Offensive Line Coach Bill Callahan has a lot of work to do
By STEVE KING
Let’s look at this realistically and from a common-sense viewpoint.
Browns quarterback Baker Mayfield has been battling a variety of injuries for almost all season.
That means he has taken a lot of hits.
Protecting Mayfield, or any quarterback, is the responsibility of the offensive line.
As such, then, the line has obviously not played up to par — or anything even close to it, really — in that respect, which is pass blocking. Do the eye test. How many times have you seen Mayfield running for his his life this season? Yes, that’s right, the answer is “a lot,” which is way too much.
That’s a negative — and a big one, since it’s little over half the offense — for a line that excels in run blocking, as evidenced by the fact the Browns had the NFL’s top-ranked rushing attack heading into last Sunday night’s game at Baltimore.
It’s almost blasphemy in Cleveland to speak ill of a line that recently had both guards, Wyatt Teller and Joel Bitonio, receiving new contracts whose worth is equal to the Gross National Product of some Third World countries.
But the fact of the matter is that the line needs to get better — a whole heckuva lot better — if the Browns passing offense, and thus the offense overall, is to get better over these last five games. That’s on Offensive Line Coach Bill Callahan, so he had better get busy because he has a lot of work to do.
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