Arizona Cardinals vs Cleveland Browns: A moment of Manziel
By Scott Allen
The Arizona Cardinals face the Cleveland Browns on Sunday morning at 11:00 a.m.
Cleveland has a lot of nicknames. The North Coast, The Forest City, C-Town, amongst others. I call it the Mistake by the Lake. Enter the Cleveland Browns. Your Arizona Cardinals face the Browns on Sunday at FirstEnergy Stadium.
The Cleveland Browns are like the Chicago Cubs of football. Just not the 2015 version. The Cardinals have not visited since September 1994 when the Browns whipped the Cardinals 32-0. The last meeting was in 2011 when the Browns beat the Cardinals 20-17 in overtime.
So what should we expect on Sunday? The Browns are 2-5 and heading nowhere fast, again. The Cardinals are 5-2 and heading in the opposite direction.
I know this much about what the Cardinals should expect on Sunday. They will see quarterback Johnny Manziel at some point. No way Josh McCown makes it through the game. I mean last week against the St. Louis Rams he got hit by a standing wall. No, really, a real wall. He lost the battle and fell backwards. If there was ever a microcosm of one’s season, that was it.
McCown, a former Cardinal quarterback, amongst other teams, is reportedly going to start on Sunday. His left tackle, Joe Thomas, told cleveland.com McCown will play as well.
"Until they tell me he won’t be out there, I’d expect him to be out there"
That’s deep Joe. Real deep. No, what’s deep is the trouble the Browns have caused for themselves. Don’t get me wrong, outside of last week’s loss to the Rams, the Browns have been in most games.
Good teams find ways to win though, not lose. Of the Browns five losses, three of them have been by a touchdown or less. Seemingly, they are grabbing defeat from the jaws of victory.
But also don’t be fooled by those that think the Browns can stay with the Cardinals either. One of my Cleveland friends, Stephen Thomas, thinks the Cardinals will get away with a 27-26 victory. I don’t think it’ll be that close. Guy thinks he’s a comedian. Actually, he is a comedian, so, yeah.
At least he has the Cardinals winning. He’s seen enough of these Browns to believe they will make it a game. If you read his article, it is very well thought out but very funny.
"The Cardinals will have 34 rushes for 58 yards. They will then have another 6 rushes for 137 yards. Lesson: containing 8 out of every 10 running plays isn’t good enough in the NFL"
That’s giving the Cardinals credit for running the ball 40 times. We all know the Cardinals would never be caught dead carrying the ball 40 times. Cardinals coach Bruce Arians can say everything he wants about balance, but unless the Browns get turnover crazy like the Detroit Lions did a few weeks ago, the Cardinals will be throwing more than the 14 times they did that day.
To be fair, the Cardinals did run 28 times last week but they also threw 29 times. The Cardinals would have to run 80 plays before they’d see 40. I get the sentiment though. The Cardinals do get a lot of little runs and then seem to run off a few big ones. Sunday should be no different.