This Sunday, the Cleveland Browns take on the Cincinnati Bengals to cap off the regular season. Below, we analyze a few advantages, disadvantages, or general thoughts about the two teams before getting
to our predictions for the game.
Myles Garrett Has to Get it, Part II
Since 2022, Myles Garrett has faced the Bengals six times, and has at least one sack in five of those games. Cincinnati has always tended to try throwing the ball more, and they also try to push the ball downfield with their talented receivers. They are the type of team that you can’t just blow up with 10 sacks against them (like what happened when Cleveland faced the Raiders earlier this season). However, because they get a lot of offense and take time to throw the ball down the field, it’s only natural that Joe Burrow will take some sacks. Sure, they will try to account for Myles Garrett — but they’re not going to radically change everything just because of Garrett. If Garrett gets a sack, he gets a sack — and they move on to trying to get the next big play.
All of that is a long way of me saying that this is as good of an opportunity for Garrett to break the sack record — and all eyes will be on him. Let’s hope he gets it. If he doesn’t, it’ll suck, but it’s not going to leave me devastated or anything like that.
The Bengals’ offense has been red hot over these last couple of weeks. Even though they are eliminated from playoff contention, the season is still young for Burrow because of the early-season injury he had. As far as they’re concerned, they are playing their hearts out still. Cleveland has had an interesting stretch defensively to where I thought the Titans, Bears, and for one half, the Bills, moved the ball all over them. And then, a switch flipped in the second half vs. Buffalo and last week against the Steelers, to where they’ve picked up their intensity.
Now, against Cincinnati, they’ll be without starting middle linebacker Carson Schwesinger. Although Cleveland has historically had the Bengals’ number, I expect them to have a degree of success this week — the kind where both sides have success offensively, and play below average defense. The Bengals have their key pieces offensively, while Cleveland doesn’t — so the scale should tip in favor of the Bengals.
Quick Hitters
Defensive coordinator Jim Schwartz was asked about whether Pittsburgh spent too much attention on Myles Garrett, but he attributed their issues more so to the trickle down effect and Kenneth Gainwell having to help block:
“Well, I mean, they are always Myles-conscious. Everybody’s Myles-aware. They have to be because otherwise he’ll just completely wreck your game. So, everybody starts their game plan with saying, ‘okay, 95 is not going to beat us, and let’s see if we can play it another way.’ I would say this – it helped us because most of the time, the guy that was chipping Myles was (Kenneth) Gainwell. And with the injuries that they had with losing DK (Metcalf) and not having (Calvin) Austin, Gainwell was their number one receiver. So, it’s a little bit like swapping queens to get checkmate a couple plays later. I haven’t given you any chess, I used to have a lot of chess, I used to play a lot more way back in the day, but, you know, it was a little bit like that. They took a very important piece out of their offense to try to take an important piece out of ours. And I think that had a lot to do with how it went. But I think, you know, the way this game went, like, our corners played extremely well, you know, and it doesn’t matter. I mean, it’s hard to cover on the outside part of the field. Rodgers is a Hall of Famer. They have very capable guys that can play. And Tyson and Denzel played outstanding on the outside part of the field. But I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention Tre Avery, because Tre’s bounced around, undrafted free agent – had a couple different teams up and down from the practice squad this year. And we lost Myles Harden, and we did a workout before the game, he just wasn’t able to go. And Tre had to step in and play. Other than like, one of his first plays was that rub pick on the one third down, which I’d like a little better awareness of just knowing that’s coming to avoid that situation, but settled down on the sideline and played outstanding ball for us. He tackled, he played tight coverage, he played sticky. You want to watch those really, the last four plays of that game – watch Tre. Watch how he’s loving receivers and played really good, but communicated really well, played with some effort, you know, and he was a guy that, whatever Wednesday before, really wasn’t in the game plan. But we talk a lot about being able to do your job and don’t be a weak link. And not only was he not the weak link, but he was a strong link for him. Guys like Tre, guys like Rayshawn Jenkins – Ray, depending on how the game’s played, sometimes Ray plays five plays on defense. Sometimes like this last game, San Francisco, Steelers, he’s playing 35. But he played really, really physically. He covered well. He was in man to man a lot on those guys, played with great effort, played with great spirit and made a big, big contribution. So, we got some good contributions from those guys. It just wasn’t the guys on the outside.”
Offensive coordinator Tommy Rees was asked about facing a team in Week 1 and then all the way in Week 18:
“Yeah, it is a large gap. You know, there’s certainly things that you look at situationally on how they played us and try to find the consistencies on who they still are versus who they were week one. Obviously, our quarterback in that game (Joe Flacco) is there now, so that’s obviously a very different thing to look at. But you just try to find the consistencies in who they are and who they still are, and how they may want to attack you defensively. But look, we probably look a lot different week one than how we look now, from a personnel standpoint. Certainly, there’s some scheme things that might be a little different, but that’s part of the year, that’s part of how you evaluate how the year goes on.”
Special teams coordinator Bubba Ventrone talked about the development of K Andre Szmyt:
“Yeah, well I am very excited about his development over the season. He’s worked extremely hard. He’s been very consistent every day, and he’s definitely improved a lot as the season’s gone along. He’s had really good weeks of practice, and it’s really translated over into the game, you know, he’s done a really good job with that. So operations have been good, and he’s been consistent. He really has. He’s done a really good job in practice, too.”
Some other notes to look forward to:
- Let’s have Shedeur Sanders finish the season strong. Beyond that, and wanting to see Garrett get the record, I’m more than happy to move on to the offseason.
Predictions
Here are predictions from multiple staff members at DBN:
Chris Pokorny: “Both teams will have success offensively, but Cleveland’s roster is a bit too thin from an injury standpoint to hold off a hot Bengals offense.” Bengals 27, Browns 20
Jared Mueller: “The Browns are not deep enough to deal with multiple injuries and the loss of Fannin and Schwesinger will unravel the only good the team has going on offense and show just how deserving the LB is of DROY.” Bengals 30, Browns 14
Barry Shuck: The Browns vs. the Bengals in the final game of the season. Paul Brown hated the Browns after he was fired, and as head coach/GM/owner of the Bengals, his greatest goals twice a year were to beat the team that bears his name. The Browns should play everybody who is on the depth chart and as many practice squad guys as possible, the entire game, plus Myles Garrett. I hate that Garrett needed that 17th game to break the sack record. The two who made the record played 16 games. Score for this game? I don’t know. 14-10. Winner? Coin flip. All of us here at DBN are already packed for Aruba after the final gun sounds and the game coverage is wrapped up. Where did I put my snorkel…..
Who do you think will win, Browns fans? Let us know in the comments section below.
