The longer this goes on, the better quarterback Baker Mayfield looks as the Browns’ No. 1 overall pick in last week’s NFL Draft.
Now we’re hearing that New England Patriots head coach Bill Belichick might well have tried to trade up to get Mayfield if the Oklahoma product began to slide.
Is it true? Is that accurate?
Who knows? Who really knows?
But this we do know: Wherever and whenever there’s smoke, there’s usually fire.
Having said that, then, think about this for a moment: If somebody like Belichick, who’s the best NFL head coach of the modern era, and perhaps the best of any era, was really, truly in any way interested in drafting Mayfield, then maybe this kid really does have a chance to be the franchise quarterback for whom the Browns have searched so long and hard – without success – in this nightmarish expansion era.
I will say this about Belichick: When he was coaching the Browns from 1991-95, I don’t think he would have been interested in someone like Mayfield. Belichick was all about his quarterbacks being big, even if they didn’t have some of the necessary physical skills. That was evident when, in March 1993, he signed Vinny Testaverde in free agency. He had all the physical tools, but he didn’t have a great football mind and he was color-blind.
Yes, as you longtime Browns fans will remember, he was indeed color-blind. Yikes!
But Belichick is willing to learn, change and evolve. He’s willing to go back and correct his problems. He’s smart. He realizes that he doesn’t have all the answers.
Mayfield, of course, lacks size. But he checks off a lot – a whole lot – of the other things you need to be a quarterback. No one knows that better than Belichick, who was smart enough to keep Drew Bledsoe on the bench and eventually get rid of him so some guy named Tom Brady could remain in the lineup, and it’s why if, I would guess, that there was indeed something to his interest in Mayfield.
And again, that should give Browns fans – and critics of the team and its selection of Mayfield – something to ponder.
