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OBR Newswire Bloviation Header
OBR Newswire Bloviation Header
Good morning, Cleveland Browns fans!
It's rare that I wake up in the morning and don't feel like sitting down to spew my dark thoughts about the Cleveland Browns in this Massive Morning Missive. That's the state I am in this morning, but I have good excuses.
The first excuse is that the Newswire itself—the links that power this incredible bit of daily infoblather —is rather uninspiring unless you want to talk about what the Browns will do with pick #2 in the upcoming draft. It's a subject that's been addressed once or twice in this space, and I don't feel like getting into the various arguments for Abdul Carter vs. Shedeur Sanders this morning.
It's a pretty basic debate built around two concepts: (1) Do you believe in a reasonably sure thing on defense vs. picking a quarterback, the latter being a a mystery to the Cleveland Browns that has haunted them for 30 years? Also, there's (2): Do you believe that Sanders is a franchise quarterback?
As I discussed yesterday, I put little stock in basing the decision on the Browns' last few decades' errors in drafting quarterbacks. It's all about this player in this situation.
Is Sanders a franchise quarterback? I believe he is... it's just that the franchise in question may not be Cleveland.
Based on what I've read (and the hours and hours of tape-watching that I'll try to convince you I've done), Sanders will require sound offensive line play and an offense that plays to his strengths. It's the former that worries me about Sanders' future in Cleveland.
Hand Stop
Stop! Please reconsider how you're spending your morning. (Photo: Unspash.com)
Despite some savvy additions this off-season, I'm still not sold on the Browns being able to protect a quarterback as effectively as they should because of the situation at both tackle positions, Joel Bitonio's advanced age, and Ethan Pocic's regression in 2024.
For a quarterback like Sanders, who is not a run-first quarterback and tends to crawl around in the pocket waiting for the right pass to develop, I'm concerned that he'll take a lot of sacks in Cleveland. At the same time, I'm convinced that accuracy is the most critical determinant of QB success at the NFL level and that Sanders could deliver a robust rookie season in the right situation.
So, that's the debate as the disruptive Abdul Carter sits out there, effectively being the "safe pick" with all the uncertainty around Sanders.
My second excuse for not being in the mood to chatter is that I'm currently deeply involved in a coding project, building out a new capability for the OBR that will help us compete better against the wave of aggregators and other info-lifters who spew repetitive noise all day long. For me, the process of coding is a creative one, new ideas fly around that beg to be put into code, and I get obsessive about building myself new toys to work with on the site. I love learning more about developing software, and pulling myself out of this zone is tough.
This bloviation is a little late because I woke up at 1AM and couldn't get back to sleep until hours later when I had coded an idea that I had during the evening. It's sick.
But my mental illnesses are not your problem. What is your problem is that you follow a football team that is, once again, in a difficult position heading into the NFL Draft. It provides plenty of grist for the mill - witness how I could slap six rehashed paragraphs together just to explain how much I didn't want to rehash the subject.
As 8AM rolls around and it becomes time to move from bloviating to actual work, I can safely suggest that you not read today's bloviation because it's uninspired.
What is inspired, I hope, is this project I'm working on, and I can't wait to start showing you what I hope it will turn out to be.
But, no, don't read today's bloviation.
Have a good one! GO BROWNS!
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