It’s 4th and 7th with 2 seconds left on the clock. The game is tied at 27-27 as the chargers bring out the special teams unit to put up 3 points to end the game. When it looked like all hope was lost for the Browns, Rookie Kicker Josh Lambo misses the 39 yard field goal! This game is about to go into Overti…WAIT, a flag was thrown on the field, it’s against the Browns. Just when the Browns hopes were alive, they were shot down by the yellow flag that was thrown numerous times on the field going against them. But this had little to do as to why the Browns lost that game.

Coming into the season, most of us expected our defense (the most expensive defense in the league) to be one of our strongest assets with defensive guru Mike Pettine leading the charge. That wasn’t the case this past sunday, when Phillip Rivers figured out our defensive schemes. And our run defense hasn’t looked much better either since almost every running back that has played against us has had 80+ yards.

Surprisingly, our offense was our strongest asset in this game. Both Duke and Crowell looked good as it looks like they’ve figured out how to run and catch. Travis Benjamin looks like he could be a rising star as he’s becoming a favorable target. Brian Hartline looked pretty decent as he made some necessary catches. As for Dwayne Bowe…something tells me he won’t last the season without getting cut.

Josh McCown was also surprisingly good with 350 passing yards 2TDs and a passer rating of 119.1 . He showed us why Pettine still went with him after his horrendous play against the Raiders. But this game showed me that he can be a serviceable quarterback when needed as he kept the Browns in the game. But not even the best quarterback could win that game with a defense that gives up so much. Last week, I was on the Start-Manziel committee most of us were on. However, it looks like McCown isn’t going anywhere…for now. It doesn’t matter if McCown keeps throwing 300+ yards every game with few touchdowns; if he doesn’t start winning games soon, then expect some changes later on in the season. At some point between now and January, we need to see what we have in Manziel so whoever is the General Manager this upcoming offseason could make some roster changes regarding the quarterback position whether it be in free agency or the 2016 draft.

At the end of the day, every player on that team needs to be reminded who they play for. They need to figure out what it truly means to ‘Play like a Brown.’ They obviously didn’t have that ‘Play like a Brown’ mentality last sunday. We need to go back to our roots as to discovering our Dawg Pound identity. Now I don’t know what funk our defense is in, but they need to figure it out soon or else we’ll start losing games.

This sunday we travel to Baltimore to take on Joe Flacco and the Ravens. We now get a chance to see how McCown plays against an AFC North team. Lets just hope our defense figures out their problems by then and can hopefully keep us in the game.