Browns had a game plan. Giants didn’t.

get used to live contact, and not get hurt. It was also an audition for some players who will be on the bubble. That’s it.

But I went Raven/Giants preseason game back when Ryan was their DC and they through the kitchen sink at the Giants with Blitz packages. It was weird.

... it's practice.
The Browns did it their way the Giants did it theirs.

Both coaching staffs have plenty of coaching opportunities to take to the practice.

was a clear indication that the Browns had a game plan.

... double a gap Blitz the are things that need to be practiced.

Stop trying to justify that we got our asses kicked in by the Browns. This isn't a very good team right now in any phase but run defense. Whining that they game planned and we didn't is just grasping at straws. We sucked they didn't. Get over it and stop making excuses.

If you watched the Hard Knocks episode they kept repeating the theme of changing the culture. Only one way to do that and that’s play hard and with a purpose. Good for the Browns trying to accomplish that

... double a gap Blitzes...

... the Browns practice looks better then the Giants.
Lots to work on.
Hopefully they get it worked out.

we hear that the Giants are playing vanilla, but when the real games start, the vanilla play continues.

In comment 14035894 Joey in VA said:

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Stop trying to justify that we got our asses kicked in by the Browns. This isn't a very good team right now in any phase but run defense. Whining that they game planned and we didn't is just grasping at straws. We sucked they didn't. Get over it and stop making excuses.

Did you read the article? It’s not the OP making that claim, he’s sharing what Geoff Schwartz said:

“Giants fans should not overreact to the outcome of the game. As NFL analyst Geoff Schwartz pointed out on Twitter, the Browns game-planned to win while the Giants didn't put any time into the actual game-planning and play calling (most team's don't in the preseason).
"One random thought from last night. You can always tell which teams have game planned just a bit for preseason game 1. The Browns last night game planned. Exotic pressures on D. Tons of play action on O… Giants were so basic on offense and defense. They didn’t game plan," Schwartz Tweeted.”

Now, anyone may by all means disagree with that take, but it’s at least worthy of consideration instead of dismissing it outright.

the last 3 seasons....

...Bubba's got a line in the water~

In comment 14035805 UConn4523 said:

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get used to live contact, and not get hurt. It was also an audition for some players who will be on the bubble. That’s it.

Bettcher wanted to focus on stopping the run.
Shurmer insisted in staying with the base offense regardless of what the defense showed.

Having said that, it would have been nice if Jenkins and Apple looked for the ball and Webb was not so jittery.

In comment 14035898 jestersdead said:

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If you watched the Hard Knocks episode they kept repeating the theme of changing the culture. Only one way to do that and that’s play hard and with a purpose. Good for the Browns trying to accomplish that

Yes, Hue was trying to start a winning culture (after MANY years of losing); Shurmur and Bettcher were focusing on specific aspects of the game and evaluating talent.

the browns need to learn how to win. if i were them id shoot for 4-0 in the preseason. gotta completely shift the mentality there.

every summer for the last several years. I don't care about the W-L record in pre-season. I don't care gameplan or not. All I care about is that the starters go out and look like starters. That was a very uninspiring performance outside of 1 run by Barkley. I don't want to hear about OBJ being out, it's only pre-season, etc. Just once, can we go out in the summer and look like we belong on the field when starters are in the game.

I'm not looking into this outcome. I'm not downgrading my expectations. I'm not jumping ship or going crazy about the new coaching staff. I'm merely upset that with an entirely new regime, it seemed like same old shit out there. It would have been nice to have seen something resembling a better football team out there in the first quarter on both sides of the ball.

In comment 14036045 Matt M. said:

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every summer for the last several years. I don't care about the W-L record in pre-season. I don't care gameplan or not. All I care about is that the starters go out and look like starters. That was a very uninspiring performance outside of 1 run by Barkley. I don't want to hear about OBJ being out, it's only pre-season, etc. Just once, can we go out in the summer and look like we belong on the field when starters are in the game. I'm not looking into this outcome. I'm not downgrading my expectations. I'm not jumping ship or going crazy about the new coaching staff. I'm merely upset that with an entirely new regime, it seemed like same old shit out there. It would have been nice to have seen something resembling a better football team out there in the first quarter on both sides of the ball.

It's frustrating but I think people have short memories. If my memory is correct 2005 through 2011 when when we made the playoffs 5 out of 7 seasons we looked like shit in preseason too. We just remember the last few seasons. The one year where preseason play rang true was 2016 when our D was sick but the O sucked. But for the most part I don't think there's much correlation between preseason and regular season. I will say we looked like we did under McAdoo. That said we scored over 30 points in the last two preseason games last year, including the game we played our starters the most.

Not sure what Ellison was thinking, but he needs to turn his head back when he's 15 yards down the field. Stalled drive because of Giants screwing up, not anything the Browns did.
The other drives I'll just say Stewart was garbage. For the D secondary is a big concern. Other than that the TD on Ogletree was a poorly designed blitz imo. Taylor saw it immediately as it was right in his face and dropped it in over the top. Ogletree was almost over the center. To expect him to cover the TE in the slot from that position with no help over the top is asinine.

that this is true. Giants were more in evaluation mode, Browns more in culture building mode. That said, Giants should have been better.

so how did that work out?

Ask Baker Mayfield...

I would think that if you are trying to build the confidence of a young player, you would want to give them an opportunity to excel. If that means to do a little "scheming" or game planning, then so be it. It's not as if the rest of the league doesn't know what to expect from a Shula / Shurmur offense or a Bettcher defense. Instead, we send out promising QB's to get embarrassed by playing into the opponent's game plan. Not a great way to build confidence. If we want to run vanilla and avoid injuries with the first string, then OK...but at least give the hopefuls a shot vs. playing punching bags to more aggressive teams. If we are trying to use these games as evaluations, how does it help to see players under these adverse conditions? I guess it's just me showing my frustration after the results of the Jets efforts last night. Wouldn't it be nice to post a "W" once in a while, even if in preseason?

to look at and evaluate a lot of players and see how some of their schemes worked against another team. No more no less. Building from scratch, which is what we are doing takes patience and time. Best to watch these games from that point of view MO. Many of us cannot do that, which is understandable after last year.

Guys are missing and playing at 1/2 speed not wanting to get hurt. People want to read something more into these games. But outside of guys on the bubble...nothing that happens in these games means jack shit.

had a live contact scrimmage before the Giants game, so they may have been more game speed ready.

That said, it's amazing how the Giants tend to look the exact same in preseason regardless of who the coach is and what system they're running.

which is to say, shitty. Game planning or not, I'm with MattM, the first team has looked like crap for most of the past five years in Ex season and has played like crap in the regular season.

It would be nice to see some evidence of quality and talent, plain vanilla or scheme crazy--quality and execution. Precious little of that Thursday night except stopping the run.

And as far as Ellison, Banks said he had to turn his head around, ok, fair point. But as far as I could see, had he done so, Eli's pass was well off target, toward the center of the field, so in addition to the bobble head not working, either the pass was off or the route.

there were tons of missed tackles, missed blocks, dropped passes, bad routes, DBs a step slow/unaware of the ball, etc etc.

This is what concerns me. Most of these are basic football skills that every Pop Warner player knows in his sleep...

Is definitely not a game plan.

the Browns already had their live contact scrimmage. They looked smoother, more cohesive as a result. I started thinking about individuals and their play and their was really a lot of positive with starters and backups. As units they didn't function all that well and it showed up on the scoreboard.

But it doesn't mean there aren't positive & negative takeaways...

The run D was great and we saw the potential depth on the DL. LBs are a wait and see tho we have decent personnel. The backend is as uncertain as we thought esp depth, tho our top DBs seemed in good position. Our favorite D weaknesses still showed - TE TDs and weak intermediate-to-deep coverage across the middle overall. The game-planning issue played a role but it would be nice to see that improve

The run game looked good save JS. Might have depth & youth w/ Simmons or Martin. We didn't see an SB target nor split out yet iirc. We tended back to the BMac special - routes run short of 1st down. The mid-to-deep ball seemed to be there tho QB accuracy & rhythm was not. WRs after #2 are a big question. Sharp, Lewis, R Shepard, Raymond are meh to this point and Latimer is our biggest hope. One could pan out at #3 but it's still little depth even w/ EE & SB running WR routes

They certainly had plays drawn up to try out. That is a plan. No, the reason we lost was because they executed their plays better and they made more plays on defense than we did.

In comment 14036497 5BowlsSoon said:

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They certainly had plays drawn up to try out. That is a plan. No, the reason we lost was because they executed their plays better and they made more plays on defense than we did.

It definitely makes a difference if they are running more complex, misdirections, blitzes, attacking weak players & holes in the D, etc and we run basic plays w/ min review of opponents' tapes. For ex. how tough would it be on an OL to protect on stunts & exotic blitzes without much game planning or review of opposing personnel, esp vs a Greg Williams D? And little time to gel together by PS game 1 w/ basically 5 new OL, a new OC etc

There's enough to improve upon but a lot of new pieces. I'll start getting a little concerned if there's no improvement by PS game 3 or worse by the regular season

That the Browns' dog didn't eat their homework.