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Browns are counting on 1 player to take the pressure off Deshaun Watson
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- Browns are counting on 1 player to take the pressure off Deshaun Watson
Browns are counting on 1 player to take the pressure off Deshaun Watson originally appeared on The Sporting News . Add The Sporting News as a Preferred Source by clicking here .
The Cleveland Browns are moments away from stepping onto the field for a real, regular season game, and the anticipation is really as high as it can get. This team will be debuting quarterback Deshaun Watson, finally, on the field. It's been a long time coming, and hopefully he'll prove the doubters and people booing him wrong by turning out a stellar performance.
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But, it's not just Watson on the field. He has to be surrounded by good players, and he also has to count on the defense to step it up and make sure that when they get points on the board, they're not allowing more points than he can do.
The Browns need Jared Verse to step up
On Friday, Ben Solak of ESPN released a feature with the X-factor for each NFL team going into the new season. For the Browns, it's edge rusher Jared Verse. Are you surprised? You don't have to be.
In this piece, he notes that the team "lost fellow starting edge rusher Alex Wright to an Achilles tear in camp, an injury that puts a greater burden on Verse to finish his rushes."
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He adds that the "next step for Verse" is converting his high pressure rate into sacks.
"Verse's pressure-to-sack ratio is only 8.4% -- fourth lowest among all edge rushers over the same time frame," he says, so it's an area of improvement.
"The Browns' defense needs field-flipping plays to create winning environments for their offense, so Verse's pressures are insufficient," he adds. "He can deliver the ceiling-raising impact of his predecessor only with a leap forward in sack production. Tough shoes to fill, of course. The last guy set the sack record."
So, it's not just about the offensive players around Watson. The defense needs to step it up, too, and Verse has to do it.
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