Think that a one-win Tennessee Titans team (1-5 with a victory last Sunday following an 0-5 start) can’t derail a Browns club with a winning record (4-2), a big contest next Sunday against the arch-rival Pittsburgh Steelers and postseason dreams, when they meet on Sunday in Nashville?
Well, think again. It has happened before — history tells us so — and as such, it could certainly happen again.
That exact nightmare occurred 43 years ago and, in essence, kept the Browns from the playoffs.
The Browns went into the final three games of the 1983 season at 8-5 and with a good shot at getting into the postseason for the second straight year and the third time in four seasons.
Brent Musberger, then working as the anchor at CBS for its NFL studio show, raved about Cleveland’s chances. After all, the Browns had won three straight games, the first two by shutout. if it’s true that a team needs to be playing its best at the end of the season, then the Browns certainly fit that description.
However, then came an ugly 27-6 road loss to a decent — but hardly great — Denver Broncos team. The Browns fell behind 21-3 late in the first half and never mounted any real comeback.
OK. Recalculating. No problem. The Browns, now at 8-6 and still very much in the hunt, could dust themselves off and get back on track with another road game, this time at the Astrodome against the Titans’ predecessors, the 1-13, going-nowhere Houston. Oilers.
Bad idea.
The Browns, wrongly figuring that the hapless Oilers would just roll over and play dead, and looking forward to a regular-season finale at home against Pittsburgh the following week, were not at all mentally, physically or emotionally prepared to play. And it showed right from the start as the Browns fell behind by a whopping 24–6 in the second quarter. They rallied to tie it at 24–24 three consecutive short touchdown runs by Mike Pruitt, but they couldn’t hold on as the Oilers got a TD of their own in the fourth quarter to win 34-27. What a disaster.
The Browns did their job the next week, building a 23–10 halftime lead over Pittsburgh on the way to winning 30–17. In what turned out to his last game as a Brown before bolting to the USFL to play for the New Jersey Generals of owner Donald Trump and offensive coordinator Chris Palmer, quarterback Brian Sipe threw three touchdown passes, two of which went to tight end Harry Holt.
The Browns finished 9–7, but games later in the day caused them to lose out on a postseason bid on tiebreakers.
Now here we are all these years later and the Titans are waiting to spring one on the Browns again. They need this time to be the ones getting off to the fast start, enforcing their will on the Titans, but I wonder if they can do that because they are a traditionally slow-starting team. They had better change their ways on Sunday.
Steve King
