The Browns made all kinds of mistakes this afternoon against the New York Jets.

That’s why they dropped a 31-10 road decision in the regular-season opener.

They committed five turnovers leading to 24 points for the Jets.

They couldn’t open up holes in the running game.

They couldn’t pass protect.

They couldn’t cover wide receiver Brandon Marshall no matter what they did.

They couldn’t get any heat on quarterback Ryan Fitzpatrick, making the journeyman look like Frank Ryan.

They couldn’t do much of anything right.

So it would be easy to blame a lot of people.

But the person who deserves not just some of the blame, but rather all of the blame, is quarterback Josh McCown. This one – this embarrassing loss — is on him.

The Browns out-bid the Buffalo Bills to sign him in free agency in the offseason. They were looking for someone with a lot of experience whose poise and savvy would allow the offense to operate efficiently and thus keep the team in games. After all the horrible quarterback play they’ve had in the expansion era, the Browns wanted a guy whose play would not be the reason why they lost.

They got exactly the opposite.

McCown went into the game knowing he absolutely, positively had to do everything possible to keep from getting hurt. The Browns had just one other quarterback on the roster in Johnny Manziel, and, with the fact he was recovering from elbow soreness and was cleared to play only Friday, he could not be counted on to play – at least productively.

Sure, McCown couldn’t be faulted if he had gotten blindsided on a blitz, but that’s not how he got hurt. He got injured, suffering a concussion, when he was hit while diving into the end zone trying to score on a scramble in the first quarter.

He knew better than to do that – or at least he should have. At all costs, he knew he had to slide and get down, out of harm’s way. He couldn’t absorb a hit, no matter what. And if that meant he wouldn’t score a touchdown, then so be it. It was far more important for him to live to run another play.

As it turned out, he was knocked out of the game and didn’t return. He will now go through the concussion protocol. That means he also might not be able to play next Sunday when the Browns host the Oakland Raiders.

And oh, did we mention that McCown also fumbled the ball away when he got hit? It was a touchback instead of a touchdown. That’s a big difference.

What was McCown thinking? He had turned himself into a human torpedo in the dress rehearsal preseason game against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers several weeks ago, taking off and scrambling and getting blasted several times. He didn’t get hurt that night, but he easily could have.

The Cleveland coaches admonished him for doing it, saying they needed him healthy, but foolishly, he didn’t listen. In the next game that he played, against the Jets, he did the same thing, and this time, he and the Browns paid dearly for it.

The Browns had worked all offseason crafting a game plan for the Jets. And, in the early going with McCown in there, it looked to be working, as evidenced by the workmanlike 17-play drive nearly the lengtrh of the field, only to have it end when he got hit and fumbled.

As such, all that work went for naught because of McCown’s carelessness, selfishness and ignorance. He got hurt and in doing so hurt his team even worse. The guy who was signed so he could use his head, did so, but not in the way the Browns intended.

There was no chance to win the game once he went out. Manziel had had no practice reps not just last week, but for a while because of his elbow. Understanding that he had a lot of rust, how was he supposed to make plays?

Manziel did the best he could, and, to his credit, he turned in a decent performance, everything considered. But he was placed into a no-win situation. Shame on McCown for doing that to Manziel and his teammates.

So here the Browns are again, 0-1 to start the season for the 11th straight time and with major quarterback issues for perhaps the 100th time since 1999, all because McCown wouldn’t do as he had been told.

McCown is lucky. Head coach Mike Pettine protected him in the post-game press conference, saying he had no problem with him diving because McCown was trying to make a football play.

Pettine never throws anyone under the bus in public. Privately, though, he had to be seething.

You have to feel sorry for Pettine. With this one-sided loss today, he moves another step closer to getting fired. McCown was supposed to help him stave that off by playing smart football and building a bridge to the franchise quarterback, whether it’s Manziel or someone else.

After today, though, that’s a bridge to nowhere for everyone involved.

And it didn’t have to be this way.