BL Predicts: Week 13 vs Pittsburgh

A leader of any large organization, sooner or later, is going to run into turbulent times. Those difficult moments will test his ability to lead. Failure to lead a group through a crisis usually means career failure both in business and sports.

Tonights game will tell us a lot about what is happening behind the scenes with Pat Shurmur, his coaches and players. When I separate out the emotions of being a Browns fan and look only at the facts, I like what I see in Cleveland. Building a team takes time. Personnel decisions have been solid, progress is being made. Undoubtedly, questions remain. Can Colt McCoy lead the team to a championship and is Pat Shurmur a championship caliber coach are the two biggest questions.

This evenings game will tell us a lot about Pat Shurmur. A string of tough losses leaves the Browns at 4-8 today. Fans are not able to observe how Shurmur is managing all of this. For certain a number of things are happening. During any crisis in an organization leadership will get challenged. A good leader of men knows how to push the right buttons to keep everyone on the team pulling in the same direction. Is Shurmur leading his men appropriately day to day and hour to hour? One big clue will be in the performance of the Browns tonight. Will the team play hard all game long or will they give a half effort? Will the Browns fight and claw for every yard, or will they go through the motions?

I am convinced that Pat Shurmur is a championship caliber coach. When i watch his press conferences it is clear, he is an honest straight shooter and he wears his emotions on his sleeve. He hates to lose but he takes full responsibilty. Finally, by all indications he is fair. These are factors that can hold a team together in crisis. Does he manage his team with the same qualities that he shows when speaking to the press? Tonight will tell us all we need to know.

My prediction is that the Browns will lose but they'll show up ready to play.

BL Predicts
Browns 19
Pittsburgh 28

The Brown Log are 6-6 on prognostication year to date.

Shurmur is responsible for today's loss

I like Pat Shurmur but today's loss was 100% unnecessary and 100% his responsibility. Let's see how he reacts, the press and fans are going to crucify him his week. It'll either drag him down or hopefully he will learn from his errors and grow.

Terrible and embarrassing loss.

BL Predicts: Week Eight vs Houston

It is officially panic time in Cleveland. Naturally the Browns are still in the hunt at 3-4, and have a chance to be a .500 team at the halfway point of the season, something that has not happened in ages. So why all the gloom and doom? I think nearly 50 years without a championship has simply clouded our ability to reason.

I will go on the record today and exclaim "stay calm". In spite of an offensive line that has two or three players who could not start for any other team in the NFL and in spite of having very little talent at WR this team has competed in nearly every game this season. Furthermore Peyton Hillis has managed to go from hero to villian in less than 8 games. Holding himself out of a game he could have played in put him in a bad position with fans in working class Cleveland. But the end of the love affair took place last Monday when Hillis blew off a commitment to attend a children's event he has promised to attend.

On the plus side, the Browns defense is in the top tier in the NFL which means that on any given Sunday this team can win and finally, for those of you who might doubt Pat Shurmur, I really suggest you listen to the man during his press conferences. He is a straight shooter and has a clear plan for this team. He also has the support of a skilled front office, it is only a matter of time before this guy is a winner and that time might well come this season.

So what do I think about today's game? I predict a shocking Browns win. As troubled as the Browns are right now, so are the Texans. They have key players missing due to injury and are 2-2 in the last 4 weeks. Look for the Browns D to come through big and even put a few points on the board today. Finally, today may be the game in which Carlton Mitchell finally contributes with some long gains. He will get a chance, that is likely

BL Predicts
Browns 20
Texans 13

The BL is 4-3 on the season in predicting Sunday's result

The winning organization

The Browns lost game one this season to Cincinnati for many reasons and without doubt one of those reasons was the poor job done by Pat Shurmur in his first game as an NFL coach. You could even hear in Shurmur's voice in the post game that he felt the burden of a job done poorly. His team made too many mistakes, especially with needless penalties and his defense got caught off guard and were still in their huddle as the Bengals quick snapped their way to the winning score. Does one bad game for a first year coach mean he is not up to the job? Of course not. Pat Shurmur is a relatively young, and obvioulsy skilled coach.

What is different about this Browns organization compared to those we have seen in the last 40 years is that the Browns President, Mike Holmgren, is not only a business man, but he understands first hand both the general managers role and the head coaching job. I can imagine that on Sunday evening following the Bengals loss, meetings were held with Shurmur and Holmgren to review the areas that needed attention following that game. Holmgren surely sought Shurmur's opinion on what went wrong, shared with Shurmur points that perhaps Shurmur did not see, and gave him some guidance on how to steer clear of those issues. The result was clear, mistakes in execution and game tactics were fixed and the Browns went on to win their next two games. Had Shurmur been left on his own without a boss who could both push him and also put things in perspective, our Browns could easily be 1-2 or 0-3 by now.

In many sports organizations, the senior executive does not have operational experience in critical roles. In the business world, when you have a young manager, he may have all the potential in the world, but he may be slow to face down problems he has no experience in managing. It's exactly the same in sports. A potentially great but young coach like Shurmur has a much greater chance of success if there is an experienced, mature and wise executive that he reports to, who can probe and assist in his development.

The Browns organization, led by Mike Holmgren is therefore capable of righting the ship quickly and efficiently and this is the main reason that in spite of being let down so many times in the past, Browns fans can justifiably start feeling optimistic about the 2011 season and the longer term future of the team.

Bud Shaw sums up what I feel pretty damn well

Have a look at this article about patience and this article about the undertaking required for the Browns to successfully move to a 4-3 defense in 2011

Meet Pat Shurmur

here is an in depth article that presents Pat Shurmur. One conclusion is already certain, Shurmur is a convinced disciple of the West Coast Offense and a conventional thinker. The Browns are going to use a traditional West Coast offense and a standard 4-3 defense. They will try to beat opponents by putting a better team on the field and by outplaying their opponents.

My worry is the Browns may now be in another 5 year plan that neither the fans nor the front office have patience for. Perhaps it was false hope, but there were moments last season in which Rob Ryan's crazy defensive formations or Eric Mangini's trick plays made one wonder if the Browns were ahead of the NFL in tactical innovation. I think one could reasonably argue that in 2010, especially on defense, that the Browns schemes allowed them to get far more results than the talent they had should have allowed. In particular, the use of 0, 1 or 2 man defensive lines allowed the Browns to mask the fact that they had no depth on the defensive front and in many cases, using up to 7 linebackers at a time, created massive confusion for the opposing QB. Just ask Drew Brees or Tom Brady. Moving forward, the Browns are clearly going to simply seek better players and play conventional football and that will require that the Browns make a major upgrade, especially on the defensive line.

On offense the Browns will go with the West Coast offense together with young QB Colt McCoy. The book on McCoy is out in the NFL, and we saw the results in the last two games this season: 6 intercepts in 2 games. I believe in McCoy but he still has to gain some experience and the West Coast offense needs strong wideouts for it to work. The Browns have the weakest receiver corps in the NFL so that is another position that requires major upgrade. Look for the Browns to work the free agent market aggresively and to draft to fill those position needs.

Pat Shurmur is going to have to clean house on talent to find new players to fit his approach and that likely means one step back to take two steps forward. Problem is that the Browns are about 5 steps from a Super Bowl. We believe Mike Holmgren but if Holmgren truly wanted to use his West Coast offense and a traditional 4-3, would it not have been better to cut the ties to Mangini one year ago?