Final. pic.twitter.com/Y95xgbPfeq

— Cleveland Browns (@Browns) January 8, 2023

The Browns are inconsistent.

That’s the only thing at which they’re consistent.

And they were that way for all of the 2022 regular season, which is why they ended it with a miserable 7-10 record after they started 2-1, following a 28-14 road loss to the Pittsburgh Steelers on Sunday after they led 7-0 with two minutes left in the first half.

Yes, good games followed by bad games.

Bad games followed by good games.

Good starts ruined by bad finishes.

Bad starts buoyed by good finishes.

Back and forth, and forth and back, first one way and then another.

No rhyme or reason for anything.

The Browns were like that box of Cracker Jack back in the day when there were prizes inside the box. You reached in there not knowing what the prize was going to be, and whether you would like it or not. There was no way of telling.

It was unnerving – the Browns, not the prizes. Hey, beggars can’t be choosers, right?

The Browns made more silly, stupid, mental mistakes this season than perhaps at any time in their recent history. They blew enough pass coverages in the secondary – and were hit with enough pass interference penalties — to choke an elephant.

Discipline?

There was none, so much so – or so little so, as it were — that you wondered what in the world the Browns did at practice – all those practices going all the way back to the OTAs in the spring.

Cohesiveness?

There was none of that, either. The Browns weren’t a team as much as they were simply a bunch of guys all wearing the same uniforms.

Playing with a sense of purpose?

None of that as well. The Browns just played. They didn’t play with a plan. They wanted to win, but they had no idea how to do it.

That’s coaching – or the lack thereof – and it’s why the Browns lost to teams with less talent but much more sense of purpose, cohesiveness and discipline, such as they did against Pittsburgh.

It’s embarrassing, humiliating and frustrating.

And it has to end – now, this moment, this instant, not to be seen or heard from again, or else head coach Kevin Stefanski will be out of a job at this point next season, if not before.

Steve King