BELIEVE IT, THE BROWNS ARE REALLY, TRULY BACK
By STEVE KING
The Browns obviously haven’t played – let alone won – a game that counts in the standings yet. That won’t come for about six weeks or so.
However, we – you, I and everyone – can still say, in unison if you like, that the Browns are back – at least in relevance.
But y’all knew that already, and have for some time now, didn’t ya?
A big piece of evidence became … well, evident on Friday, and it needs to be pointed out, if nothing else to remind everyone just how big – and grand and wonderful – this all can be this season.
It came with USA Today’s Weekend Edition. Despite being nearly 40 years old, the paper has done a great job of keeping its finger on the pulse of this country to know what’s chic and cool, or not.
And the Browns, after being not chic or cool at all for almost all of this nightmarish expansion era, especially heading into recent seasons, are very much so – very, very chic and cool – now.
On the top of the front page of the paper were small photos, superimposed in against each other, of the two biggest and coolest and most chic Browns, quarterback Baker Mayfield and wide receiver Odell Beckham Jr. The headline was, “NFL TRAINING CAMP; LOFTY GOALS.” The sub-headline, or tease line, was, “Odell Beckham Jr. has a new hairdo and outlook as Browns’ expectations soar. In Sports.”
When you go to the top of the front page of the sports section, there is a much, much, much bigger photo of Beckham running a route at practice on Thursday morning as the team opened training camp. Beneath that is the main story of the section with this headline, “Newest Browns star Beckham sports new look.”
The lengthy story jumps inside to Page 2 with an even bigger – a much, much bigger – photo of Beckham.
This was the paper’s big splash for the opening of NFL training camps. USA Today need to make a big splash to give the big splash its due, and to attract readers. And it picked the Cleveland Browns.
Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the new reality.
And, oh, yes, have a great weekend, if, simply by reading this and having become aware of all this, you haven’t already done so.
