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'Turn on the film and, mayhem': Dwight Freeney left his mark on NFL in Hall of Fame career
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- 'Turn on the film and, mayhem': Dwight Freeney left his mark on NFL in Hall of Fame career
S teve Doerschuk studied the Pro Football Hall of Fame Class of 2024 from an Ohio perspective. Defensive end Dwight Freeney was a rookie in 2002 and spent 11 of his 16 NFL seasons with the Colts .
Dwight Freeney's arrival in Canton takes Browns fans back to the early days of the Browns' expansion era.
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Freeney was a Colts rookie when he battled veteran Browns left tackle Ross Verba late in the 2002 season at Cleveland .
The Browns were on a 5-2 hot streak that still stands out as a highlight of the era. Beating the Colts would have been a crowning achievement, a conquest of a rising power led by quarterback Peyton Manning.
At first, Colts head coach Tony Dungy intended to break in Freeney slowly, but the rookie kept making plays, soon earning a heavy workload.
Dwight Freeney, a member of the Pro Football Hall of Fame's Class of 2024, talks with visitors during a visit to the Hall, Friday, May 24, 2024.
In the Browns game, Freeney sacked Tim Couch twice for losses totalling 17 yards. He squashed a drive by tackling William Green for a 5-yard loss.
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It was a thriller. Cleveland play caller Bruce Arians dialed up a touchdown drive that provided a 23-21 fourth-quarter lead, but Manning made hay with Marvin Harrison (172 receiving yards) and rallied the Colts to a 28-23 advantage.
Pro Football Hall of Fame Class of 2024 enshrinee Dwight Freeney takes a photo of the class banner outside the Hall, Friday, May 24, 2024.
Couch got the Browns to the 5 in the final seconds before running out of downs.
Freeney's play against Cleveland continued to reflect why he is going in the Hall of Fame.
The teams met again in the 2003 season opener, when Browns quarterback Kelly Holcomb was coming off a 429-yard day in a 36-33 playoff loss at Pittsburgh .
Freeney helped put Holcomb on the run all day. In the fourth quarter, he tackled Green for a loss that stalled a promising drive. He was a factor in another late stop. Mike Vanderjagt's 45-yard field goal with six seconds left gave Indianapolis a 9-6 win.
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In 2005, facing Browns left tackle L.J. Shelton, Freeney sacked Trent Dilfer three times in a 13-6 Colts victory.
In 2008, when he faced second-year Browns left tackle Joe Thomas , the Browns led 6-3 in the fourth quarter. They had a third-and-8 near midfield when Freeney beat Thomas, dislodged the ball while sacking Derek Anderson , and watched teammate Robert Mathis return the resulting fumble recovery for a game-winning touchdown.
"He got the best of me a couple of times, especially early in my career," Thomas said when both he and Freeney had retired.
Thomas, four years younger than Freeney, recalls being in college, studying Hall of Fame left tackle Jonathan Ogden.
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"Dwight Freeney had two sacks against Ogden ... against a first-ballot Hall of Famer!" Thomas said. "He gave one of the best left tackles all-time his lunch that day."
Thomas said the 6-foot-1, 265-pound Freeney "weopanized the spin move" and noted, "people had done it before, but not like him."
"He could do the three things that make you a great pass rusher," Thomas said. "He could beat you inside, he could beat you outside, and he could beat you running you over. He was short and squatty, with those big strong thighs."
Dwight Freeney poses for a photo during the Pro Football Hall of Fame's Class of 2024 press conference, Feb. 8, 2024, in Las Vegas.
During a stop in Canton this year, Freeney recalled facing Thomas.
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"I spent a lot of time studying Joe, trying to find a weakness in his approach," he said. "I couldn't find any.
"I would keep turning on film, turning on film, trying to find somebody who got to him.
"There wasn't anybody. I would come to the conclusion, I'm going to have get creative."
Freeney was on the same defensive line as another elite defensive end, Mathis, who recently told colts.com writer JJ Stankevitz, "I would put Dwight up against anybody one-on-one at any point in history."
Freeney's calling card after getting up from a big play was a pound of the chest and a salute.
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Colts owner Jim Irsay, selected by Freeney to be his Hall of Fame presenter, said such a player comes along "every 70 years … turn on the film and, mayhem."
Freeney, now 44, grew up in Bloomfield, Connecticut, north of New York City. His favorite player was Giants linebacker Lawrence Taylor, who ranked high on a 2019 USA Today list of the 100 best players all-time.
The day Freeney announced his retirement, he said, "I gave it my all, and hopefully I made a difference in some kid's life like Lawrence Taylor did for me."
In college, Freeney played for Syracuse teams that were competitive in the Big East, except in three losses to the Miami Hurricanes by a combined 130-13 score.
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He joined the Colts with limited fanfare as a No. 11 overall draft pick in 2002.
"He was in the perfect situation," said Dungy, who was Freeney's head coach from 2002-08. "We played on AstroTurf. We had the lead a lot, and people were going to have to throw against us."
Dungy and General Manager Bill Polian conceded the 6-foot-1 Freeney was quite short for an NFL defensive end, but both were taken by his speed, skill and zeal. They were getting a brute who could bench press 500 pounds and squat 750.
The list of players taken in the rest of the first round was fairly nondescript, although Baltimore landed future Hall of Fame safety Ed Reed at No. 24. The Browns took the aforementioned William Green at No. 16.
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Freeney made second-team All-Pro in his second season, 2003, when Michael Strahan and Leonard Little were the first-team defensive ends. Freeney and Julius Peppers , both members of the Hall of Fame Class of 2024, were the first-teamers in 2004.
Freeney and Osi Umenyiora were the first-teamers in 2005. Jason Taylor, Jared Allen , Patrick Kerney, Mario Williams and Justin Tuck were other contemporaries in that time frame.
Courtney Brown, the first pick of the 2000 draft by Cleveland, never joined the discussion of "best ends" − his last NFL season was 2005.
Freeney spent 11 seasons with the Colts. Unlike Thomas, who retired after 11 years with the Browns, Freeney hung on another five years, suiting up for the Chargers , Cardinals , Falcons, Lions and Seahawks .
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In 2011, near the end of Freeney's Indianapolis days, the Browns finally beat the Colts, but with Kerry Collins and not Manning playing quarterback. Freeney had a 9-yard strip sack of Colt McCoy .
Freeney was 35 when he sacked Josh McCown in a 35-20 Cardinals win at Cleveland in 2015.
The last game of his career was with the Falcons in Super Bowl 51, on Feb. 5, 2017 in Houston .
Atlanta wound up blowing a lead, but one play after Falcons QB Matt Ryan fumbled the ball away to the Patriots in the fourth quarter, Freeney sacked Tom Brady .
In the 2019 ranking of history's greatest players, the top four were Jerry Rice, Brady, Taylor and Jim Brown. Brown was a Syracuse man. Freeney, another one, joins him in the Hall of Fame.
This article originally appeared on The Repository: Colts Dwight Freeney sacked way to Hall of Fame vs Cleveland Browns
