
11-19-2008, 06:15 AM
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Capo Regime
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Join Date: Feb 2004
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CPD
Quote:
Bill Livingston: Brady Quinn's play is a revelation
by Bill Livingston/Plain Dealer Columnist Tuesday November 18, 2008, 6:39 PM
Brady Quinn won't be the salvation of the season. But his play is a revelation, given how long the Browns waited to use him.
Still, some perspective is necessary. Quinn's intermediate passing game carved up Denver, but that defense is the Thanksgiving bird of the NFL, ranking 29th of 32 teams.
Buffalo was ranked in the top half, barely, at 13th. But part of the Bills' defense is the Buffalo winter. Snow didn't fall, but screaming wind showed up in force. Buffalo is windier than Chicago, so complaints about the lack of deep passes by Quinn have to be tempered by the conditions.
Tuesday, when coach Romeo Crennel passed out praise for the 29-27 victory, Quinn went unmentioned until Crennel was asked about him specifically. Not to say Quinn was great. A 56-yard game-winning field goal is not exactly Frank Ryan-to-Gary Collins in the 1964 title game or even Derek Anderson-to-Braylon Edwards last season. But it was enough.
Anderson, the former incumbent, beguiled the Browns' front office in 2007, to the extent that Quinn did not get a sniff of playing with the first-teamers in this training camp. So, when national media members said Anderson "won" the job, well, not really. He won a walkover.
Chuck Crow/The Plain DealerBrady Quinn's play will not be enough to save the season, but it's does show promise for the future.
This season, Anderson faced several top-five-ranked defenses -- Pittsburgh, Baltimore twice, Washington and a team reputed to be the New York Giants, although it didn't play like the Super Bowl champions. It seemed in a quirky way to be only what was fair. The Browns had to learn if Anderson was for real or if he was a flash in the pan. He turned out to be the latter, and on the order of Kelly Holcomb in the Pittsburgh playoff game in early 2003. The problem was that Anderson's flash sparkled far longer than Holcomb's because the fuel that fed it was the combustible opposition of some of the NFL's poorest teams.
The Browns stumbled to a 3-5 first half this year. A golden opportunity passed to bench Anderson in the bye week before the team thought to be the Giants showed up. Anderson's roller-coaster season after that unlikely victory ended, as roller coasters do, on the bottom. In this case, the reference is literal, for Anderson landed on his butt after throwing the screen pass from hell against Baltimore in his last start.
Cont..
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