The Cleveland Browns are 3-1, but I'm here to take a deeper dive into their first 4 games and see if this team may be a contender in 2020.
Baker Mayfield
To begin with, a lot of the Browns play hinders on Baker Mayfield. They have a ton of skill players everywhere you look, but everything in this offense moves through Baker, at least that's how it was last season. Last year, the Browns were not able to jump out to many leads, thus putting the pressure on Baker to perform and causing him to look erratic at times. They were force-feeding OBJ; it clearly was not working. This failure to connect with OBJ even led to Jarvis Landry leading the Browns in receptions, yards, and touchdowns last year. They also did not have the best play-caller behind them with former head coach Freddie Kitchens who struggled to get that offense moving. New head coach Stefanski still has a lot to prove, but working his way up the ranks at the Vikings to OC was pretty impressive. I think he has a lot to do with the Browns' early success. Baker looks confident this season, despite missing some throws, he's made some impressive throws also. However, they haven't needed to rely on Baker that much as he only has 729 passing yards, 7 TDs, and 2 INTs through 4 games. That's only slightly over 180 passing yards per game in today's pass-happy NFL. This lack of a passing game seems like it doesn't make sense. However, that is what is working for the Browns right now, which leads directly to my next point.
Leading the Game
This season, the Browns have been able to take leads in games as soon as they are ahead on the scoreboard, they pound the rock. These leads have been the major key that has led the Browns to three straight wins. Now we are very early in the season, and the only team above .500 the Browns have played is the Ravens. The Ravens slaughtered this team 38-6 and wouldn't you know...that is Baker's worst game this season. Only 1 TD pass, 1 INT, and he only completed 53% of his passes for 189 yards. This brutal game is not the way Stefanski wanted to start the season. However, in the past three games, the Browns have been able to jump out to early leads against Cincinnati, Washington, and Dallas. Even in the game against the Football Team, the Browns stayed calm after letting them come back and continued to pound the rock. Baker limited his mistakes in this game, which truly helped them get the win that week. What we've seen thus far is that if the Browns can get an early lead, this is how they have been thriving and it's because of their incredible running back duo.
Nick Chubb and Kareem Hunt
Nick Chubb and Kareem Hunt have been nothing short of spectacular this season. The Browns as a whole are averaging over 200 rushing yards per game and have at least 100 more rushing yards than every other team in the league. How are they doing this? Jumping to early leads and using their dynamic running back duo to run the ball down teams' throats. Unfortunately, Nick Chubb sprained his MCL in the first half against the Cowboys, so he's out 4-6 weeks dealing with that. However, we have seen Kareem Hunt carry the full load in the past and I'm not so sure he's alone anyways. The Browns had D'Ernest Johnson come in after Chubb went down and he carried the rock 13 times for 95 yards! He looked impressive, Kareem also had a solid game despite dealing with a groin issue, and even Dontrel Hilliard looked decent as their 3rd running back. One thing we've learned about the Browns is they are most definitely a run-first team and it has worked for them for three weeks in a row. Hopefully, they can get Chubb back sooner rather than later and they could be a contender moving forward just because of this rushing attack.
Rest of season?
So what does this all mean for the rest of their season? We don't quite know just yet. We'll see how they play against one of the leagues best defenses thus far this season with the Colts in week 5. Then follow that up with another elite defense in the Steelers. This should be a true test for the Browns to show if they are real contenders or pretenders. However, aside from these next 2 games, the remainder of their schedule looks pretty easy. They have the Steelers and Ravens again, but besides that, they play teams like the Jaguars, Jets, Bengals, Eagles, and Giants. The Browns have a legitimate chance to make the playoffs. I want to see them at least compete with some of the better teams on their schedule for the remainder of the season. Then the Browns may finally actually be a contender again and a legit threat in the AFC. As long as Baker does not make mistakes and this run game continues to be successful, watch out for the Cleveland Browns.