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Sports Illustrated
Sports Illustrated
Sport
Greg Bishop

The Browns Are Good, REALLY Good, and We Football Experts Owe Them an Apology

Browns Joe Flacco Cleveland Deshaun Watson NFL Myles Garrett Football Kevin Stefanski AFC Baltimore

American football aficionados, you owe the Cleveland Browns an apology. So do most sportswriters—raises hand sheepishly—pundits, analysts and pretty much anyone with a television ever tuned to SportsCenter.

Here’s the thing: The Browns are good. Like, really good. Cleveland hired the obvious current front-runner to win Coach of the Year in Kevin Stefanski four seasons ago. They have the favorite to win Defensive Player of the Year, Myles Garrett, spearheading an elite unit. They have the best strange story from this NFL season in quarterback Joe Flacco, the starter-turned-champion-turned-backup-turned-one-man circus tent revival. They’ve fought through injuries, losing Deshaun Watson (again), high levels of skepticism, a dreaded playoff history, an even worse recent postseason history and ridicule that sometimes came from its own fan base.

An NFL evaluator on Flacco: “Imagine others discounted this. But Flacco, the way he’s playing, there’s some good fortune involved here, too. The kind every other team in the league would take.”

Troy Taormina/USA TODAY Sports

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