Saturday afternoon’s Senior Bowl at Ladd-Peebles Stadium in Mobile, Ala. (12:30 p.m.on NFL Network) is a chance – an excellent one, really – for the Browns to continue to equip and furnish the home they’re rebuilding.
It may sound simplistic, but that’s exactly what the Browns are doing. They’re putting the structure back together.
When Sashi Brown, Andrew Berry, Paul DePodesta, Hue Jackson and the rest of the gang arrived in Berea in 2016, they found a fixer-upper in dire need of much repair. There was some work – but not a whole lot – accomplished during the season, and as such still much is left to be done.
The foundation of that house – a franchise quarterback with whom the Browns can move forward – has yet to be acquired, and until that happens, there’s only so much the team can do. There appear to be no candidates in Saturday’s game in that regard. But there are 21 other starting positions on offense and defense that also need addressed in varying degrees of urgency, and there are a lot of viable candidates for those spots – those accessory pieces — in the Senior Bowl.
The Browns should know more about those players than just about everybody because Jackson and his assistants are coaching the South team. After being with the South players – and seeing the North players as well – the Cleveland coaches are have a good, hard look at both of both rosters.
The Browns have built up some momentum following their nightmarish 1-15 finish by re-signing linebacker Jamie Collins to a four-year contract and bringing in Gregg Williams as defensive coordinator. Now they need to continue that upward mobility, and there’s absolutely no excuse not to do so after going through this week. They have gained tons of information on these guys, not just what they did in college but how they’ve looked in NFL-style practices and meetings conducted by NFL coaches.
It should be fun to fun watch. Just look at it as the 2017 (offseason) season opener.
