It’s the bye week, so no game today.

 

Thank goodness.

 

A few days ago, a local longtime sports talk radio host mused that if the Browns didn’t play another game this season, he would be totally fine.

 

With the team at 0-12, the host has seen enough. No mas. Roberto Duran would be happy.

 

I get it, but I wholeheartedly disagree with it. Nothing is gained by doing nothing. You have to work at it – a lot, a whole lot — to get better. There is a month left to the season. Practice, practice, practice. Allen Iverson would not be happy.

 

But whatever the case, the Browns are off today. Some – a lot, actually, and maybe, more specifically, most everybody – would argue that the Browns have been off all season, and really for all but two years of the expansion era, and they’d be right.

 

Yes, the Browns need a break. In fact, they’ve needed a break for a whole long while.

 

And therein lies the crux of this story, this message – the only story and message you need to chew on this weekend as you watch other teams play on TV or rediscover the fact that you’re married and have three kids on your family roster. Imagine that? Guess it’s time for a family reunion of sorts, then, huh?

 

Giving the Browns a bye week with four weeks left is like providing runners in the Boston Marathon their first water station at 25 miles, 385 yards.

 

These young, inexperienced Browns, many of them raw rookies who have never gone through anything this long, this tedious and this humbling in their lives, needed that break a long, long time ago, when it would have mattered. Now, they’re beaten down so much physically, emotionally and mentally that it doesn’t mean a hill of beans anymore.

 

And because the NFL gave them the bye week now, it tells you two things: First, that the league doesn’t care at all about the Browns. And secondly, that the league doesn’t want the middling-at-best Browns, at least right now, to be on TV any more than is necessary during this important ratings period.

 

Less air time for an 0-12 team, better numbers.

 

Get it?

 

Got it.

 

But you, the fans, still care about the Browns even when you’re as angry and as disappointed and as frustrated as heck about what’s going on, so you’ll watch whenever the Browns play again “down the stretch” this season, holding your nose and at the same time holding out hope that this time next year, things will be better.

 

Enjoy he day off, because you need it, too.

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