no longer love him. He's.
He's in my dog house.
[00:08:34] Speaker A: The affair is over.
[00:08:35] Speaker C: That is a, that was a fickle love that you guys had.
[00:08:39] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:08:39] Speaker C: It's not like, it's not like Jonas.
[00:08:41] Speaker B: Brothers love field goals and game winning kicks and extra points is important.
[00:08:46] Speaker A: So there's no love like Jonas brothers love.
[00:08:50] Speaker C: No bone could never turn on them.
But, yeah, I mean, it's just all around and it's just kind of what we've been talking about for seemingly weeks now is it trickles. It seems to be trickling into every single aspect of the game. You got coaching, it's been bad. You've got special teams has been bad. Defense has been bad. They play better today, but they still, you know, there were spots. I texted you guys during the game and I was like, juan Thornhill literally just called an audible in the secondary and then didn't cover the guy.
Like, he called it and he missed the assignment. It was clear it was his missed assignment, too. He came up and everybody else turned around to look at him. He wasn't there.
[00:09:34] Speaker B: Oh, gosh.
[00:09:35] Speaker A: Safety. Looking for safety help.
[00:09:36] Speaker C: Yeah. I was just like, are you kidding? Like, he's, you know, he's. He's going around giving the x like we used to do.
He's telling everybody like, hey, we got to get into this other thing. I see something and then I just. You're not going to do your job. The captain in the secondary just doesn't do what he's supposed to.
[00:09:52] Speaker B: He's busy making the call.
[00:09:55] Speaker A: I mean, how many weeks this year have we had double digit penalties?
[00:10:00] Speaker B: Every week.
[00:10:01] Speaker A: That's every week, right?
[00:10:03] Speaker C: Yeah.
And how many. What do we end up with in this?
[00:10:06] Speaker A: 110, ten or 80, I think so.
[00:10:09] Speaker C: We do have a question, guys on Facebook that came in, why was James benched pregame? Well, the rumor was that they're looking to move him, so they bench to avoid injury.
[00:10:19] Speaker A: It sounds like the. The locker room at least just, again, this is rumor stuff, but sounds like the locker room is severely fractured, a fractured coming out of last year with guys that wanted Alex Van Pelt to be around, the guys that wanted Joe Flacco to be around, a la Mari Cooper. Now, playing in Buffalo, Joe Flacco guy is the rumor. And Jameis Winston obviously comes in. This big, charismatic guy a lot of people, like, has a history of being a successful passer. These guys see each other every day in practice. Right? And so, again, the rumor in the locker room is what you're starting to hear buzzing about, that people on the team want to see Jamis under center, just to see if that could provide a spark on the offense. And so this morning, it was kind of no surprise, I think, to see his name demoted to third string to emergency quarterback.
So it's kind of a turn of events, because then, obviously, DTR comes in, and then Jamis did eventually get to play. I guess he had a finger injury towards the end of the game, which is what allowed Jamis to actually get on the field.
[00:11:26] Speaker C: And Jamis played better than any of the quarterbacks. I mean, score a touchdown, drive.
[00:11:30] Speaker A: I mean, there's that garbage, garbage time kind of. But, I mean, yeah, I mean, he looked. He looks totally fine.
[00:11:36] Speaker B: At least he at least threw the ball to Jerry Judy.
[00:11:38] Speaker A: Yeah, he threw the ball down the field. I mean, that's what we've been asking for all year long.
[00:11:42] Speaker C: Oh, man. That was just a. I'm thinking about things that I was texting you guys during the game. That was. The other one is. Is Deshaun Watson. I understand he was 15 to 17 on the day, and I'm not shitting on his performance before he went down at all. I think it was adequate. It was fine. Like, it was fine. It wasn't like.
It still wasn't $230 million quarterback esque, but it was fine.
But the big play, Kenny, you mentioned that the announcers got on him a little bit, and they started showing all the open receivers that he was missing downfield.
[00:12:17] Speaker A: Yeah, he was on a call with Spearho. Spiro Diaz, I think, was on a call today, and they kind of went back and they were like, look, there's been no less than five plays where he's had receivers wide open downfield, 1520 yards, and is just hitting the checkdown guy, which, like, again, they weren't being overly critical. They were like, look, it's a positive play. Went for three, four yards. But, I mean, here he's got Njoku wide open in the middle of the field for. For 20 yards. Like, you need those chunk plays as an offense. And they kind of admitted they were like, look, I was a Browns fan, I'd be frustrated with this offense because I'm watching wide receivers become wide open in the middle of field and down the field, and they never get the.
[00:12:53] Speaker C: Ball thrown their way well and promptly, right after you texted me and said they were getting on him, I said, well, I'll watch the next few plays and just see what happens. The very next play, we were driving. I think it might have been the drive that Nick Chubb ended up scoring the touchdown, but we were driving, and he threw for a first down. On the very next play, it was just Cedric Tillman coming across the middle. He caught him on the right side of the field, and it was a good pickup. It was like a 1214 yard pickup for a first down, which is fine. Like you said, good, you know, positive play. It was fine. But then I look over and Jerry Judy is literally standing in the end zone, nobody within, like, 15 yards of him, just waving his arms. And I'm like, how do you not see that? It wasn't like he was on the opposite side of the field, either. He was just 15 yards further than Cedric Tillman was.
[00:13:41] Speaker A: Jerry Judy had a frustrating day. I mean, they panned him on the sidelines a number of times, and he was throwing his helmet and, yeah, did not look good.
[00:13:50] Speaker C: I mean, I'd be pissed if I was him, too.
Levi Crozier on Facebook just followed up on his question. After you answered that, Kenny, he said, so everyone wants you to be their quarterback, so you're not their quarterback.
[00:14:03] Speaker A: That's exactly right. Yes.
According to Kevin Stefanski, Deshaun Watson going into today's game still gave them the best chance to win, end quote.
[00:14:13] Speaker C: Yeah. So, yeah, so let's go ahead and get into that real quick, since we're on the Deshaun Watson topic. Obviously, the big news out of this game was Deshaun Watson goes down. It's, they say, possibly an Achilles injury. It's clearly an Achilles injury. That toast, he's not coming back from that this year. He possibly won't come back till mid to late next year. Like, that's a. That's a bad injury.
[00:14:42] Speaker A: Yeah. Achilles is tough for. For anyone, right? I mean, it's a. That's a harrowing injury to have, especially for guys that rely on your speed and strength to do their profession. I mean, that's. It's one of those. That's really tough to come back from. It takes a long time to rehab.
You end up with muscle atrophy and a lot of other things because of the time off. So it's. It's not good at all. I mean, Rogers made a pretty miraculous recovery out of his, to be honest. I mean, prior to the Rogers recovery, Achilles sometimes was a year and a half, two year injury. So, you know, even if Deshawn rehabs and comes back from this healthy, it likely is going to be this time next year or later, maybe Christmas time, before he'd be ready to play.
So you can, you know, empathize with that part of it in terms of kind of watching it go down and seeing his reaction on the field, for sure.
[00:15:39] Speaker C: Yeah. And I will say this. There's a lot of mixed reactions in person today when we were there, and I. And we'll go ahead and get into this because I know this is what's lightened up all of Twitter in the room.
[00:15:54] Speaker A: This is the dumpster.
[00:15:55] Speaker C: Yeah, we're going for it right now. You mentioned before we jumped on here, Kenny, that Brown's Twitter and Brown's nation is in a civil war right now regarding the way the crowd acted. And like I said, I was there, so I got to witness it. And basically, let me walk you through this.
So he goes down, right? You know, non contact injury. Um, I was a little confused at first because, like, I thought maybe somebody tripped him and he just tweaked his.
[00:16:22] Speaker A: Ankle back up real quick to. To introductions first.
[00:16:28] Speaker C: Oh, injured. Okay. So it was hostile from the beginning in this for Deshaun Watson. Um, so we got. We got in there, and I. We went in early specifically so we could see introductions. Cause it's Nick Chubb's first game back, and I was. I was turned. I was like, all day. That's all I could talk about was like, I can't wait to see Nick Chubb.
And we get in there, and I actually have video that I can let you include in our full podcast later this week, Kenny. But when Deshawn comes out and they announced Deshawn's name, because those two were last, it was Deshawn and then Nick Chubb. And when they announced Deshawn's name, a chorus of boos, the loudest boos, the entire game, the entire day of anything. Even I'm talking louder than when the Bengals came out. They were booing Deshaun Watson, the whole crowd, everybody.
[00:17:22] Speaker A: And at this point in time, that's. That's fair, right? I mean, regardless of what everybody thinks after the injury, like, this is before.
[00:17:28] Speaker C: The injury, and I was booing, too, because I was done with DeShawn Watson being our quarterback and running this team into the ground, I was ready to move on to somebody else.
[00:17:37] Speaker A: That was the pent up frustration of thousands of people that have watched this guy not be a good quarterback for a long time.
[00:17:44] Speaker C: Yeah. Yes. And so immediately after that, like, I'm talking, as soon as they announce his name, it's almost like they. They knew what they were gonna get when they announced a Sean Watson's name, because they didn't linger on it. They immediately went into, like, the Nick Chubb montage and, like, all this. All these Batman graphics on the jumbotron and everything else and announced Nick Chubb, and the place goes insane.
Like, as far as just, like, player, you know, announcing the players coming onto the field, by far the loudest I've ever heard it. When a player got announced, and it was just. It gave me goosebumps when he was announced at the beginning of the game, because it's rare that you see a city in a fan base fully embrace a player like that. Like, I know that there's, like, we all, like Miles Garrett. We all. You know, you can point to different. We all love Phil Dawson. We all love Joe Thomas, and Joe Thomas is probably the closest thing to niche Hub, I would say, as far as if something were to happen to him. But, like, it was crazy, the just how everybody. You look around and everybody's faces, it was almost like everybody wanted to cry. Like, they're like, oh, my God, he's back. And it was just amazing to see that with a fan base and to see them be fully behind Nick as he ran onto the field, and he kind of stopped at the end and, like, looked around, you could tell he was taking it all in, just like, this is. This is phenomenal.
[00:19:08] Speaker A: So, I mean, I'll be honest, just his. His essay in the Players Tribune this week had me watery eyed just reading through that and everything he's been through.
[00:19:17] Speaker C: So, yeah, and so from the rip, I mean, the crowd kind of set the tone that if Deshaun Watson was going to play bad, they were going to let him know. Now, luckily, not that he played. I just. I already mentioned, it's not that he played phenomenally, but he was 15 of 17, so there wasn't, like, a ton of plays where you were, like.
Like, where the crowd got a chance to really start to build momentum and boo him. What started happening throughout the game was the offense was still sputtering and big, big moments so that we couldn't keep drives going.
And so you heard this low murmur that I. And I know I texted you guys, about this. You heard this low murmur that started to build throughout the game of, like, something. Everybody's going to go nuts on the offense and on Deshaun Watson specifically here soon because we're just not moving the ball like we should.
Even though he was, you know, completing passes, we weren't sustaining drives, we weren't scoring points, we weren't doing those.
[00:20:15] Speaker A: And that's the thing that we've seen out of Deshawn a couple of times, right, is when Deshawn was playing really, really well, like the best Deshawn can play. He was efficient, right? He was. He'd go through these stretches where he was eight of nine and ten of eleven for, you know, 64 yards or whatever. It wasn't like he was lighting the world on fire, making mistakes and he was taking care of the football. And again, that was for whatever better or worse. Like, that was the ceiling of Deshaun Watson. Now, like, however we got here, there's a million questions and things, but that was as good as he could play. He would. He, he could at least get into a rhythm sometimes and complete a number of passes, short passes in a row and move the football a little bit. The problem was he disappeared in crunch time and was. Wasn't able to make those same throws.
[00:21:04] Speaker C: Yeah. And so this murmur continued to grow and continued to grow. And then all of a sudden it happened and he went down. And when he first went down, like, very first went down, it was just kind of confusion around the building because nobody knew what happened right away. And it was very quiet at first. When everybody realized that Deshaun Watson was hurt, it wasn't deafening cheers at that point, it was like there was some. I don't know how else to put it, but almost like optimistic noises around the, the stadium. Like, people were like, oh, we might see somebody else, this is good. And people started talking and whatever else. And then when the cart came out, this was the part that was really effed up for me, is like, as soon as you saw the cart, the crowd erupted and everybody started cheering and everybody was so happy that DeShawn was getting carted off the field because they knew there was no chance for him to get back in the game. And I was on the side. Like, I'm.
I understand that most of that probably came from frustration with not, not only DeShawn Watson, but the coaching staff, with the owners, with everybody else. But at the same time, like, I was like, this is kind of messed up, guys. Like, the dude's getting carted off the field. Like, I don't know how I feel about everybody cheering here. It felt, for lack of a better term, it felt icky to me. I was like, I don't like this. I was just kind of quiet. I was in shock. I was like, I don't. I don't know what to make of this and how bad it is. Until Kenny texted me and told me his achilles was 100% ruptured.
[00:22:44] Speaker A: Yeah, I mean, the replay, they show, I mean, they had a great angle of just directly behind the pocket, and as soon as he hit the back of his drop back, essentially, it.
You just saw it roll, roll like a fruit by the foot.
[00:22:56] Speaker C: And so, I mean, I don't know what your guys are feelings, are you. I mean, I'm not. I'm not here to judge anybody. I just. To me, it felt, when the crowd went, when the crowd got his turned as they did, that Deshawn was getting carted off. It felt weird to me.
[00:23:12] Speaker A: Yeah.
Sorry, Bill, go ahead.
[00:23:15] Speaker B: I was going to say, I think it kind of comes from just weeks of frustration where you just hear Stefanski in the press conference just saying, we're changing nothing, we're going to run it back. We're going through the same thing. And I think everybody's kind of thoughts were, the only way Deshaun's getting off the field this year is if he gets hurt. And at that point, it happened, and everybody wanted a quarterback change. Everybody wanted to see Winston or DTR.
They wanted a change. And it wasn't happening from the administration, whether that was Haslam's and Andrew Barry telling Kevin he wasn't allowed to take him out of the game or whatever it was. I think there's a lot of murmurs about that, that, yeah, him getting hurt was the only option of him getting switched out with somebody else. And I think that's the frustration aspect of it where, you know, people get into that. But.
[00:24:01] Speaker C: And I agree with that, but like I said, I can understand it, but I just.
[00:24:05] Speaker A: Yeah, things so r1 quick, nefarious sidebar.
I'm already starting to see some stories being put together about the fact that the Browns administration has an insurance policy on Deshaun Watson's contract. So, you know, they want to talk about, you know, the fans, you know, maybe cheering or being excited in some way that Deshawn got hurt.
Don't forget that the admin knew this as well, that this might be their one out in terms of, like, why was Deshawn still on the field, even though he was playing poorly? Well, again, the administration knows the only way that they might be able to create some cap room here and get out of this hell would be for Deshaun Watson to get hurt, which is where we're at now. Uh, the second thing is, yeah, the Sean Watson got hurt. Um, and, like, now we're in this weird place because I'm seeing a lot of fan on fan crime right now. A lot of friendly fire out there. Um, you know, I think, first off, from the players, I'm. I'm literally blown away by this. I mean, I understand guys having their guys back, whatever, but it's interesting to me that after three years of pretending away, sexual assault allegations and the stories of the face of our franchise taking advantage of women doing things so unspeakable that the tv and local radio literally can't even repeat them on air, they can't say these things on live broadcasting. That Browns fans are actually now the bad guys in this story. So some pretty interesting mental gymnastics to get there. I mean, to sit in, lecture Browns fans after what this organization has put them through the last three years is just. Honestly, it's ridiculous. I mean, if you weren't on your soapbox giving lectures about morality and the seriousness of sexual assault three years ago when they signed this guy, like, you can miss me with your newfoundland righteousness. We've got more people worried about booze and cheers in this town right now than we have worried about being one in six and how we got here. And, like, that's just a loser's lament. And, like, first off, like, are we really looking for morality in a place where people start drinking at 07:00 a.m. they piss outside. And fights happen regularly, like Cleveland, but across.
[00:26:27] Speaker C: I witnessed the pissing outside that happened.
[00:26:29] Speaker A: Well, and, yeah, I haven't seen a lot of fights at Cleveland Brownstein, but every week you see on Twitter videos of people fighting in football stadiums. I mean, I think a lot of adults have. Have in their mind, like, when they're taking their kids to the game. Like, there's probably an age threshold now where you're looking to see, like, is my kid mature enough to be outside with all these people? Because it's kind of chaotic. It's a place for lunatic fans, right? Like, the NFL is not necessarily a wholesome place to bring small children anymore.
So again, I think we're just looking for morality in all the wrong places. And let me be clear. Like, I wanted Deshawn bench not hurt. And so while I don't outright condone cheering for an injury to anyone? I do think the reaction is understandable, and here's why. I think this is so different than any other player in the history of the league being injured. And here's why is because we've been told from day one, from day one, we have to separate Deshaun Watson, the football player, from the human. We've spent three years dehumanizing this guy so that we could palate the fact that he was going to be the most important person on our football team. So when you spend that much time saying, well, we gotta ignore the whole human side here and just, you know, as a football player, we're just gonna talk about football, blah, blah, blah. Like, that's what we've done from the onset. So I don't know how we're surprised now when you get this, what we. Classless, dehumanizing reaction. It's what we've been told literally from ownership since day one. Like, look, all the stuff that happens outside of football, that's not really important. Don't pay attention to that stuff. We don't want to talk about allegations and settled lawsuits and all these things and, and real victims on the other side of, of those, um, we're just going to talk about Deshawn the football player and Deshawn the football player. Guys, Deshawn sucked.
[00:28:37] Speaker C: Sucks a million asses a second.
[00:28:39] Speaker A: So, like, it's just. I, again, is it right or wrong? Like, I'm not going to make that. I'm going to say it's understandable that we've put people in a position where they. They really never accepted this guy as a human. You know, we always go through this when we sign a guy like Brian Hoyer, and you go, oh, local kid, homegrown. We like this guy. Like, you get to know them personally and you enjoy the fact that they're on our football teams. That was never the case with Deshaun Watson. We were always told, we don't really care, but we're not going to talk about the Sean the human. We're going to talk about player.
[00:29:13] Speaker C: It is something that I've never really taken the time to dive into that deeply, on that level that you're talking about. But it is funny, now that you mention it, literally everybody that they've brought in since I've been a Browns fan, and they'll give you 25 reasons why you should love the guy.
[00:29:29] Speaker A: Yep.
[00:29:30] Speaker C: And Sean was the only one that.
[00:29:31] Speaker A: They did not, never could do that with Deshawn. And so just let me also offer an alternative thought here, too. Just, I think the reaction was, was mixed in the stadium, kind of as you alluded to there, Ronnie, but I.
[00:29:42] Speaker C: Do believe after the, like I said, when the cart came out, there was a big cheer. But then, like, half the crowd turned on the half that cheered in the stadium. It was instantly civil war. Like, you had people yelling at each other and swearing at each other. Like, are you serious? Like, the dude's injured. They're like, basically the response was, f you. I'll say what I want.
[00:30:03] Speaker A: And that's my alternative thought here, though, is, is given the mixed reaction, I think that it was because not necessarily everyone was cheering that Deshawn was hurt, but because they were excited about finally getting the chance to see this team and its offense run by someone else. And you can count me in that crowd. Like, like, if Deshawn were where he was supposed to be today, where he had earned the right to be, he would have been on the sidelines today, clipboard in hand, and Achilles still intact. Yeah, like, that's, that's where he should have been. So again, I just think, like, we gotta, we gotta chill out for a second as Browns fans, like, and, and keep in mind who the real enemy is here, because I'm way more disgusted about this front office and where they've led this organization and warp speed to fans hating fans, players talking down to them, the civil war they've created by mismanaging this whole scenario from day one. Like, that's what I'm disgusted about. Like, you've turned a fan base against a team and a team against the fan base. This team and now this fan base are in utter disrepair, and it's going to take years to rebuild.
[00:31:13] Speaker C: Like you said, it's the, the fall was so fast. Like, last season with Joe Flacco was the most fun I've ever had watching the Browns that I can remember. And then fast forward to this season. And this is the moat. And again, we're talking. We all went through one in 31. This is the most miserable I've ever been watching a Browns team.
And it's because of all the things that we've been saying nonstop is like, we knew what to expect going into the one in 31. We knew it was a complete rebuild. We knew that we were going to be lacking in talent, but we would at least try our best to win games where we could, and that's exactly what they did.
This team has an abundance of talent, and it seems like nobody wants to play, and so it's the complete opposite. You came into this this season with. With, at the very least, playoff aspirations.
But at the most, like, you're talking, like, division, you know, championship, or, I'm sorry, conference championship. So, yeah.
[00:32:17] Speaker A: Like, and in seven weeks, we've gone from that to. This could be a complete fire sale. Like, don't. Don't buy any jerseys. Don't get too excited about any players that you've watched, because I don't believe there's anyone that is safe, maybe outside of Nick Chubb right now.
[00:32:34] Speaker C: You know, everybody would have said Miles Garrett, obviously, but his name's already started to be floating around, and he's even played into that himself a little bit, and he played into it even more today. I think he kind of walked into it. I don't think he meant to, but he did when he made the comment about Deshaun Watson's been a model citizen.
[00:32:53] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:32:54] Speaker C: Like, you can't say something like that with the things that he's gone through. Like, even if you are just trying to have your teammates back, he has been the opposite of a model citizen in the NFL.
[00:33:06] Speaker A: Yeah. And look, all these guys are coached in how to talk to the mediaev. Um, there's times when.
When, regardless of what the temperature in the room is, like, you just gotta let it cool down, regardless of whatever your truth is. Like, you just gotta. You gotta kind of take a pass on the question. And today was probably one of those days that we probably should have let everything settle, because it's just out of control out there. It's an absolute Dumpster fire. I mean, you get. You got players talking down to fans, fans now, you know, hating some of these players. And we're talking about, again, all the. All the Deshawn stuff. It's like. Like, it's ugly. It's an ugly conversation. And again, I just like, my whole piece. My whole lament is like. Like, keep. Keep your eyes on and the focus on who put you here, because at the end of the day, like, I get Miles is trying to have his guys back, and I get that the fans were understandably frustrated, but, like, it's the Haslams and the people in charge of this organization that have put this whole thing in motion.
[00:34:08] Speaker C: Yeah.
And here's another thing, Kenny, you mentioned, you know, we just talked about the fall from last year to this year.
Let's just go the last 24 hours. This was supposed to be a monumental occasion. Nick Chubb was returning everybody. I've never seen at least this. I shouldn't say never. This season, I have not seen our fan base as United, besides maybe opening day as they were for this game, and to witness Nick Chubb come back in the second that Deshaun Watson went down out the window, and this. It completely turned. And this day was. I mean, it's clearly more remembered for that. It's going to be more remembered for that than Nick Chubb's return. Like, sure, it was great Nick Chubb came back. Like I said, his. His player introduction was the loudest player introduction I've ever seen in Brown Stadium.
When he scored his touchdown, we had all been cheering, Chubb, Chubb, Chubb, Chubb for, you know, however many a quarter and a half at that point. And then when he scored, the place went nuts again.
Basically, every time he touched the ball and you heard his name, everybody went nuts. And so it was still, even though they were losing at halftime and, like, going into the third quarter, it was still a good feeling. Like everybody was like, yeah, we're losing, but Nick Chubb's back and we're excited. And then. And as soon as Deshawn went down, it all changed.
[00:35:32] Speaker A: Yeah. And. And things again just got progressively worse. Like, as soon as the game ended and these guys all hit the microphones and Twitter went ablaze.
I mean, this is like Bottlegate 2.0, but without the bottles. I mean, the. This is an embarrassment across the board just because of just the total outcome here, which, again, is just everybody hating everyone, which is just unnecessary. So it's very disappointing on what, to your point, should have been a celebratory day, an exciting day, a fun day, a welcoming back, a guy that is revered across the city and is a fan favorite to everyone.
And now we're left with this.
[00:36:15] Speaker C: Yeah. And just the dichotomy of it. Like, you know, everybody turning on Deshawn and hating Deshawn. Like, collectively, overall, I think the city is, you know, I don't speak for everybody, but I think overall, the city's pretty much done with them. Regardless of how you feel about people booing his injury or cheering for his injury or whatever, the city as a whole is done with him being their quarterback.
[00:36:39] Speaker A: Yeah. Look, I mean, we talked like, this is a long term, lengthy recovery.
Again, I don't wish injury on anybody. I do hope that this is kind of the end of the Deshaun Watson experience here in Cleveland. I hope he can, you know, rehab and get healthy and maybe find success in another town somewhere. But I don't think we need to go back down this road once he's been cleared to play football again.
[00:37:09] Speaker C: Well, and just what I was going to say is I just want to drive home the fact that I know fans are in a civil war over to Sean Watson, the handling of whether you cheered or you didn't cheer, whatever the case may be for that injury. But in that, like I said, that's what this day is going to be remembered for, rather than Nick Chubb. But being at the game, I again want to reiterate just the fact that the whole everybody was behind Nick Chubb and, and the love that the city of Cleveland and all the fans have for him. You could feel it all day long. So it's just, you know, a lot of negative things happen today, but it was one of the most positive things I've ever seen in Cleveland Brown Stadium on the same day. So pretty wild to see.
[00:37:57] Speaker A: So I think with that, we've kind of talked to Nazi in here about Deshawn. What do we think about Nick Chubb's actual return?
[00:38:09] Speaker C: I'll let you go, Bone.
[00:38:12] Speaker B: It was exciting to see him on the field, but aside from the touchdown, it was somewhat uneventful.
I think he was average, two yards of carry and I think he had like eleven carries. So I think they, they put him in a little bit and they didn't, you know, overuse him. They. I think Deontay Foreman had quite a few carries and Pierce strong kind of spelled them as well. But, I mean, he scored, which I think was great. I think that was, you know, hopefully part of the game plan to get him in the end zone and they did that. So, so that was, that was memorable, Kenny?
[00:38:44] Speaker A: Yeah, I mean, I think, again, all those things, it was exciting to see him back out on the field. Obviously, just to have him back in the lineup is huge for this team.
I'm not worried. But I think it was clear that we always talk about guys coming into this season, right? If there's a holdout or anything else, it's like you can be in shape and work out the best trainers in the world and lift, you know, a million pounds, all these things. But there's a difference between being in shape and in game shape. And I think that that was the one thing that was kind of clear today was it's going to be a couple of weeks, I think, before we really see vintage Nick Chubb. Um, which again, like, not, not his fault, not a knock on him or anything, or his preparation. I just think, um, like his, his vision and things. Like, it's going to take a while before those get back to the elite level that they were at, and for him to physically feel and be at game shape and game speed, I mean, I think we've probably all witnessed this, right? Just even in smaller scales, playing youth football, middle school, high school, college, like, it doesn't matter what time, which sport you take time off of, and how well equipped you are physically coming into the season. There's a difference between the way you come in and the way you feel four and five weeks into the season.
[00:40:11] Speaker C: Yeah, I would agree with that. The conditioning part of it and being in game shape. The other thing that you mentioned, some of the things like vision and those types of things, and I don't necessarily think.
I don't think you said this either, Kenny. I'm not saying that, but I don't think he's lost any of those things. I think it was.
I think his adrenaline was high today.
I think he was coming back. You know, like I mentioned, all the stuff with everybody rallying around him, the letter that he wrote, all that, it was just a big momentous for him. And I think a little bit of what happened was your adrenaline gets high and you rush. And he just. I think he was pressing to make that big play and to get everybody excited and out of their seats. And it was almost like that patience that we've come to know and love just wasn't there today. And again, I'm not saying it's, it's gone by any means. I just think that he was for Nick Chubb and what we're used to, he was rushing a little bit and pressing to make that play so well.
[00:41:13] Speaker A: Yeah, I mean, we're so used to watching Nick Chubb get behind an offensive lineman and take his, his jump cuts here and there and then pop out on the other side and run for 1819 yards just out of. Just pop out of a pile, you know? So I think that, to your point, like, that's kind of what was missing today, which we didn't get a chance to see, unfortunately.
[00:41:32] Speaker B: But you know what? You know what Nick Chub gotta. His, like, first touch of the football was he was left high and dry in the middle of the field, extending out to catch a ball over his head.
[00:41:41] Speaker A: True.
[00:41:43] Speaker B: That was nice.
[00:41:45] Speaker A: And really on like one of the, I can't remember if it was the next player or play after the next play after that.
He was by himself, basically in pass pro back there, and picked up a free runner, which was impressive. Again, just for a guy that hadn't played football for 400 days, just talking.
[00:42:03] Speaker C: About the same play I was about.
[00:42:04] Speaker A: To make what's that?
[00:42:07] Speaker C: I say, you might be talking about the same play I was about to bring up. Was it the broken play?
[00:42:12] Speaker A: I don't even know. It was just. It was just a straight drawback, but there was just a free rusher and it was just. It was Nick and their backer, like one on one and he just blew it up.
[00:42:21] Speaker C: The. I think it was the same play, but. But Deshawn ran into him and ran into Chubb and it looked like, like the fake. Whatever way they were going to do the fake, whether it was probably Deshawn, let's be honest, it probably wasn't Nick Chubb, but he went the wrong way, like, to give him the fake, and he ran right into him.
And Nick Chubb's, like, knocked off balance, falling backwards, and he just, like, gets her. You got to watch the replay. It's one of the most. You can see in his eyes. He's like, oh, God, I got to get there. And he literally, it's like he's taking a bullet for Deshawn. He just dives out in front of him, takes the dude's legs out and flips him over. I was like, no way. Like that. That is vintage Nick Chubb. Like, I'm going to do whatever it takes. Yeah, but we're going to get it done, so.
[00:43:08] Speaker A: Yeah, for sure. So there was, there was definitely some good mixed in. And as bone put out, like, I. I think it was good. They got him some meaningful carries down by the goal line. Right? Like, I think that was important to get him in the end zone today. I think that felt good for everybody in the stadium. Like, seeing Nick Chubb in the end zone.
[00:43:23] Speaker B: So he looked fast on that zone outside that he scored on, too. And he almost did, like, a little spin move, you know, to get in, which I thought was promising and kind of cool to see him. You know, that was.
[00:43:32] Speaker A: That was the best run I thought he had all day. That was the most Nick Chubb, like, run because he did. He had, he had some speed to the outside and made them the cut inside and a little spin to get in the end zone.
Yeah. So hopefully, you know, again, a couple more weeks and we'll see more and more and more of vintage Nick Chubb. I just think it's. I just think we're a couple weeks away from being able to work where he's fully comfortable and heck, I mean, now there's obviously going to be a quarterback change. Who knows which direction they're going to go in here now.
[00:44:04] Speaker C: I think Jamus is the guy the rest of the year? I think he has to be, especially because DTR came in, and I'm not saying, you know, DTR didn't have time to pre prepare. I understand those things, but he's also in, he's not a rookie anymore. He's had several years to learn this system. Well, I mean, I guess it's kind of different because it's under Dorsey now, but, I mean, learn Stefanski system and. And be able to run the offense. And I don't know what he looked on tv to you guys, but in the stadium, he looked absolutely lost. Like, he looked like he had no idea what he was doing. He was just running for his life.
[00:44:42] Speaker A: I think a lot of that was just lack of preparation. Right. I mean, the guy's been third string all year long and hasn't had a lot of reps with the ones, and this game plan wasn't crafted for him, so he was stepping into a game plan that was Deshaun's game plan, and I think he did as good a job as you can do. I don't know that he was shades lighter or darker than the performances he had last year. He kind of is just a young quarterback that needs some molding, and I think that's why I said, I don't know what they're going to do. You're one in six right now. If your priority is winning football games, you play Jamis the rest of the way.
If your priority is, well, Deshaun's probably out. We may be looking at starting over from him.
We have a young kid here in DTR. There was a fifth round pick. Like, do we owe it to ourselves to, you know, put him through the paces and see what we have for the rest of the year? That way we know when we get to the April, like, which direction we're going to go. A quarterback, for sure.
[00:45:52] Speaker C: Yeah.
Yeah.
And it's anybody's guess at this point which direction they're going to take as far as chasing wins or chasing a high draft pick. Because you got to remember, this is the first year that we have a first round draft pick in a while, so it'd be nice if it was a high one.
[00:46:10] Speaker A: Well, and, and I have to imagine now, like, all of a sudden your record and stuff starts to matter. Whether or not the Haslams were responsible for keeping Deshaun in the game plan or whether that was truly Kevin Stefanski and Andrew Barry's doing.
Like, if they finish one in 16, that doesn't look good. That doesn't look like the administration that you want handling the first overall pick in the draft. So if they don't come back and win some games here and make this thing look respectable, they may just be unemployed at the end of the season.
[00:46:43] Speaker C: Yeah.
So I guess, I mean, was there anything else that you guys wanted to talk about with the game? I know we didn't really talk much about the Bengals and what happened. I mean, the Bengals didn't. Here's the bottom line. The Bengals didn't play well.
[00:46:55] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:46:56] Speaker C: I mean, just played good enough to beat the Browns.
[00:46:58] Speaker A: I think that's the key is like, there was another game that was winnable if you had an average football team and we don't.
[00:47:07] Speaker C: Yeah.
And we talked about it earlier. Joe Burrow didn't do much. He threw for 180 yards.
Their running back got loose on us a couple times, but it's not like he killed us all day long.
We just, we didn't capitalize on anything and we couldn't get anything going on offense, so.
[00:47:24] Speaker A: No, and, and I mean, you look at the overall statistics here, I mean, the Bengals are two of 13 on third down. The Browns were eight of 19. Time of possession excuse heavily in the Browns favor. We had the ball for almost 35 minutes to their 25. I mean, you know, a couple of sacks either way, but penalties and turnovers. Penalties and turnovers that have killed the.
[00:47:46] Speaker C: Browns all season long.
[00:47:48] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:47:49] Speaker C: So ten for 82 turnovers.
[00:47:54] Speaker A: Yeah. It's never good when defensive linemen are intercepting your ball.
[00:47:58] Speaker C: No, no, not at all. So I guess with that, let's just go ahead and get into the burning river. Sports cast dog of the week.
We're going to give our nominees for dog of the week. Kenny, I'm going to start with you.
[00:48:09] Speaker A: You started me. Thank goodness, because I'm going to go Nick Chubb for scoring a touchdown this week and coming back and being the hero we all know in life.
[00:48:17] Speaker C: Love fair bone. I'll go with you.
[00:48:21] Speaker B: Oh, well, heck, I'm going to go into Joku because he made a real nice catch in the end zone. Double toe, toe, toe tap, you know, to keep it in. And, man, he jumped a mile to catch that football. I feel like in the back.
[00:48:33] Speaker A: That was a big league throw, too.
[00:48:35] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:48:36] Speaker C: He makes the most athletic plays. I will give him that. Like, sometimes he drops routine balls, but then he catches one like that and you're just like this guy.
[00:48:45] Speaker B: Yeah. I don't know the stat set line for the day, but I feel like he showed up a little bit today, made some catches and he hit him.
[00:48:52] Speaker C: For 76 and a touchdown.
[00:48:54] Speaker A: Yeah. Really good day.
[00:48:55] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:48:57] Speaker C: And my dog of the week nomination is going to go to Cedric Tillman.
The week after Amari Cooper gets shipped out, Cedric Tillman proceeds to come in and give us eight for 81. So that's a solid day for any Browns receivers this season, let alone a guy that's just starting to get some serious playing time in his second year. So 30 year, whatever it is. Second year.
[00:49:21] Speaker A: True. So, yeah, you know, we've been saying all year about DeShawn and just how this quarterback room, just our quarterbacks have not thrown for 200 yards. We haven't went over 300 yards as a team for total yards all year. Today. We did. Took three quarterbacks to do it.
[00:49:48] Speaker B: But we did it.
[00:49:49] Speaker A: Finally did it.
[00:49:50] Speaker B: We did it.
[00:49:52] Speaker C: That's incredible. How did I miss that?
I've been waiting for it all season.
Man.
That's sad.
So final thoughts, guys, and this could be anything around the NFL, not just Browns related. Kenny, what are your final thoughts for week seven?
[00:50:10] Speaker A: Yeah, again, I'm going to go back to my little monologue there. I just, we just all need to just take a step back and chill. There's enough, we've had enough fan on fan violence, fan on player violence for the day.
And, you know, what was the, in the Hunger Games? Just remember who the real enemy is here. And it's, it's not Miles Garrett, it's not Greg Newsome. It's not these guys that are speaking out about Deshawn. It's, it's the guys up top that have put us in a position where we are literally at war with ourselves. So don't lose sight of that. You know, keep being fans, love the team and love each other.
[00:50:52] Speaker C: Bone, final thoughts.
[00:50:56] Speaker B: I'm more excited for the, for the Browns than I've been since after game one. When I realized Deshawn was terrible.
My perspective on the team completely shifted after he got hurt. I'm not going to lie like my interest completely just, well, that's a fair assessment.
[00:51:12] Speaker C: Your entry level goes from here to here.
[00:51:14] Speaker B: It was literally gone when he was on the field and when he got hurt, I immediately was reinvigorated as a Browns fan. Not that I think we're going to, you know, catch the world on fire, but it's, it's a change. And he didn't deserve to be the quarterback after those first six games. So that's how I feel about that. I'm, yeah, it sucks he got hurt, but, but as a Browns fan, I feel like you have something to look forward to next week.
[00:51:43] Speaker C: Fair. And so my final thought for this week being at the game, I will say this. This was for so many different reasons, most of them not good. Really only one good reason. This was the most memorable game I've ever been to at Cleveland Brown Stadium.
Our team's ass, the franchise quarterback, went down. The whole crowd cheered.
But Nick Chubb came back.
So we're all kind of excited, but we're not sure if we should be.
So. I don't know. It was just. It was very.
I'm sure anybody that was at the stadium today knows, like, it was just an interesting day among many, many interesting days at Cleveland Brown Stadium.
[00:52:34] Speaker A: That's fair. Yeah. I know today was a big deal with everything that happened with Deshawn, but let's also not forget that Tim couch broke his leg. And the crowd, crowd cheered mercilessly at Tim Couch on the, on the way to a playoff run.
[00:52:49] Speaker C: That's the worst part, is he was literally on his way. They were, they were in the process of making the playoffs that year, and.
[00:52:55] Speaker A: Tim Couch was, you know, like him or hate him as a quarterback, was at least a generally likable guy, you.
[00:53:01] Speaker C: Know, so Jack, now he would ball our asses.
[00:53:06] Speaker A: It's not like this hasn't happened before in Brown's lore.
[00:53:09] Speaker C: Yeah.
With that, let me remind everybody one more time to call the Burning river sports guest hot take hotline.
Remember, we want hot takes. We know you got them. We want to hear them. We want to put them on our show and talk about them. The number to call right there at the bottom of your screen, 330-227-8080 that's 3302-2780.
Call us. Leave us a message. Let us talk about it. Be sure to check out our gear, www. The tap and media.com backslash shop. And that'll do it for us. Kenny, what can we expect this week?
[00:53:41] Speaker A: This week, you can expect our normal show being released on Thursday, where we will preview the week eight game against the original Cleveland Browns, the Baltimore Ravens. We will have another brownsbacker interview with this Week with the Bowling Green Browns backers, our new friends from the president's summit this year. And then we do have an interview with Brownstrand that is temporarily planned. I know there were a go. We're all a go.
Do we have another guest joining us tomorrow night or for this week?
[00:54:17] Speaker C: I don't think so. I think that's next week.
[00:54:19] Speaker A: John Hughes is not this week.
[00:54:21] Speaker C: No, John Hughes is next week.
[00:54:22] Speaker A: All right. So, just. Browns are not in Bowling Green.
[00:54:24] Speaker C: John Hughes is the 28th recording day. That'll be the 31st. Halloween. John Hughes will be on Halloween.
[00:54:33] Speaker A: Got it. Got it. Excellent. Yes. Brownstone out in Bowling Green. This.
[00:54:37] Speaker C: I'm going to tell John Hughes to dress up.
[00:54:40] Speaker A: Should we all dress up?
[00:54:42] Speaker C: Yes.
But check us out on social media. Tapping media is on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. At the tapping media, I'm burning river sportscast, that is. This podcast is on Facebook, Instagram, tick tock, and YouTube at Burning for Sportscast and on X at Burning Repod. Find our podcast, wherever you podcast. Talking, Apple podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, music, Amazon music, Stitcher, Pandora, I heart radio, podcast, Castro. Good pods. Where we're a number one rated football podcast, and so many more. And I think that's it, guys.
[00:55:12] Speaker B: That's it. Well, guys, go to sleep. So, I'll see you later. Bon appetit.
[00:55:18] Speaker A: Don't just be a part of the problem, B. The whole damn problem.
[00:55:21] Speaker C: And only you can prevent river fires. Burning river sports guest out.
[00:55:28] Speaker A: Burning, burning.
Burning river sports guest.
[00:55:33] Speaker B: Good night, burning river.
[00:55:35] Speaker C: Good. Good night, Cleveland.
[00:55:39] Speaker B: See that? It went out of order.
[00:55:42] Speaker A: Good night, Cleveland.
[00:55:43] Speaker C: Good night, Cleveland.
