Browns Film Breakdown Morning Newsletter: 11/12/2024
Jedrick Wills says the silent part out loud, and another play addition for the Browns final stretch.
Apologies for missing yesterday, guys. Life has been too chaotic of late but things will settle in and return to our previously scheduled Browns content.
The Browns held media availability Monday for head coach Kevin Stefanski and an open locker room session as is usual for the return from the bye week. In that time, Jedrick Wills was at his locker and discussed his season, recent injuries, and subsequent benching with reporters. What came out of it was something I couldn’t believe. I could in theory, but it was still jarring to actually hear those words spoke.
This is the embodiment of “saying the silent part out loud.” For many who criticize Wills, it’s usually over his lack of effort on a down-to-down basis and a clear failure to pursue his craft with attention to detail. He quits plays too soon, shows a passive approach, and just flat out doesn’t seem to love the game. For him to say he made a business decision to not play in the Browns Week 8 game against the Ravens—which was followed by his Week 9 benching—made too much sense to Browns fans who followed his performances and actions for several years.
It’s clear now the former Top-10 pick won’t be back in Cleveland following the season and it’s also clear his time in the NFL is limited. He doesn’t care enough about the game to be the type of player he needs to be. Which is a big bummer on several levels. You don’t like seeing a player with the talent to be great failing to reach that level because of effort and desire. You also feel the pain of the Browns not understanding this aspect of Wills when they selected him in 2020. It’s clearly been his biggest hindrance since arriving in the league.
Football loves him but he doesn’t love it back. It’s not the end of the world, it doesn’t make Wills a bad person. If he doesn’t love it, he shouldn’t play it, but it’s a bummer for the investment the Browns made into the player and how it can set them back at the position for a while if the Dawand Jones Hail Mary move doesn’t pan out.
Reminder on what we’re doing with these Newsletters each morning:
We will aim to do with this Morning Newsletter — give you something new to know. This Newsletter won’t be over-saturated with links to click on or anything useless but rather something small, concise, and meaningful that has to do with the Browns each morning. Topics will vary but normally it’ll be something I watched on film review, or something I noticed about the next opponent, or a college player I think you should know ahead of the off-season. Just a piece of information I think is worth your time and definitely won’t waste your time. That is what you can expect. And with a nice and direct link to your daily podcast as well.
Let’s move off the Wills nonsense and into another scheme I hope the Browns roll out more frequently in the final eight games of 2024.
Now that the negative is over with I wanted to hit on something more positive and you know that for me it comes from watching the film. On Sunday, as the Browns didn’t play, I was rewatching some of Ohio State’s win over Purdue and I found myself thinking “teams just don’t run the tight end delay as often as they should. It’s one of those plays that just feels undefeated when you see it applied correctly.
In the 2nd quarter, as Ohio State pushed into the Purdue red zone, quarterback Will Howard found tight end Gee Scott for a touchdown that was so well designed it reminded me of NFL schemes using the concept. Here is a look at the All-22 of the play.
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