Khaki Lackey

One thing I liked about Rhule early on was that he seemed really adaptable. Now he and Snow seem to be ignoring the failures and instead of learning from it, stubbornly digging in.

I’ve tried to be patient. I’ve seen enough of the Matt Rhule era.

We have too much invested in the secondary for them to get carved up like this.

Curable by winning, or beyond that?

Reports like this came out at the beginning of Ron’s 3rd year. There were threads on here about him constantly cursing out the players in practice and how they hated him and how he had lost the locker room. All exaggerated horseshit, of course. We might be in for a great season. I mean, I’m not going to hold my breath, but we might.

He’s going to be the offense version of Matt Patricia. Hard pass.

Why watch all 22 when you can parrot meme drivel?

I think we all know damn well that Baker's height is Matt Rhule's fault.

God, Ron drove me insane. He somehow thought it was virtuous to try to milk a 10 point lead for three quarters. He seemed to enjoy blowing leads. He even alluded to (paraphrasing) "liking close games where he relied on the defense" in an interview one time. Playing not to lose = Mr. .500. Ask John Fox. (However, Fox or Rivera would be preferable to our current 'playing not to win' regime.)

Officially? I’ll go ahead and file the paperwork.

God, remember when we though we had purged Sionne Fua and Rivera brought him back to try to convert him to OL? Ron fuging loved that dude as awful as he was. Why do coaches get these blinders with their man-crushes?

If picks are the coaches fault, I guess Sam Darnold is a really good QB. Why is he not starting?

Nah that's just you seeing what you want to see. Rhule's done planty to make this team bad, but I've never seen bad QB play overlooked as much as it was on Sunday. I guess Darnold is a hall of fame talent that's just being held back from Matt Rhule. Or did we actually blame the QB for bad play last year?

I agree, but we know the run D is a liability and the TOP really exaggerated it. The second half showed me that when the QB play wasn't awful (and Elflein is partially to blame also for all the bad snaps) that the run game improved and the run D improved too. (usually teams that are bad against the run wear out and get worse as the game goes on, whereas we actually got better.)

Do you know what the time of possession was in the first versus second halves?

and the run defense would have been better if they weren't on the field nearly the entire half.

So really bad execution from the most important player on the field can't disrupt a game plan? Sure it can. And it did. A team/coach goes as his QB goes, until it's Baker Mayfield, apparently. For the record, I blame Rhule for a lot of things, and I really like Baker as a QB. I think he's going to put a nice year together. I'm pretty much on playoffs or bust as far as Rhule goes.

Well, you obviously didn't read the post, but sure, blame Rhule for the field conditions and inflation while you're at it.

Made the throws? He had like 4 deflected passes and a pick. In the second half, sure.

First of all, I apologize for breaking the 24 hour rule. I'm not usually a thread starter but I've felt the need to post this response too many times, so here we go. If Baker plays halfway decent in the first half, we win that game. His nerves got the best of him, and it showed. For someone who was visibly calm, he didn't play like it. Maybe he's one of those that needs to be fired up to be at his best. I don't know. I know the training camp reps brigade is out in full force, but I have yet to have any of them explain to me how he regressed from the last preseason game to the season opener because of training camp reps. It should also be noted that the two weeks that he regressed, he was getting all the reps with the ones. A lot has been made about establish the run game. It's difficult to do when snaps are muffed and all of your second downs are "and ten" and all of your third downs are "and long." Add in batted down passes, incompletions, and a pick, it makes for a lot of three and outs. Once the team gets behind in score, it becomes even more difficult to establish the run. Which leads to.. A defense that is fragile against the power run being on the field the entire half. The TOP battle was pathetic. It's asking way too much for a defense that is vulnerable. I can't find stats by half but I'd bet the TOP was closer in the second and I'd be very curious to see Cleveland's rush yards in each half. (post if you got 'em) As far as the bad snaps, If you want to blame having Elf out there on Rhule, fair enough. I won't argue with that. Baker's play in the first half affected the entire game plan and had repercussions on both sides of the ball. The good news, second half Baker was awesome and that's who I expect to see the rest of the year.

The team had invested a lot in Sam and he supposedly put in a ton of work in the offseason. With Baker's history of attitude, I don't have a problem making him earn his spot. It went on too long IMO. However, How does he look sharp in the last preseason game and then regress in the two weeks afterwards where he got ALL THE REPS? The answer is that he didn't. His nerves got the best of him and he shat the bed in the first half. Did he get better in the second half because he finally achieved the magical number of reps?

I don’t know man. With an extra 90 seconds, three time outs and the refs doing their best to assist them, I think they could have gotten a TD, but I get your point, I would have wanted 7 there. According to Rhule after the botched snap, the 2nd and 3rd downs were RPOs that Baker decided to R. Supposedly.

The latter. Leftwich will be a disaster as HC

Baker plays halfway decent in the first half and we win that game. You can't blame coaches for bad snaps and batted balls (well, technically you can blame the coaches for having Pat Elflein in uniform) Hey, adjustments were made and Baker righted the ship and put us in a position to win, so hats off to him for that, but he looked like ass in the first half.

Oh hell yeah. Baker totally redeemed himself and if he got that first half out of his system and plays like the second half Baker, he'll do just fine. I'm just of the opinion that the bad snaps, smacked down passes, and bad accuracy of the fist half had a HUGE impact on the game. We were in a lot of 2nd/3rd and long situations, which doesn't help when trying to establish the run. Also the number of three and outs don't help a defense that struggles against the run. Our coaching staff sucks, but the L yesterday was directly related to Baker's 1st half performance.