THE BROWNS ARE RANKED — GET THIS! — FOURTH

By STEVE KING

The Browns are fourth in sportsillustrated.com‘s Monday Morning Quarterback NFL rankings following the bulk of free agency and heading into the NFL Draft in about five week.
Yes, that’s right, the Browns are fourth!
That’s not fourth from the bottom.
That’s not fourth in the AFC.
That’s not fourth in the North Division.
That’s not fourth in the state of Ohio (hey, Ohio State is really good, and the Cincinnati Bearcats are coming on strong).
That’s not fourth in teams whose home cities border one of the Great Lakes (also Buffalo, Chicago and Detroit.
It’s not any of that — not even close to it.
It’s at the other end of the spectrum, as in fourth in the entire NFL, no matter where the teams are located or what conference or division they’re in.
My jaw dropped — quickly and greatly — when I saw that. Perhaps yours did, too. If not, then it should have, for it’s truly amazing news, especially considering where this team was at the end of the 2017 season, winless, wounded, woebegone and wobbly. From 2015-17, the Browns were a combined 4-44. They went 18 years between playoff appearances. They weren’t 31 years between consecutive winning records.
Bad? Hopeless? No, it was worse than that. The Browns had passed bad and hopeless about 20 miles back.
From all that to this, fourth, well, it’s almost too good to be true.
The story, by Conor Orr, entitled, “Post-Free Agency Power Rankings: Browns Jump to No. 4, Saints Fall to No. 14,” begins this way:
“Free agency shouldn’t, and usually doesn’t, move the needle all that much. Teams are largely who they are based on a longer history of drafting and developing smart coaching hires and a twinge of indescribable luck. And then the 2020 Buccaneers came along, adding Tom Brady, Leonard Fournette, Rob Gronkowski and Antonio Brown along the way.
“The roster was great before any of them got there, but sometimes a flurry of moves is so well-received that it pushes a team over the dividing line.
“The greatest player in NFL history is not changing teams this offseason, so it is unlikely that we’ll look back at the last weeks of this free-agency cycle and pinpoint it as the moment when something changed for our Super Bowl LVI champion. However, there was some serious movement this offseason in a depressed market which created some real advantages for a few franchises good enough good enough to figure the whole thing out.
“This is a somewhat academic way of telling you that, yes, you’re getting power rankings, If the headline wasn’t clear, we’ve waited far too long (six whole weeks) to inject the football media’s version of corn syrup into your digestive psyche, It’s actually amazing you did NOT get post-Matt-Stafford-to-the-Rams power rankings, post-Andy Dalton-to-the-Bears power rankings and post-Larry Ogunjobi-to-the-Bengals power rankings. Try to look away. You can’t.
“All of those moves (and more) will be baked into this set of power rankings. Don’t worry, for we’ll try this exercise again after the draft.”
The defending Super Bowl champion Bucs were, of course, ranked No. 1, the Kansas City Chiefs 2, the Green Bay Packers 3 and then the Browns, of whom Orr wrote:
“Hear me out: John Johnson was one of the best safeties in football, and Band-Aids one of the Browns’ biggest weaknesses in 2020. Factor in the reintroduction of 2020 second-round pick Grant Delpit, and you have a potentially devastating secondary to pair with an offense humming along at peak efficiency, Whether or not Odell Bdeckham returns to form (or returns to the Browns at all), it feels like this version of the Browns is uniquely positioned to take the division and fully realize its potential. There is simply too much talent on both sides of the ball, especially at cornerstones like defensive back, pass rusher and pass blocker, to ignore this team coming into the year.”
Pinch me. I want to make sure it’s real, that I’m not dreaming.
Following the Browns  to round out the top 10 are, in order, the Buffalo Bills at No. 5, the Pittsburgh Steelers at 6, the Baltimore Ravens at 7, the Seattle Seahawks at 8, the New England Patriots at 9 and the Miami Dolphins.
The AFC North’s other team, the Cincinnati Bengals, are next-to-last at No. 31.