Baker Mayfield and Donovan Peoples-Jones (center, ground) had Hail Mary moment
Matt Starkey/Cleveland Browns
When I began the Mayfield Memorandum project this season, it seemed as if there would be countless opportunities to expand the focus from Baker Mayfield himself to those who made significant contributions to his and the Cleveland Brown’s success. And why not? The team had been promoted to Super Bowl contenders, by consensus.
Well, so much for that.
The Browns, with a messy, injurious 37-14 home loss to the Arizona Cardinals, the NFL’s only undefeated team, have fallen to 3-3 and are struggling to the point that the Super Bowl is an unrealistic dream. Making the playoffs again is challenge enough.
Mayfield is getting too little to no help—including from himself and his coach.
Kyler Murray erased all doubt Sunday in FirstEnergy Stadium about who the best of the University of Oklahoma quarterback in the NFL is when he again outshone his former Sooner roommate. In two times their teams have met since Murray followed Mayfield to the NFL—Heisman Trophy winners and No. 1 draft picks—Murray has proved the better player, if not the better performer. (Mayfield is the Ted Lasso of commercials.)
When Peter King published on his Football Morning in America Monday blog a list of the top NFL quarterbacks, he placed Murray No. 1 and did not include Mayfield. He tried to make it a Top 10 list but could not. “In my 38 seasons covering the NFL,” King wrote, “I’ve never seen a class of quarterbacks as good as this one.” So he made his list 12 deep—and still no Mayfield. King did make it clear that the list was not “who are the best, but how they’re playing right now.” His assessment:
- Kyler Murray
- Josh Allen
- Dak Prescott
- Lamar Jackson
- Tom Brady
- Aaron Rodgers
- Justin Herbert
- Patrick Mahomes
- Matthew Stafford
- Kirk Cousins
- Derek Carr
- Joe Burrow
King labeled his choices “fungible.” If based on who is playing best “right now,” the list could change from week to week so fungible fits. More important, the list is ominous for Mayfield and the Browns. He has lost in 2021 to three of those on it—Murray, Herbert, and Mahomes—and won only once: 14-7 against Kirk Cousin’s Minnesota Vikings, a victory facilitated by the best defense the Browns have played but not by Mayfield.
Mayfield has four games ahead of him against listed quarterbacks from the AFC North—Jackson and the Baltimore Ravens, Burrow and the Cincinnati Bengals. The Browns play both twice, not to mention two tests by Ben Roethlisberger and Pittsburgh. Roethlisberger is at the wrong end of his long career, but anyone who considered victories over the Bengals a given when predicting wins-losses before the season, may want to consider that King thought the second-year Burrow deserved even loftier status.
All and all, it feels like a spooky and dangerous time for the Browns and isn’t yet Halloween. Coach of the Year Kevin Stefanski guided the Browns to defeat, the first time his team had lost two games in a row since he became coach in 2020, while the Cardinals got along just fine without Kliff Kingsbury, their head coach-offensive and play-caller who was sidelined with COVID. Spencer Whipple, a 32-year-old assistant receivers coach, called the plays, took apart a Browns secondary that is supposed to be much improved by General Manager Andrew Berry’s off-season acquisitions—but isn’t.
Perhaps it has something to do with the ability of the quarterback on the other end of the calls. Murray did what he did at Oklahoma and has done subsequently in the NFL. As intimidating a dual threat as Lamar Jackson is, Murray is a sharper, more accurate thrower and is quicker on his feet, if not as strong or better than Jackson as a runner.
Mayfield once could match Murray’s accuracy but his internal gyroscope has been out of whack of late, his impressively long touchdown pass at the end of the first half notwithstanding. Receiver Donovan Peoples-Jones, who went up and got the ball in the mosh pit that an end zone can become when a Hail Mary pass is in the air, deserves as much or more credit than Mayfield. Officially the touchdown pass was 57 yards but NFL Next Gen Stats determined that the ball was in the air for 66.4 yards, the longest completion since Next Gen began monitoring the statistic in 2016. His total stats did stand up comparatively well: 19-of-28 (67.8%), 234 yards, 2 TDs, 1 INT, 102.4 rating.
Mayfield dropped both his long bomb to Peoples-Jones and showed a better connection with receiver Odell Beckham Jr. before his left (non-throwing) shoulder was reinjured by a J.J. Watt sack in the third quarter; it resulted in one of Mayfield’s three turnovers (two fumbles and the interception). Though the hit left him crumpled on the field looking like a worse-for-wear ragdoll, Mayfield, as is his wont, got back into the fray after visiting the sideline medical tent. He finally left in the fourth quarter when all was lost and showed up for his postgame interview with his left arm in a sling but promising he would be ready for the short-week, Thursday-night game with Denver.
Who knows who else will be available for the decimated offense that played without starting tackles Jack Conklin and Jedrick Wills Jr., receiver (and Mayfield safety blanket) Jarvis Landry, and leading rusher Nick Chubb, and then lost Kareem Hunt, No. 2 of the NFL’s best 1-2 running punch in the fourth quarter. OBJ also suffered a shoulder injury but like his quarterback climbed back on the horse.
Whoever the Browns’ Thursday-night horses turn out to be, there is a chance they will not turn a questionable stable into the best it had figured to become. Everyone had expected that the Browns horses could run with the big boys in the NFL’s fast lane, but this has proved incorrect. “We’re a 3-3 football team, which means we’re average across the board,” admitted Stefanski, who might want to rethink basing his decisions on analytics charts that he and top Browns management sleep with under their pillows.
Once again, Stefanski threw away points when, down only 7-0 in the first quarter, he chose to go for fourth-and-3 from the Cardinals’ 13 in lieu of a short field goal. Stefanski has tried 12 times to convert fourth downs and has succeeded on only five. As on three previous occasions, Mayfield suffered a sack. Instead of letting his quarterback walk away with three early points and the positivity that can come from driving his team into scoring position on its second possession, Stefanski’s choice resulted in a big, fat zero.
That isn’t even average.
NOTE: All of the enumerated Mayfield Memorandums can be found at: https://stevelovewriter.com/blog/
