McMANAMON: Browns' latest embarrassing loss brings barely answered questions
By Patrick McManamon
Beacon Journal sports writer
POSTED: 08:18 p.m. EST, Nov 01, 2009
CHICAGO:The only certainty from the Browns' embarrassment against the Bears: Randy Lerner said no when asked whether he'd consider changing the coach in the bye week.
Aside from that fact, the Browns appear to be approaching an implosion.
Just listen to them after a 30-6 loss that was even more one-sided than the score.
''It's ridiculous,'' said quarterback Derek Anderson.
He was right. The Browns right now are ridiculous.
Include Anderson in the group. His quarterback rating after the first half: zero-point-zero. By game's end, it had risen — to 10.5. Yet coach Eric Mangini kept him in the game for almost 57 minutes.
During the game, Lerner stood in the tunnel and watched where just about everyone could see his reactions.
After, he tried to explain his team's state but really couldn't.
''I'm sick about it,'' he said. ''I saw the same thing you saw.''
Some pointed questions were directed at him, and he answered some, but in a couple of cases asked for a couple of days to clear his mind and reflect:
-- Would you consider a change in coaches during the bye week?
He looked up, pondered for some 10 or 15 seconds, then shook his head no.
-- Do you want to hire someone to run the football side of the operations?
Yes, he said, that is a priority. Someone who can explain the decisions and ask the right questions internally. Bernie Kosar's name did not come up, but he clearly is a possible choice.
-- What can fans hang their hats on for the remainder of the season?
Lerner said he ''feels like St. Anthony,'' the patron saint of lost items, then said he really didn't have ''a great answer for what to hang your hat on right now other than a massive amount of thought and analysis and reflection and personal honesty is going to go into thinking about what's going on.''
He admitted that's not a real answer, but he needed time rather than speaking in an emotional moment after a game.
-- Is what he's being told about the quarterback situation sensible to him, because from the outside, the way the quarterbacks have been used did not seem sensible? Lerner said he hadn't been told much, but admitted it did not seem sensible.
As he spoke, he looked as baffled as anyone who watched as Brady Quinn stayed stuck to the bench while Anderson was completing 6-of-17 passes, with two of his completions fumbled away to the Bears.
Quinn didn't even look for his helmet until Anderson was hit as he threw from the end zone. That throw turned into an interception, which turned into Chicago's last touchdown.
The point isn't that Quinn demands the playing time; it's that Anderson's play was nowhere for the second week in a row. His footwork was off, his arm-motion inconsistent. As a result, the offense was beyond poor.
Why not try something?
Like Lerner, Quinn was asked some pointed questions:
-- Did something happen to keep him on the bench?
''All I know is we've got to get better as a team,'' Quinn said.
-- Did he challenge the coach in any way, speak up in a meeting, get into an argument with him?
''No,'' he said. ''You don't need to fabricate things. The situation is what it's been. Everyone has to support one another.''
-- Do you wonder what it will take for you to get into a game?
''No,'' he said. ''I feel like our team needs to get better right now.''
Then there was Jamal Lewis, a pro's pro who did not argue for one second when it was suggested to him that this season must be like torture. Lewis then said this season probably will be his last.
-- Nobody could have expected a 1-7 start?
''Not the way we work,'' he said. ''The way we work in practice, the way we work in training camp, I wouldn't have expected it, either. You just have to put the pieces of the puzzle together and find out what are we really trying to do.
''I'm sure that is win, but it's how we're trying to win. How are we trying to win? What are we trying to do? I think that's what everybody is trying to figure out.''
--Does he have an understanding what the Browns are trying to do?
''No, I don't have an understanding,'' Lewis said. ''I just know we're trying to win. I know we want to win, but at the same time, a lot comes with winning. A lot comes with the formula, with your chemistry.''
Lewis admitted this was not good to say at the halfway point of the season, but added he was not calling out the coach.
''We're all men,'' he said. ''That's something that we have to figure out. We have to know where we're trying to go.
''It's not about the coach. It's about us as whole, period.''
Half a season remains for something to change, but hope is hard to find. Right now the Browns are embarrassing themselves at every turn, and in every city.
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