We know all too well of the Browns’ many issues as the club tries to get itself turned around.
Those difficulties are discussed in some way, shape form every day. It’s what happens when you’re coming off an NFL- and franchise-worst 1-15 record and have posted a numbing nine consecutive losing seasons, also a team mark – by far.
With that, then, it’s tough to remember that not all is lost, not all – everyone and everything — is gloomy.
There are bright spots, and the brightest of them, as it has been for so long, continues to be left tackle Joe Thomas, the 11th-year pro who will someday become the Browns’ 17th member of the Pro Football Hall of Fame.
This comes to mind with the recent news that Thomas, who holds the team record with 10 Pro Bowl appearances, has made the NFL Network’s top 100 players list for the seventh consecutive time. He is ranked No. 25, and for the first time, he is the only Browns included. Again, last season’s record and the sustained losing are at fault for that.
Last year, when Thomas was ranked No. 23, he was joined by tight end Gary Barnidge (94). Barnidge was released earlier this offseason, a casualty of the Browns’ complete overhaul and youth movement.
Thomas was 25th in both 2015 and ’14, being one of three Browns named each time.
He was 28th in 2013, 82nd in ’12 and 43rd in ’11. On all three occasions, he was joined by one teammate.
Thomas, who was selected in the first round, at No. 3 overall, in the 2007 NFL Draft, is proof that the Browns can get it right with their high picks, and how well things can work out when they do.
Indeed, as bad as the Browns have been in so many other ways for a decade, Thomas has been that good. In fact, you can ask nothing more of a player in that he is not only one of the best at his position in his era, but also that he has never missed an offensive snap, let alone a game, in his career.
A great man and an ironman. That’s Joe Thomas in a nutshell.
If only the Browns could find some more like him.
