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Cleveland Browns News and Rumors 9/25/26: Reliability Wears Number 24
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- Cleveland Browns News and Rumors 9/25/26: Reliability Wears Number 24
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CLEVELAND, OHIO ( TheOBR.com ) - Good morning, Cleveland Browns fans!
THE DAILY BLOVIATION
I'm a big fan of certainty. I'm risk-averse. It's one of the reasons we stayed at our old place years after they lost interest in the NFL, and I got unhappy with certain things there. The relationship wasn't working anymore, yet I stayed put. It wasn't until some Browns fans stepped up to the plate as investors that I started to feel more confident about our chances if we moved.
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I'm willing to put up with a lot to avoid uncertainty.
All of which leaves me with my usual level of tense in advance of Sunday's Browns game against the Carolina Panthers . I don't know which team this really is. Are they as bad as they looked against the Jaguars ? Is Tampa Bay just that bad that they made the Browns look artificially good?
My rational mind tells me that Week 2 is a better indicator than Week 1. My actual mind informs my rational mind that it's stupid and to go away.
All of which means I don't have a reasonable prediction about what to say about the upcoming game. Neither team has really announced who they are yet - the inept squads of two weeks go or the more impressive teams of Week 2.
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Lane Adkins has a stack of notes in Rumor Central this morning, including which version of that defense the coaching staff believes is the real one, and what Monken thinks Watson left on the field in Tampa . That's VIP material, so I'm not giving it away here. Go read it or sign up for a subscriptio n. That's how it works around here.
WHAT WAS CERTAIN UNTIL IT WASN'T: Nick Chubb was the easiest player in the building to scout for quite a few years. Pull up one carry from 2019 and one from 2022 and you'd see the same guy: shoulders square, feet churning, four yards before anybody got a hand on him and a fifth after three people did. Every week. For seven years.
Today he's back in Berea to sign a one-day contract and retire as a Brown , and then he talks to the media this afternoon. He announced the retirement back in August. The Houston year happened. We'll allow it.
The numbers, for those who need them: 6,843 rushing yards and 51 touchdowns as a Brown, third in franchise history behind Jim Brown and Leroy Kelly. Four Pro Bowls . And he's one of four players in NFL history to retire averaging 5.0 yards a carry on more than 1,000 attempts. The other three are Jim Brown, Joe Perry, and Jamaal Charles . That's the whole list.
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What the numbers leave out is that he never gave you a reason to worry about him. No contract drama, no social media nonsense, no quotes that ran for three days on the sportsyapping shows, fueling hot tags. He played for a franchise that went through quarterbacks the way I go through coffee filters, and the one position you never had to think about was running back. Then came the knee in Pittsburgh , and even the comeback was quiet. Over on our board , Verba wants him in the Ring of Honor as soon as possible, and UrbanAchiever says he "will never not hate Minkah Fitzpatrick for that dirty hit." Seconded on both, despite Chubb's own seeming forgiveness of the Steeler defensive back.
Also on that thread, ChetDawg: "I bet he could still run better than Judkins." Rude. Also, I watched Tampa.
This part stings a little. Chubb retires the same week that the Browns' leading rusher through two games is Deshaun Watson , with 60 yards on 13 carries.
Yep. That's where we are.
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THE REAL FALCONS?:At lunchtime yesterday, HokieDawg started a thread titled Just maybe Stefanski was a problem.... . Fair enough. Atlanta was 0-2, had gotten blown out 34-3 by Carolina, and had become the first team since the 2008 Rams not to run a single play inside the opponent's 20 through two weeks. By 11:30 last night, the Falcons had hung 35 on Green Bay at Lambeau , Bijan Robinson ran for 194 yards, and Michael Penix Jr. was back from the ACL. So which Falcons are real? Same question, different uniform. PrimeTimeHaden said it best on that thread: wait until they play at least backup-level talent at quarterback before judging the coaching.
UGH, A LEFTY:I'm a lefty and used to the BLATANT DISCRIMINATION against my kind. From scissors to the right-handed favoritism of school desks, we face being a reverse-brained minority all the time.
That's true of the NFL as well. ESPN has a fun piece on why the NFL has struggled with left-handed quarterbacks , now that Atlanta has two of them in Penix and Tua. Steve Young says coaches see a lefty and go "ugh," as if it's more work. Jerry Rice had a left-handed equipment manager throw him something like 10,000 balls over his first few years with the 49ers until the guy's arm gave out. The Falcons' staff flipped the play diagrams and bought a Jugs machine that throws backward spirals. Our old coach, it turns out, is thorough and deals with lefties. Maybe they should look into Dillon Gabriel . They've got the backward jugs machine already, after all, plus Stefanski loved Gabriel. Seems like a good fit.
PANTHERS, ALSO UNREADABLE:And the team coming to town Sunday? Carolina opened with a 59-37 loss to the Bears and then beat Atlanta 34-3. Mary Kay Cabot notes that Bryce Young leads the NFL with nine completions of 25 yards or more and is tied for the lead with six touchdown passes. Nobody knows who anybody is yet. That's September.
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ROOKIE, NOT PLAYING LIKE ONE:Denzel Boston has a 45-plus-yard touchdown catch in each of his first two NFL games. Per Scott Petrak, he's the fourth player in league history to do it and the first in 50 years, joining Bob Hayes, Mac Haik and Sammy White. The Tampa one was a short in-breaker that he spun out of and took 55 yards past three Bucs. Asked if he expected this: "Did I expect it? No. Is it a surprise to me? Also, no." Denzel Ward already calls him a No. 1 receiver. The No. 39 pick. Andrew Berry, take a small bow.
AS BADASS A PLAY AS I'VE SEEN: Jared Verse , who arrived in the Myles Garrett trade, had zero sacks and zero pressures through nearly two full games. Then with the Bucs facing third and 2 at our 13 in the fourth quarter, he ran around Tristan Wirfs and flattened Baker, forcing the throw that nearly got picked and holding Tampa to a field goal. Mike Rutenberg told Cabot it was as bada$$ a play as he's seen. Verse: "I could play the best game of my life and not be pleased with the way I played." PFF has him 93rd among edge rushers. He's learning a brand new 4-3 scheme after two years standing up in the Rams' 3-4, and he says the learning curve has been steep. So which Verse is real, the grade or the play? I'll take the play, and I'd like three more of them against Carolina's new left tackle.
LET IT RIP:Monken was asked what kind of reception he expects for Watson on Sunday and landed on the right message. "Let it rip, man. You've already had a hell of a career already, man. Let's just go down fighting, go back, go down swinging." Then he called his offense young, caught himself, and added "using that term again, for God's sakes." I enjoy this man more every Wednesday. Through two games Watson is 40 of 52 for 443 yards, three touchdowns and one interception.
I don't think the crowd's reaction on Sunday is uncertain at all. If he plays well, he'll be fine and tolerated by the fans. If he plays like he did against Jacksonville and in the decade of the 2020s, he'll be booed. Not sure which we'll get, but it will keep the radio stations and other hot take merchants busy on Monday.
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MORE NFL HYPOCRISY:PBOY reports on our board that Kyle Juszczyk got fined $14,926 for pretending to drink a beer after a touchdown, in a stadium wrapped in beer ads. A tipping point for the NFL's hypocrisy? Probably not. Steve Buffum gets the last word: "But not a tippling point, apparently."
ENTER SANDMAN:Metallica is coming to Huntington Bank Field on June 15, 2027, with Limp Bizkit and Avatar. Tickets go on sale today. Ole1Sock: "Man, I can't wait until we get a dome and then big acts like Metallica will actually be willing to play in Cleveland." The lakefront, getting one last rock show before the moving vans show up.
SPEND IT LIKE BERRY:Jack Duffin has a free piece this morning on the Browns' spending philosophy : top cash spender in the league over six years, roughly $38 million a year above average, and he argues it's sustainable. He also asks the obvious follow-up, which is where the wins are, and answers it honestly: the extra money can't close the gap between a Watson and a Mahomes. Subscribers get his 2027 post-June 1 cuts preview too, for those of you already living in March.
Nick Chubb signs his name one more time this afternoon. On Sunday, the Browns take the field at home for the first time this season and give us data point number three. I have faith. Chubb gave us seven years of Sundays that looked exactly like the Sunday before. I'd settle for two in a row.
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Have a good one! GO BROWNS!
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THE LIFT
Positive news from the world of sports and beyond...
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In a Culture Obsessed with Staying Young, We Ignore the Many Benefits of Aging - While Bryan Johnson is out cloning his own cells in hopes of living forever, a researcher writing in Nautilus points out that getting older comes with some real upgrades. Processing speed and working memory slip, sure. But older adults tend to get better at regulating their emotions, at knowing how they think (metacognition, if you want to impress somebody), and at figuring out what actually matters. There's also something called the positivity effect: older people pay more attention to good news and remember it better. "A younger brain may be faster, but an older brain can be wiser." Which explains a lot about why the longtime fans on our board still show up every Sunday expecting a win against the odds. Science says we're not delusional. We're seasoned.
WRAPPING UP
When not checking whether he's the Jacksonville Barry or the Tampa Barry this morning, Barry McBride is the Publisher and Founder of the OBR and bloviates this nonsense every morning. You can follow him on Twitter @barrymcbride or write him at barry@theobr.com if you are so compelled.
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