BEREA, Ohio (92.3 The Fan) – Whether or not the Browns return to the playoffs might very well rest on the shoulders of quarterback Baker Mayfield.
Fair or not, that’s the gig.
Mayfield and the 6-6 Browns have struggled this season to find any level of consistency and coming off the bye week they’re fortunate to still be in the thick of the playoff race.
“We still have everything in front of us, but now it’s crunch time,” Mayfield said Wednesday. “Everybody’s talking about playoffs, but that’s when we need to have that singular focus, block out everything else and realize that we need to take care of business one day and one week at a time.”
The Browns enter Week 14 as the No. 11 seed, five slots back of the current playoff field, in the AFC, but a win over the Ravens Sunday afternoon would keep them alive and put the AFC North back in their sights as well.
For head coach Kevin Stefanski it’s an all-in, push the chips to the middle of the table, sell out and use every trick in the bag to win week for him, his coaching staff and his team, that is assuming he believes in that sort of thing.
“I think you have to put everything you have into that one week,” Stefanski said. “These are one-game seasons. For us, our focus really goes to this week and whatever we can do to get a win.”
It’s essentially ‘must win’ from here on out for the Browns. A loss this week would all but slam the door shut.
“Right now we’re just looking at it as a one-game-season at a time,” Mayfield said. “Everything that we can accomplish is still in front of us, so if we handle it correctly it will happen that way, so just have to do so accordingly.”
Mayfield, who is completing 62.2% of his passes for 2,413 yards with 11 touchdowns and 6 interceptions this season, used the bye week to relax and recharge with family and friends in Arizona and Austin, Texas.
The injury talk surrounding Mayfield has died down, and so has some of the pain he has been playing through.
The time off helped.
“Quite a bit, to be honest with you,” Mayfield said. “I haven’t had any major setbacks the past few weeks and I had another week off so I’m looking forward to keep getting better as the weeks go on.”
Stefanski and executive vice president of football operations and general manager Andrew Berry have expressed within the last week that they feel Mayfield will play his best football of the season over the final five weeks.
“We’re just looking to overall being better on offense,” Mayfield said, “score more points, convert on third downs, just be better overall in those critical situations and capitalize when our defense is playing like it has been.”
Whose job is it anyway – Stefanski would not say who will start at right tackle Sunday against the Ravens, but all signs point to it not being Blake Hance, who had been filling in for All Pro Jack Conklin.
“We have made decisions,” Stefanski said. “I am not going to announce it right this minute, but we feel good about the five [starting] guys.”
Rookie James Hudson III would appear the lead candidate for the job because he’s the lone true tackle left on the active roster. Alex Taylor is also on the practice squad.
Conklin, who missed three weeks on IR with a dislocated left elbow, suffered a season-ending patellar tendon tear at Baltimore. He underwent successful surgery last week.
Believe in Baker – While everyone looks to Mayfield to step up down the stretch, there is little doubt he’ll do just that within the locker room.
“Everyone in this building believes in him,” tight end Austin Hooper said. “No matter where you stand with anything, anybody, you can't ever question Bake's toughness, and for him to have a week to just heal up alone is huge.
“We all believe in him. We have believed in him. We'll continue to believe in him. He's the leader of our football team, so, we're ready to watch him be him.”
Running on empty – Because the bye week was so late in the season, it’s conceivable the Browns just simply ran out of gas in recent weeks.
“To be honest with you, the last couple games, it looked like we were just out of gas,” Hooper said. “It’s the latest bye week I’ve ever had - the latest bye week a lot of these coaches have ever had. I never had a December bye week.”
Stefanski was asked Wednesday if he saw that.
“I did not, but obviously, Hoop has a good feel for his guys,” Stefanski said. “This late bye, there are other teams that have the late bye, as well. There are teams that have a later bye than us. We try to be mindful from a workload standpoint, but it is a long season. It can be taxing physically. It can be taxing mentally.”
The hope is that the week of allowed some of the bumps and bruises from the first 12 games to heal.
“It was good to just unplug, rest,” Hooper said. “There are a lot of ailments people are going through. Having that was just awesome to get your legs back under you, get some juice back there. We can run, feel good.
Just being out there feeling good out there on the football field helps.”
Still in protocol – Rookie speedster receiver Anthony Schwartz remains in the concussion protocol and unable to practice.
Schwartz suffered the concussion during a 45-7 Week 10 loss at New England on November 14.
Field upgrades coming – Bulldozers and fencing were spotted in Berea Wednesday, but before the comedians get rolling with a monologue of jokes about the current state of affairs, the Browns are preparing to put in a heating system for the practice fields.
The unused portion of the east side of the fields have been fenced off for safety to house the heavy machinery required to complete the job.
The project is a part of the future expansion and renovation to the CrossCountry Mortgage Campus which remains in the planning stages but is expected to include a new or expanded indoor field house.
The team has been acquiring property adjacent to the facility to make way for the expansion, which is expected to take years to complete.
Injury report – DNP: TE Harrison Bryant (ankle-OUT), DT Malik Jackson (knee), WR Jarvis Landry (knee), WR Anthony Schwartz (concussion); LIMITED: S Ronnie Harrison (ankle), C J.C. Tretter (knee); FULL: QB Baker Mayfield (foot, left shoulder), LB Sione Takitaki (shoulder)
Up next – Practice Thursday.
