Although the Browns were utterly destroyed 38 -7 by the Steelers last Sunday, people have lost their minds with overreactions to one bad game.

Now, I’ve been saying since the beginning of this season that I still believe Baker Mayfield is “the guy”. He possesses talent and ability that no Browns quarterback since 1999 has held – and I may go as far as to say he has the highest ceiling of any Browns QB ever. I’m not claiming he’ll follow up with complete dominance like Otto Graham or an MVP season like Brian Sipe in 1980, but the potential is there and his rookie year stats honestly were not far off and were maybe better than Sipe’s ‘80 campaign.

A Tough Comparison

Sipe 1980 (MVP) – 16 games – 60.8% completion – 4,132 yards – 30 TD – 14 INT – 91.4 passer rating 

Mayfield 2018 (rookie year) – 13 games – 63.8% completion – 3,725 yards – 27 TD (all time rookie record) – 14 INT – 93.7 passer rating

Baker is critiqued more than any other QB in the league. I would also put him right on top of a list of the most scrutinized players in the NFL, along with his teammate Odell Beckham Jr. Part of this comes with their fiery attitudes, interesting personalities, and willingness to put themselves in the spotlight. Both are extremely over-hated, not deserving of a lot of the criticism they face.

Max Kellerman and Stephen A. Smith concurred that both Odell and Jarvis Landry should request trades out of Cleveland. At this point, this had to be for views or clout. The team is 4-2. I have never seen a successful team slandered like this before, and I guess it’s part of the curse of playing for Cleveland.

It’s not all his fault

Baker is only in his third season in the league. In that time, he’s had 4 different head coaches and 4 different schemes, including two of the worst coaches in NFL history, Hue Jackson and Freddie Kitchens. Kitchens had absolutely no idea what he was doing for the 2019 season, leading a talented roster with tons of hype to a 6-10 record. He infuriated players, showed an inability to take accountability for his and the team’s failures and was just a childish human being. Mayfield threw for 22 touchdowns and 21 interceptions last season, leading fans to question whether sticking with him was actually the right move.

6 games into a season that already has 66% of the wins they held in 2019, people are once again questioning Baker’s status as the starter. This just doesn’t really make any sense, honestly. Mayfield’s role in Kevin Stefanski’s offense is to ride behind a strong rushing offense and roll out for play-action plays, and he’s done a fine job following that scheme. He still holds a 10 to 4 TD/INT ratio but played significantly better when Nick Chubb was anchoring the run game. Cleveland is still 8th in points scored and 6th in touchdowns, despite putting up 13 total points in their two lowest scoring games this season. His stats really aren’t even bad, and he stacks up decently against some well-praised guys like Rivers and Roethlisberger.

The Browns team is overall banged up, in a season where limited training camps left just 89 days for Stefanski and Mayfield to work together. The team’s pass defense is atrocious, and the Steelers’ defense was suffocating, on all facets. I can say with confidence that any quarterback would’ve struggled that game, even as bad as Baker looked.

Everyone needs to take a deep breath and understand that this is one bump in the road. Historically Pittsburgh owns us, and an away game without RB1, RG1, two starting safeties and several other banged-up guys does not make me very concerned.

The Browns still have one of the easiest remaining schedules based on strength of schedule. I’ve referenced in a previous article that they’re still the same old Browns until they raise the Lombardi trophy, but I have slightly more confidence in their ability to produce on offense this season. I also trust Baker and I know he still has that rockstar attitude and ability he flashed his rookie year. Being a quarterback is part of a process, and learning and unlearning from his past mistakes isn’t an overnight change. I’ll leave you with some food for thought, comparing his stats through 34 career games versus two Hall of Famers.

Update: I told you.

Baker Mayfield just went absolutely nuclear after a disaster of a start. On his first pass of the game, he underthrew a pass to Odell that was picked off. On the run back, Odell injured his knee and spent the rest of the game in the locker room.

Mayfield then proceeded to complete 22 passes in a row, obtaining his only other incompletion from a spike to stop the clock. He put up 297 yards in the air with 5 passing touchdowns, good for a perfect passer rating of 158.3. He led the Browns down the field with a minute to go and set the game-winning 24-yard touchdown with an absolute DIME to Donovan Peoples-Jones.

I’ve already seen a lot of people discrediting him, but a win is a win and that was absolutely his best game as a pro. I don’t care that it was against a bad Bengals defense, because completing 22 consecutive passes for 5 touchdowns is impressive against high schoolers, as far as I’m concerned. Had the roles been reversed, social media would’ve exploded with praise over Joe Burrow’s amazing game.

This was the first flash of rookie year Baker that we’ve seen in quite some time, and it opens the door to consider whether having Odell in his arsenal is holding him back to an extent. Odell is a top 10 receiver talent and can hurt you with his speed, route running, amazing hands, or even with his arm. That being said, with a receiving core of Landry-Higgins leading the way, it reintroduced some of the phenomenal chemistry he held with them back in 2018. However, Beckham Jr. could be out for the remainder of the season, which is never a good thing.

We’ll have to see if Baker’s hot streak continues, and if he ever throws an incompletion again.