March 15, 2010
Sunday Round-Up

Eventful day in Cleveland sports. Three different items deserve some attention, so I’ll try to address them all briefly.

PART 1: Cavs / Celtics Bazooka Point

In the words of PTI’s Mike Wilbon, Father Time is undefeated. Every day that seems to be more apparent to people watching the 2009-10 Celtics.

It wasn’t long ago that I heard pundits still talking about Boston winning it all this year. There was a dramatically different tone in the commentary of today’s game. Jeff Van Gundy (to his credit, usually the sole voice of reason on the ABC broadcast) became the first national commentator to declare that the Celtics might not get out of the first round of the playoffs.

This isn’t a news flash to the Mesa team. After all, I’m on record dating back to August about how much of a threat I thought the Celtics were going to be to the Cavs this season. However, I do think it’s interesting that the Celtics’ overall play has gotten to the point that the media’s opinion of them is starting to change. Granted, their weakness is still being pegged as “inconsistency” rather than just plain age, lack of effort, and lack of talent. But considering that the Cavs scored 104 points on the Celts and won by 11 despite missing 17 free throws and only shooting 41%, it seems to me that the writing is on the wall.

Speaking of which…

PART 2: Goodbye Brady Quinn, You Were Never Even Allowed to Test Positive for PEDs

That’s right: as I’m sure you all know by now, the Browns have shipped Body by Quinn to Denver for a fullback named Peyton Hillis, a 2011 6th round pick, and a conditional 2012 pick (you know, the season that we’re not even sure will exist yet).

The trade should come as a surprise to absolutely no one. Once Holmgren traded for Seneca Wallace and then decided it was a good idea to pay Jake Delhomme $7M this year, Inadequinn’s days were numbered.

But what I am still a little surprised by is the return on investment. The package listed above isn’t exactly a treasure trove, especially considering that it seems there were multiple teams who had at least a slight interest in attaining the King of Myoplex’s hypothetical talents. (ESPN’s Chris Mortensen spent several tweets on Saturday talking up Quinn and mentioning strong links to KC and Washington.) Although the more I read about Peyton Hillis, the more it seems that they’re betting on him to be a significant part of the offense as a “true” West Coast pass-catching fullback.

The bottom line, though, is that Quinn’s got a fresh start in Denver lined up for this season. Though there’s always some chance that he could get his act together and doom me to a future of Quinnbots prattling on about the Browns’ front office reopening the wounds of the Elway years by handing the Broncos a franchise QB, I would counter by quoting the one, the only Jon Gruden. As he noted in the closing minutes of the Browns’ Monday night game last season when BBQ chucked two consecutive deep-outs into the opposing bench, “I don’t know much about statistics, but I do know that if you want to play quarterback in the NFL, you gotta be able to throw the ball between those two white lines.”

PART 3: Goodbye Kamerion Wimbley, You Were Never Even Allowed to — Wait, They Traded WHO?!

Unlike the Quinn deal, this one came completely out of nowhere. But the Browns brain trust dealt Kam Wimbley to Oakland for a 2010 3rd round pick, bringing their draft pick total for this season to either 12 or 13.

In looking at some basic stats, the reality is that Wimbley went from 11.0 sacks in his rookie season to an average of ~5 per season from 2007-9, a stretch in which he only missed 1 game. In comparison, mid-season waiver pick-up Matt Roth tallied 4 sacks in 6 games in 2009. Holmgren and Heckert must believe that Roth’s success is sustainable (in concert w/the other linebackers on the roster), thereby making Wimbley expendable. Given the renowned depth of this upcoming draft, a high 3rd rounder should be enough to come away with a player of some impact.

[Note: it was revealed the morning after I wrote this that the Raiders only gave up the later of their two 3rd rounders, #86 overall instead of #70 overall, to get the Browns to dump Wimbley. This revelation obviously makes the trade even more questionable than originally thought.]

This brings us back to the powder keg of potential.

In the span of about three days, it seems as though the average Browns fan has gone from viewing Holmgren as a franchise-changing savior to someone who, at best, should be treated with skepticism and, at worst, may be a complete idiot. The front office has now officially entered into the realm of culpability by (gasp!) making actual decisions, some of which have not exactly been met with loud and immediate applause. The big money signing of a 35 year-old Jake Delhomme, the dumping of BBQ (expected) and Wimbley (unexpected) have altered the team without a doubt. They’ve also helped create a scenario in which the 2010 NFL draft will either change the franchise into a legitimate team, or ensure that for the next decade it stays in the cellar like the deformed son of some backwoods survivalists.

It’ll be interesting to see far the fan base’s good will extends beyond the draft. My guess is that unless Heckert and company come up with a series of picks that’s universally endorsed by every major NFL analyst, people in Cleveland are going to start freaking out immediately. If so, it’s a ridiculous reaction, since no one will know until the actual season whether or not the team has improved. (I’d remind everyone that the great Rey Maualuga—who Mangini was practically tarred and feathered for passing on—ended last season with 1.0 sacks and spent part of this off-season at the Betty Ford center after a drunk-driving incident where he crashed into 2 parked cars and a meter.)

That said, this week’s flurry of activity has started the clock on the Holmgren/Heckert era. We’ll see how long it is before they’re being crucified on the Plain Dealer’s comment boards—and whether or not we have any actual results to judge them on beforehand.

-T

2:06am  |   URL: http://www.josemesaisdead.com/post/449631568/sunday-round-up
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FILED UNDER: NBA NFL Brady Quinn Holmgren Heckert draft Celtics Bazooka Point Kamerion Wimbley 
March 5, 2010
Browns Talk: Kill That Noise

Tonight is arguably one of my least favorite sports nights of the year. Why? Because 45 minutes before I started writing this post, NFL free agency began.

This is not in itself a bad thing. On one level, it’s an improvement. Instead of idle speculation, I get actual information from the NFL sources I follow about roster moves and trades. The Browns could, in theory, start to make some improvements. Most importantly to me, some 21 year-old’s 40 yard dash time at the combine will cease to qualify as news.

The problem for me is what it does to the Cavs.

The regular readers of this blog, I believe, fall into an extreme minority in the Cleveland sports community. Though there are a number of truths I could follow that sentence up with, the one I’m talking about tonight is this: I think we all care tremendously more about the Cavs than the Browns.

Unfortunately, this is not the norm. And it drives me insane.

I understand that for a long time, the Browns were very competitive, very exciting to watch, very much justified as THE team in Cleveland. They were a squad that people felt embodied the spirit of the city. They were full of charismatic stars and great players, like Jim Brown, Bernie Kosar, Clay Matthews, on and on. They were a team that people felt were almost perpetually on the verge of that elusive championship.

But let’s be honest, those days are long gone. Yet the city’s love affair with the Browns still trumps the others, regardless of who’s actually performing and who isn’t. I generally think that the Plain Dealer’s Bud Shaw is a hack, but he hit the nail on the head last spring when he wrote something to the effect of, “The Cavs are heading into the playoffs with the best record in the league, the Indians’ season opener is this coming week, so it’s only natural that most of the reader questions in my inbox are about Brady Quinn.”

The Cavs are on pace to again finish as the #1 seed in the entire league. The Browns haven’t made the playoffs since 2002.

The Cavs boast a guy who may go down as the greatest player in the history of pro basketball. He’s in the midst of having one of the most dominant statistical seasons ever. He may be a unanimous vote for MVP this season.  Meanwhile, the Browns don’t even have a legitimate starting quarterback.

Since Dan Gilbert bought the team, the Cavs have built a world-class organization full of character guys committed to winning. They make lop-sidedly positive trades, and with the exception of Larry Hughes, when they decide to spare no expense they usually get a high return on investment. The Browns have been the sports world’s most absurd game of front office musical chairs since their return in 1999. They are likely paying as many people as much money to NOT work for them as they’re paying to the staff currently on the job. And again, they’ve been to the playoffs once in the past decade.

I could go on and on with this stuff. The point is, despite this huge gap in competitiveness and intrigue, the hibernation period is over again. The Browns will now automatically jump to the #1 story position on every Cleveland media outlet. There will be more discussion over the tender given to Matt Roth than to Andy Varejao’s qualifications as Sixth Man of the Year, more interest in pre-draft workouts for cornerbacks than in who the Cavs will be set to play in the second round of the playoffs, more attention paid to any progress in Josh Cribbs’s contract renegotiation than in the return of Z, a guy whose number will hang in the rafters of the Q. It’s as disgraceful as booing the Cavs for trouncing an opponent with efficient offense and stifling defense, but falling short of the Chalupa plateau. (Granted, this hasn’t been as much of a problem this season because of the Cavs’ increased offensive production, but the point stands.)

I don’t even expect this to change if the Cavs do in fact win the NBA title this season.  In my most cynical moment, I imagine people emptying off the streets during the the victory parade to mourn upon hearing the news that the Browns cut Brady Quinn—or even worse, LeBron’s re-signing in Cleveland being overshadowed by the Browns’ late acquisition of Troy Smith.

The Cavs are in the midst of another very special season. In a nightmare scenario, this could be the last time we ever see LeBron in a Cleveland uniform. Even if it’s not, he’s now entering his prime with a solid (even excellent), likable supporting cast hungry to bring home the big prize. Let’s all enjoy this. And the next time someone you know brings up Mike Holmgren, for god’s sake, tell them to kill that noise until mid-summer. We’ve got winners in town.

-T

12:10am  |   URL: http://www.josemesaisdead.com/post/427937288/browns-talk-kill-that-noise
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FILED UNDER: NBA NFL Cavs Browns LeBron Holmgren Brady Quinn Troy Smith 
September 22, 2009
Devil’s Advocate: Alternating Snaps

By this point in Mesa’s existence, Mike and I have made it fairly clear that our M.O. is to question the established norms of how to look at sports.  Every once in a while, though, I’m going to take this position to the extreme and write a post based on an argument that I don’t necessarily believe in 100%, just for the sake of conversation and contrarianism. 

I know in advance these posts will motivate probably 85% of our readership to call me a complete idiot. But I’m okay with that - especially since I’m slapping this disclaimer on them.

I’m going to refer to this as the “Devil’s Advocate” series.

For the inaugural installment, I’d like to endorse the idea that Quinn and DA should alternate snaps.

In conversations I’ve had with friends, this seems to be a really controversial topic. The established football wisdom is that not running the same quarterback out for every play will “disrupt continuity” and prevent the offense from “getting into a rhythm.” This is supposed to be attributable to all kinds of things:  a different snap count, a different way to run the huddle, different tendencies once the ball is snapped, whatever.

However, after listening to Jon Gruden ram the merits of the Wildcat formation down my throat for the entirety of the Dolphins-Colts game on Monday Night Football this week, I realized something:  almost all of the reasons the Wildcat supposedly works are the same reasons that playing two different quarterbacks is NOT supposed to work.

If my memory serves me correctly, these are the main pro-Wildcat positions:

1) It forces the opposing team to spend valuable practice time preparing for this alternate formation leading up to any games against an opponent who uses it.

2) Despite the time spent preparing for it, the Wildcat creates havoc on the playing field because the defense has to instantaneously adjust to a completely different set of weapons and possibilities at a moment’s notice. This increases the likelihood of a breakdown that will allow for a big play.

On MNF, the Dolphins ran 84 offensive plays. They used the Wildcat for 12 of those 84, which calcs out to about 14.3% of their snaps. In other words, Miami’s established starter, Chad Pennington, was still under center for more than 85% of their time on offense.

Hypothetically, let’s say that your team had a starting QB whose specialty was supposed to be short, accurate passes - but that he’s currently struggling to move the ball in any fashion.  Hypothetically, let’s also say your second string QB has a completely opposite skill set - say, throwing deep for big yardage.

Since your offense needs some kind of spark, isn’t there merit to the idea of inserting that second string QB into the game for, say, 15% of your snaps in order to expand your offensive capabilities and screw up the defense’s head in the same fashion as the Wildcat? 

The reasoning I’ve heard for why the Wildcat doesn’t disrupt the offense is, “Well, the team actually spends time during the week running the Wildcat, so they’re familiar with it. This eliminates the negative effects.”  So, um, couldn’t you just practice running some plays with this alternate QB set? In theory, it should work just as well as practicing the Wildcat, right?  Especially when you define the Wildcat as what it really is:  putting in someone other than your starter to play quarterback for select snaps.

Plus, there’s no danger to “disrupting the offense” in this scenario because - guess what - the offense has shown it’s incapable of getting into a rhythm if run traditionally.

The only other counter-argument I can think of is that, if your QBs really have these completely opposite skills, any time the second-stringer comes in to take the snap, it’s like telegraphing a deep throw. 

But when you take into account that the second-string QB can hand off just as easily as the starter, it’s not a sure thing. (The reality of the Wildcat is that even if a running back like Ronnie Brown takes a direct snap, he’s just as likely to hand the ball off as run it himself or throw - which is exactly what the regular quarterback would’ve done in the same play.) And it’s ESPECIALLY not a sure thing if your “accurate” starter has been throwing very poorly, even on short-range passes.  In that circumstance, the second-stringer doesn’t limit you any more than your starter. All he does is open up more possibilities. 

Finally, if you’re only running this alternate set for a small fraction of plays, then there’s theoretically no danger to your starter’s status as “the guy.”  The only thing that could threaten him is if the second-stringer is consistently more effective and explosive than he is.  And in that case, well, wouldn’t you be better off just installing the second-stringer as your starter?

In other words, if we use the Wildcat as the guideline, there seems to be very little downside to trying this alternate formation - supposing there’s a team that, hypothetically, is in this exact circumstance (a sluggish offense, a questionable starter, and a back-up with complementary skills). But how likely is that to happen?

OK, you may begin calling me a jackass….now.

-T

11:00pm  |   URL: http://www.josemesaisdead.com/post/194771273/devils-advocate-alternating-snaps
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FILED UNDER: Devil's Advocate Browns Derek Anderson Brady Quinn QB NFL