General

Browns Blog: ‘Did We Do Enough To Pull Ourselves Up In The Division?’

Apr 25, 2010, 9:03 PM UTC

Dawgs By Nature, our Cleveland Browns blog, thinks the Browns improved during the 2010 draft, because that’s what happens when teams get to add several new players, some of whom are high draft picks. That’s, y’know, how it works. Ah, but context, people, context: their real question is, did the Browns get better enough?

If you want to win in this league, you have beat the other teams on the field. If you want to be better on the field, you have to beat them in the front office.

I think we had a good draft. I know we improved our football team. But one of my biggest concerns with this draft is our success relative to other teams, particularly other teams in the division; did we do enough to pull ourselves up in the division? It doesn't really matter if we got better, we have to get better relative to the other teams in the division, or we'll never be at the top.

The Ravens' draft is the one that scares me. If Kindle's knee ends up being OK and he isn't robbed of his explosiveness, the Ravens' defense just reloaded.

Our Draft

Philosophy

I am of the "Best Player Available" school when it comes to the draft, and I don't think you can make the argument that some of the players we chose (TJ Ward, for example) were the best on the board when we chose. Others (Colt McCoy, Joe Haden) may very well have been. Not even Michael Smith knows for sure; maybe these guys were at the top of our board when we selected them.

Whatever the philosophy of the front office, we can be sure that we selected players at positions of need. I want Mike Furry and Brandon McDonald as far down the depth chart in the secondary as possible, and Haden and Ward should certainly push them down while Asante can probably push for playing time in sub packages. Colt McCoy fell into our laps at our biggest area of need; Quarterback. We got a young defensive lineman, a guard for the right side, and a big, speedy wideout. Each of our picks was in one of our biggest areas of need with the exception of Hardesty.