EDITOR’S NOTE: The following, which is the first in a three-part series on the top Browns players from 1965 through ’95, covers the players ranked nos. 21 through 30. It is part of a bigger series on the 70 best Browns players of all-time.
Just because something is new doesn’t necessarily mean it’s better.
That’s not just the opinion of a bunch of old guys who are stuck in the past. It’s also the overriding theme of the 30 best Browns players from the period of 1965 through ’95, after which the original franchise moved to Baltimore and became the Ravens.. That is, they are better as a group – much, much, much better, in fact — than the 30 top players from the expansion era of 1999 to the present. The final installment of that three-part series appeared in the last issue of the Orange and Brown Report magazine.
The Browns had a tremendous amount of success in the 31 seasons from 1965-95, getting into the playoffs 14 times and losing out on tie-breakers on three other occasions. Before the NFL-AFL merger in 1970, they made three NFL (NFC) Championship Game appearances, and in the modern era, they won six Central Division titles and advanced to three AFC Championship Games.
A resume like that doesn’t happen by accident. It takes a lot of good players to do it, and those Browns teams had more than their share. The rosters were filled with talent, and that becomes apparent when you look at the “bottom” 10 of the top 30 players from 1965-95. A lot of players from this list would be among the top 10 players from the expansion era.
Here we go:
*No. 30 – wide receiver Brian Brennan – played with the Browns from 1984-91 – Even though he came to the club with little fanfare, being the latter of two fourth-round picks in the 1984 NFL Draft, and was surrounded by wide receivers who were bigger, stronger and faster, the Boston College product still made his niche – and then some. The 5-foot-9, 178-pounder had 315 receptions, tying him with Kevin Johnson for fourth place on the Browns’ career list. That’s rare air, as only Pro Football Hall of Famer Ozzie Newsome, Gary Collins and Greg Pruitt are ahead of Brennan. In addition, his 4,148 receiving yards rank ninth, just ahead of Hall of Famer Dante Lavelli (3,908). He had his best season in 1986 when the Browns finished a franchise-best 12-4 and made it to the AFC Championship Game for the first time, leading the team by a wide margin in receptions (55), receiving yards (838) and touchdown catches (six). Then he had a combined eight receptions in the two playoff games that year. No one in club history has had better hands than Brennan. That, plus his tremendous quickness, allowed him to be one of the greatest pass catchers the Browns have ever had.
*No. 29 – kicker-punter Don Cockroft — played with the Browns from 1968-80 – Lou Groza is in the Hall of Fame. A nine-time Pro Bowler, he was a standout left tackle but is much better known for what he did as a Browns kicker for 21 seasons. He was so good, in fact, that he’s been called “The Father of Modern Kicking” for all the innovations he brought to the position, and the award given to the top kicker in college football every year bears his name. When he retired after the 1967 season as the last of the original Browns, he left a daunting legacy that was going to be intimidating for his successor. But Cockroft, who was actually drafted in the third round in 1967 out of tiny Adams State and spent that season hanging around Groza as a non-roster player, was still able to make his own mark in a 13-year career and continue the tradition of great Browns kickers. He is third in team scoring – behind Groza and fellow kicker Phil Dawson – with 1,080 points, led the NFL three times in field-goal percentage and finished with a career mark of 65.9 percent. In addition, he doubled as the team’s full-time punter for his first nine seasons, something that’s unheard of now. When Cockroft retired, he left a big hole of his own for the next Browns kicker to fill.
*No. 28 – center Tom DeLeone – played with the Browns from 1974-84 – His longtime teammate, left tackle Doug Dieken, who also appears on this list, tells the story of when he first knew that DeLeone was special and would be a perfect fit for the Browns offensive line. During a 1975 game against the Pittsburgh Steelers at Cleveland, a big fight broke out, as usually happened in those days when the arch rivals met. The melee started when Pittsburgh defensive tackle Joe Greene kicked Browns right guard Bob McKay in a – ahem — very prone area because he thought McKay was holding him. Standing on the sideline as a reserve behind veteran starter John Demarie, DeLeone charged onto the field and clocked Greene. It wasn’t long after that that DeLeone become the starter and embarked in earnest upon a great career. A two-time Pro Bowler and a Cleveland Browns Legend, DeLeone is best known as being the personal bodyguard for quarterback Brian Sipe, the triggerman of the Kardiac Kids. With DeLeone fortifying the middle and making the line calls, Sipe always had time to throw. Growing up in Kent, about 50 minutes southeast of Cleveland, DeLeone starred at Roosevelt High School and then Ohio State before being drafted in the fifth round by AFC Central rival Cincinnati in 1972. He played two years with the Bengals before going to the Browns. As it turned out, Cincinnati’s loss was Cleveland’s gain for the next decade.
*No. 27 – outside linebacker Chip Banks – played with the Browns from 1982-86 – No defensive player in Browns history had more talent than Banks. And no Cleveland player on either side of the ball departed the team with more unfulfilled potential. Make no mistake about it, Banks was a very, very good player during his short five-year stay with the team. He made the Pro Bowl four times, tying him with Clay Matthews, Jim Houston and Walt Michaels for the most ever by a Cleveland linebacker. On paper, he appeared to be on the fast track to the Hall of Fame, exactly what the Browns hoped to get from a player they drafted in the first round, at No. 3 overall, in 1982 out of USC. Hall of Fame coach Hank Stram, while working as a color analyst for the national radio broadcast of a Thursday Night Football game against the Bengals at Cleveland in 1983, paid Banks a huge compliment when he said, “I saw Chip Banks in the locker room before the game, and he looked like Superman with his shirt off.” Yes, Banks had all the physical tools – and then some — but off-the-field issues left him far short of being as good as he could have been. The Browns finally traded him to San Diego following the 1986 season and he played five more years with the Chargers and Indianapolis Colts. He retired after 1992 season, but instead of beginning the five-year wait to get into the Hall of Fame, he just drifted off into anonymity.
*No. 26 – nose tackle Bob Golic – played with the Browns from 1982-88 – There’s a whole new generation of Browns fans who know Golic only as being an afternoon drive-time talk show host on a Kent-Akron radio station and a host on a Cleveland TV station’s pre-game Browns show. But long before he was offering his opinions over the airwaves every day during the work week and then on Sundays to boot, he was doing so daily in the locker room to media members as a seven-year member of the Browns. He was one of the best and most popular players on some of the best and most popular teams in Cleveland history. Many Browns fans will recall Golic high-fiving Santa Claus while leaving the field at Cleveland Stadium following a double-overtime playoff victory over the New York Jets in 1986. Making the Pro Bowl three straight years, including after that season, he anchored the middle of a defense that performed very well but never got its due because of all the stars on offense. A native of the Cleveland area – he graduated from what was then St. Joseph High School – Golic was a second-round draft pick of New England out of Notre Dame in 1979. He played three years with the Patriots as a linebacker before being cut. But that’s the best thing that could have happened to him, for the Browns claimed him on waivers and moved him to nose tackle. So he got to go home and move to a position that, once he packed on some weight, was perfectly suited for him and allowed him to blossom.
*No. 25 – running back Kevin Mack – played with the Browns from 1985-93 – With 5,123 yards, Mack is fifth on the Browns in career rushing. His 46 rushing touchdowns rank fourth. That’s good on any team, but especially one that has four Hall of Fame running backs. Taken in the first round, at No. 11 overall, in the 1984 NFL Supplemental Draft after playing in the spring that year with the USFL’s Los Angeles Express, the Clemson product made an immediate impact as a rookie in 1985 when he rushed for a team-leading 1,104 yards and joined with second-year man Earnest Byner (1,002) to become only the third set of players from the same team in league history to rush for 1,000 yards in the same season. He went on to top the Browns in rushing the next two seasons as well and five times overall. But what’s even more special Mack’s accomplishments – that 1985 season, the other years being the team’s top rusher and the fact is he is high up on club’s all-time rushing list – is the tremendous change in offensive philosophy that occurred going into the 1986 season. In an effort to take advantage of the talents of high-profile quarterback Bernie Kosar, who had arrived in the Supplemental Draft in 1985, and the fact that new offensive coordinator Lindy Infante was a passing guru, the decision was made by the team to abandon its heavy-run personality and focus on throwing the ball. The plan worked, as the Browns became one of the top teams in the NFL over the next four seasons, and Mack helped the process along greatly by refusing to complain about his demotion on the offensive pecking order. Instead, he concentrated on becoming a better pass receiver out of the backfield, catching 42 and 40 passes in back-to-back seasons. And when he carried the ball, he continued to excel with his inside running, getting a lot of local attention when, near the goal line in a 1991 game against Pittsburgh at Cleveland, he rammed into linebacker Greg Lloyd and knocked him cold. For that play alone, Mack deserves a spot on this list.
*No. 24 – right tackle-left guard Cody Risien — played with the Browns from 1979-83 and 1985-99 – Throughout their history, the Browns have had some excellent left tackles. We’ve already mentioned Lou Groza and Doug Dieken, plus there’s Dick Schafrath, Tony Jones and the man currently holding down the spot, Joe Thomas. Schafrath should be in the Hall of Fame, and Thomas may well get there. But the club has had some pretty good right tackles as well, and Risien is right near the top of that list. The last of the team’s three seventh-round draft picks in 1979 out of Texas A&M, he helped the team right away, becoming the starter at left guard as a rookie before switching spots with Henry Sheppard the next season and going to right tackle, where he became an anchor for the rest of his career. Risien made the Pro Bowl twice in the last half of the 1980s when the Browns had one of the best offenses in the NFL. But even that doesn’t truly reflect just how good he was and how much he meant to the Browns. Unfortunately so, that came when he blew out his knee at Philadelphia late in the final preseason game of 1984, which did a lot to sabotage the club. Picked to win the AFC Central, the Browns had a disastrous season from the get-go, losing their first three games and eight of the first nine, causing head coach Sam Rutigliano to get fired halfway through the year. The problem wasn’t the defense. Rather, it was the offense. The Browns never scored more than 27 points all year. Four times they were held in single-digits scoring. The result was a 5-11 finish. So, now do you think that Risien was a good player, and that right tackle is an important position on a football team?
*No. 23 – free safety Thom Darden – played with the Browns from 1972-74 and 1976-81 – Like Risien, Darden was able to come back completely from a torn anterior cruciate ligament suffered in the middle of his career. And like Risien, Darden’s absence in that one season really doomed the Browns. In 1974, Darden had eight, or exactly one-third, of the Browns’ interceptions in a 4-10 finish. The defense gave up 344 points. In 1975, the Browns had just 10 interceptions as a team in a 3-11 finish. The defense allowed 372 points. When Darden returned in 1976, he once again had one-third of the Browns’ interceptions (seven), and the team rebounded mightily, finishing 9-5 and earning Forrest Gregg the AFC Coach of the Year award. And the defense limited foes to just 287 points, 85 fewer than the previous season. A Sandusky (Ohio) High School and Michigan product who was drafted in the first round, at No. 18 overall, by the Browns in 1972, Darden had his best year in 1978 when he led the NFL with 10 interceptions. He finished with 45 career interceptions, still the most – by plenty — in Browns history.
*No. 22 – guard John Wooten – played with the Browns from 1959-67 – Teaming with Hall of Famer Gene Hickerson for all of his career, Wooten gave the Browns two fast, athletic guards who could run downfield and make blocks. That was a big reason for the offense’s – and the team’s – success during that time. The big break for both Wooten and Hickerson came following the 1962 season, when starting guard Jim Ray Smith, at the end of his career, was traded to Dallas and Blanton Collier took over as head coach and did away with Paul Brown’s messenger-guard system of sending in plays. So whereas before Wooten and Hickerson were sharing the messenger role, Collier made them both starters in 1963 and everyone and everything just took off from there. They were at their best during that 1964 NFL championship season, and it led to Wooten becoming a Cleveland Browns Legend.
*No. 21 – left tackle Doug Dieken – played with the Browns from 1971-84 – Dieken had been a tight end at Illinois – and a pretty good one at that – and when the Browns drafted him with the first of two sixth-round picks in 1971, he was hoping the club would him a shot at that position. When he got to Cleveland and was handed a jersey with No. 73 on it and told he would be playing the offensive line, his heart sank. As it turned out, it was the best thing that could have happened to him. Left tackle Dick Schafrath was in his 13th season, so he was near the end of his career. And he didn’t help himself by running 62 miles from Cleveland to Wooster in the offseason as part of a promotion with a car dealership. That destroyed whatever was left in Schafrath’s legs, and by halfway through the 1971 season, new head coach Nick Skorich had to make a change at left tackle by inserting Dieken. He held down the spot until he retired 14 seasons later. Dieken was a very good player, especially in his role of protecting the blind side of quarterback Brian Sipe. He was such a good one-on-one blocker that the Browns rarely had to give him help with a tight end, even though he was always working against the defense’s best pass-rushing end. Dieken was a rock as well. In fact, he still holds team records with 194 consecutive starts and 203 consecutive games played. Not surprisingly, he was inducted into the Cleveland Browns Legends.
NEXT: Part II, players nos. 11-20.
