The Browns will sign Dez Bryant

By Steve King

Let me make it clear at the outset that I have absolutely, positively no inside information.

I know as much – or as little, as it were – as anyone.

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So, then, this is hunch – just a hunch. It’s a feeling – a strong one, to be sure – but only a feeling after looking at the situation from all different angles.

Nonetheless, I am convinced beyond any shadow of a doubt that Dez Bryant will soon be a Cleveland Brown. It – his signing with the team — will happen by the weekend and he’ll be on the field trying like crazy to learn the Cleveland offense and get used to all of his new teammates, particularly starting quarterback Tyrod Taylor.

The free-agent wide receiver is set to meet with the Browns on Thursday, and I don’t think he leaves without at least having agreed to contract terms, even if he doesn’t actually sign.

Here’s why:

*The Browns need a down-the-field passing threat in the worst way so as to get the safeties out of the box and open up holes for the running game.

*Bryant needs a job.

*Cleveland General Manager John Dorsey is a great salesman and is really aggressive. He gets what – who — he wants, and I am sure that he wants Bryant because he knows what the former Dallas Cowboy’s presence would do for the Browns not just on the field, but off it as well in terms of the way it would infuse the locker room and the fans by showing them that the club wants to win now. Yes, the Browns will continue to build mostly through the NFL Draft and by signing young veterans who are on the way up, but when you have a chance to get a guy like Bryant who, while he’s not the player he once was, can still play, you’ve got to do it. You most definitely have to do it. It just makes all kinds of sense.

I would be shocked if it didn’t happen.

So, what do you think?

THIS IS ONE OF MY FAVORITE STORIES OF LATE

Capital letters mean capital improvements when it comes to the Browns.

I saw it in the paper on Monday – and, being an old newspaper guy from way back, I know that, just like the internet, when you read it in the paper, it absolutely, positively has to be true – that the Browns – CLEVELAND IN ALL CAPS, as it was written to indicate the favorite — are four-point favorites to beat the Buffalo Bills (Buffalo written in mostly lower-case) on Friday night at FirstEnergy Stadium in the preseason opener.

That’s right – it was not a typo – the Browns are actually favored to win a game – and by four points, mind you.

The home-field advantage is worth three points, so if the teams played at a neutral field, just as they used to back in the day when they scrimmaged against each other in training camp at Edinboro University, the Browns would still be favored to win by one point.

How cool!!!

When’s the last time the Browns have been favored in any game against any team?

OK, I know it’s an exhibition game, so it doesn’t really count. But I don’t care if it’s a preseason game, a mini camp intrasquad scrimmage without pads or any other competition. I don’t care if it’s against the Buffalo Bills, the Buffalo Bisons, the Buffalo Bison (two different teams), the Buffalo Braves, the University of Buffalo Bulls or any other team from Buffalo, N.Y., Buffalo, Ohio or any other town called Buffalo. It doesn’t matter one bit.

In all seriousness, with as bad as the Browns have been the last two years with just one win in 32 tries, it really, truly is a big deal that they’re favored. You have to start somewhere – you have to learn to walk before you can ever expect to run — and this is that place and that time.

Yes, the Browns are getting a little better, and now we have concrete proof. The oddsmakers in Las Vegan don’t lie. They don’t fool around.