CLEVELAND, OHIO (TheOBR.com) - Good morning, Cleveland Browns fans!
SCHEDULE DAY: I wrote about this yesterday, but now it's finally here. It's schedule release day! This is, of course, a completely artificial day of celebration where we're supposed to be excited about something that borders on being meaningless. Sort of like New Year's Eve without the excuse for drinking and nostalgia and forced frivolity, I guess.
The Browns will reveal their full 2026 schedule on the team's official website and social channels at 7:30 p.m. ET, with the league doing its usual television extravaganza at 8 p.m. on NFL Network and ESPN2. Single-game tickets go on sale when the schedule drops, because nothing says "fresh start" quite like handing over money before knowing which quarterback will be upright in Week 11.
We have, at least, created a thread for our Insiders to opine about the schedule and what they've heard, and you're welcome to join in if you wish. The OBR will produce an elaborate schedule release video using Hollywood-level visual effects. We've spent months working on it, or at least minutes, and we believe it will be the "Heaven's Gate" of schedule releases. The, uh, movie. Not the cult.
THE AGE OF EXTREMELY WEIRD BROWNS QB CONTENT:The Athletic reports that Season 3 of Netflix's Quarterback premieres July 14 and will include Jayden Daniels, Baker Mayfield, Cam Ward, and Joe Flacco — listed, beautifully and absurdly, as a Cleveland Browns/Cincinnati Bengals quarterback. This franchise has produced a lot of odd quarterback content over the years, but "Joe Flacco, Netflix protagonist" is right up there. I'm not saying I won't watch. Of course I'll watch. I'm a Browns webdork. This is what the illness requires.
Flacco's season apparently gets the full streaming-doc treatment: opening the year as the Browns' starter ahead of Dillon Gabriel and Shedeur Sanders, getting traded midseason to Cincinnati after Joe Burrow was injured, finishing 2-8 as a starter between the two Ohio stops.
Since the Browns remain starting quarterback-free at the moment, we can at least see the life of an ex-Browns quarterback, as Baker Mayfield is also featured in the show, doing Baker Mayfield-like things and not winning the Super Bowl, but doing just enough to torment Browns fans about what they've suffered at quarterback since he was dealt away. A Baker Mayfield vs. Kevin Stefanski subplot between the Buccaneers and Falcons will make for nice headlines later this year, as two individuals booted out of Cleveland will have a fight over who booted whom and why.
Emmanuel McNeil-Warren
Emmanuel McNeil-Warren (Photo: USA TODAY Sports)
SAFETY ROOM GETS INTERESTING:
Scott Petrak has a good piece on second-round safety Emmanuel McNeil-Warren, and the Browns' official site rookie minicamp notes back up the same early theme: the kid has the physical package, the confidence, and the coaching staff's attention.
McNeil-Warren said he expects the Browns' safety group to be "dominant for real," adding that he can rotate, play anywhere on the field, work in the box or deep, and "make plays." Todd Monken's description was even better: "Long, fast, anticipating, being physical, got unbelievable range," then the money line — "I think the sky's the limit. He wants to be an elite football player, and he goes about it the right way every day."
McNeil-Warren is 6-foot-3 and 213 pounds, ran 4.52, and left Toledo with 207 tackles, 11 tackles for loss, five interceptions, eight forced fumbles, and 15 passes defensed. The Browns traded up to No. 58 to get him.
The NFL is back in love with safeties who can do everything because offenses keep throwing tight ends, condensed formations, and motion nonsense at defenses. Monken even referenced Kyle Hamilton as the kind of chess-piece body type Baltimore used so well. If McNeil-Warren can be even a diet version of that — and, yes, I realize I just cursed the poor kid with a comparison paragraph in May — the Browns defense gets more flexible in a hurry.
Have a good one! GO BROWNS!
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Positive news from the world of sports and beyond…The world of 2050: What's actually possible - Big Think
There's a lot of doomerism about the coming age of AI, spatial computing, and robotics. There are calamatists out there talking about the "abrupt extermination" of the human race and other horrible things. I blame James Cameron and "The Terminator". And "The Matrix". And yes, it will cause dislocation among knowledge workers, especially as people trust AI model outputs far more than they should. I prefer to look at it as a huge opportunity to make our lives better - almost unrecognizably so - as human-built and designed machines take over more autonomous tasks. Big Think shares my optimism. I'm convinced that our lives can dramatically improve over time thanks to human advancement, if it's managed properly. My biggest concern isn't the machines, but our own reaction to them, and how prepared our leaders are to help us navigate the inevitable changes in our lives.
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When not refreshing schedule leaks like a lab rat pressing the pellet button, Barry McBride is the Publisher and Founder of the OBR and bloviates this nonsense every morning. You can follow him on Twitter @barrymcbride or write him at barry@theobr.com if you are so compelled.
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