The conversation between Thursday Night Football and kickoff in Cleveland was most about Browns GM Andrew Berry trading QB Joe Flacco to their AFC North and in-state rival, the Cincinnati Bengals. Flacco was lights out against the Pittsburgh Steelers and had many screaming about the trade.
The Flacco trade did lead to the Bengals victory over the Steelers. On Sunday, Berry’s other in-season trade also helped lead to a victory. (Does the GM get credit for two?)
On Sunday, Campbell had a stellar game:
If you only look at the box score, Campbell had a good day: 1 tackle, 1 pick-6, 2 pass breakups. The value of all of those plays was so much higher than can be accounted for in counting stats.
If Achane scores that touchdown, does Stefanski feel like he needs to call more pass plays? Same question if Campbell allows the Waddle touchdown, which would have run the score to 17-10.
If Campbell, as Cleveland defenders have done before and did do on Sunday, dropped the deflected pass or ran out of bounds right away, are the Browns able to put the game away, or is there a replay of the Minnesota Vikings game?
Did Campbell single-handedly win the game on Sunday? Obviously not. Can we judge the trade of Newsome for Campbell already (especially if we include that the Jacksonville Jaguars are 0-2 since the deal)? No, just like the Flacco deal cannot be judged based on Thursday Night Football. Is Campbell the “for sure” answer across from CB Denzel Ward? We will need a few more games to be certain.
For now, Berry’s decision to make the cornerback swap deserves the appropriate amount of credit. As I noted on social media, the credit should come at a similar level as the criticism did after TNF:
For now, Cleveland can celebrate with a Victory Monday, where the run game, the defense, and a bad opponent led to a no-doubt level win in Week 7. Just give a little credit to the Browns GM along the way.