Are the Browns a playoff team?
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By STEVE KING
Are the Browns, as presently constituted, a playoff team in 2020?
I know, I know, perhaps the bigger question is if there will even be a 2020 season. I get that. I really do. I am not 100-percent certain – actually, I’m a lot less certain than that — that there will be a season, despite all the decision-makers in the NFL plowing ahead as if the possibility of a 2020 season is a fait accompli.
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There is absolutely no way that anyone – NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell included – can make long-range projections like that based on what we know now about this coronavirus pandemic going forward, which is very, very little.
Whatever the case, that’s another story for another time.
For the sake of this story, though, let’s assume that there will indeed be a 2020 season. Again, then, are the Browns, as presently constituted, a playoff team this year?
A lot of people – people whose opinions I greatly trust – seem to think the Browns will make the playoffs.
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Like the possibility of there even being a 2020 season, I am not sure at all that the Browns will qualify for the postseason. I think it is a 50-50 proposition, at best, that it will happen. I wish I were more confident, but with the defense the way it is, with more questions than answers, especially at the all-important position area of linebacker, I just can’t be.
I might have some support in that opinion in the person of sportsillustrated.com staff writer Kevin Hanson. With the dust of the 2020 NFL Draft still settling, he has boldly put out a 2021 mock draft for the first round. The focus of the story is teams possibly tanking to get a chance to take the perceived best player available, and the presumptive No. 1 overall pick, Clemson quarterback Trevor Lawrence.
Once more, whatever the case, the focus for Browns fans is that Hanson has the team having the 16th of the 32 picks. With a total of 14 teams – seven in the AFC and seven in the NFC – making the playoffs, drafting 16th would mean the Browns are, record-wise, beveling right at the halfway point, which means they could just barely make the playoffs, or just barely not.
In Hanson’s scenario, they would barely miss out, as there are seven teams behind the Browns in the Tennessee Titans (No. 19), Pittsburgh Steelers (20, Indianapolis Colts (21), Buffalo Bills (25), New England Patriots (26), Baltimore Ravens (30) and Kansas City Chiefs. In that, of course, the teams with the best records select later in the round, the Browns look to be about an 8-8 team, which would be two wins better than last season but still not good enough for the playoffs – for what would be the 18th consecutive year.
Ugh.
Hanson has the Browns drafting Auburn wide receiver Seth Williams with that pick. Here’s what he says about Williams:
“If selected by the Browns, Williams (6′ 3″, 224 pounds) would give Baker Mayfield a big-bodied receiver to complement smaller wideouts Odell Beckham Jr. and Jarvis Landry. The physical wideout had a breakout season (59/830/8) despite playing with a freshman quarterback, and has averaged 17.3 yards per reception in the first two seasons of his collegiate career.”
The positive is this: If, as mentioned, there is no way that the NFL can be sure at this point that there will even be a 2020 season, there is no way – and then some, if that’s possible – that Hanson or anyone else can be sure at this point that the Browns will miss the playoffs in it.
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- “Browns Exercise Contract Option On Star DE Garrett, TE Njoku” (AP) –
- New 2020 Cleveland Browns Jerseys (Browns Daily Dose)
- “What the Browns didn’t do, and one thing they definitely got right” (CBS) –
- How to get a Jedrick Wills Jr. jersey (Browns Daily Dose)
- “Can Donovan Peoples-Jones Be the Third Receiver for Baker Mayfield and the Browns?” (numberFire) –
- “Meet the new bosses … hopefully not the same as the old bosses” (BrownsZone) –
- The beginning of the Dawg Pound (Browns Daily Dose)
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