The Pittsburgh Steelers had lost four straight games before Sunday. A Week 11 showdown against Cleveland was just the thing to end that slump.
Ben Roethlisberger isn’t the only QB who has come back to haunt the Browns
Pittsburgh beat the Browns again, so what better time to look back at Cleveland’s tortured luck when it comes to finding a franchise quarterback -- starting with when they passed up on Big Ben.
Charles LeClaire-USA TODAY Sports
Ben Roethlisberger is 20-2 against his division rival. His 10 wins in Cleveland are more than any Browns quarterback except Derek Anderson since 2006. But the part that hurts the Browns the most is that he could have been wearing burnt orange and white instead of black and yellow. The Pro Bowl quarterback said on Wednesday he thought Cleveland would keep him in his home state of Ohio with the No. 6 overall pick in the 2004 NFL draft.
Instead, the Browns selected Kellen Winslow. Since 2004, they’ve started 22 different quarterbacks and made the playoffs zero times.
Roethlisberger isn’t the only quarterback to bring ruin to Cleveland after being passed up by the Browns. Since 2002 — the approximate season the Tim Couch experiment ceased being fun and became a treatise on the punishment a human can endure — 15 quarterbacks have been selected in the following 20 picks after Cleveland’s first-rounder. Those names include players like Roethlisberger, Aaron Rodgers, Andy Dalton, and Derek Carr.
Those 15 quarterbacks have a combined 36-9 record against the franchise. If the Browns are facing a highly touted passer they overlooked early in the NFL draft, there's an 80 percent chance they're going to lose. That's even worse than the 69.2 percent losing rate they've cut since rejoining the league in 1999.
This list doesn’t even include Carson Wentz, who was selected by the Eagles with the No. 2 pick after they traded up in the 2016 NFL draft with the Browns. In his NFL debut, Wentz threw for 278 yards and two touchdowns in the 29-10 win over Cleveland.
| Year | Browns Pick | No. | 1st Round QBs or Within 20 Picks | Record vs. Cleveland |
| 2002 | William Green | 14 | Patrick Ramsey | 0-0 |
| 2003 | Jeff Faine | 21 | Rex Grossman | 0-0 |
| 2004 | Kellen Winslow | 6 | Ben Roethlisberger | 20-2 |
| J.P. Losman | 1-1 | |||
| 2005 | Braylon Edwards | 3 | Aaron Rodgers | 2-0 |
| Jason Campbell | 2-1 | |||
| 2006 | Kamerion Wimbley | 13 | n/a | |
| 2007 | Joe Thomas | 3 | n/a | |
| Brady Quinn | 22 | |||
| 2008 | n/a | 22 | n/a | |
| 2009 | Alex Mack | 21 | n/a | |
| 2010 | Joe Haden | 7 | Tim Tebow | 0-0 |
| 2011 | Phil Taylor | 21 | Andy Dalton | 8-3 |
| Colin Kaepernick | 0-0 | |||
| 2012 | Trent Richardson | 3 | Ryan Tannehill | 2-0 |
| Brandon Weeden | 22 | |||
| 2013 | Barkevious Mingo | 6 | EJ Manuel | 0-1 |
| 2014 | Justin Gilbert | 8 | Teddy Bridgewater | 0-0 |
| Johnny Manziel | 22 | Derek Carr | 1-1 | |
| 2015 | Danny Shelton | 12 | n/a | |
| 2016 | Corey Coleman | 15 | Paxton Lynch | 0-0 |
| 36-9 |
There are some lessons here. Trading up to select Brady Quinn may actually have been a smart move because there weren’t any high-level QB prospects in the Browns’ draft stratosphere in the following two season. Passing on a player doesn’t mean he won’t end up in Cleveland; Jason Campbell wound up behind center for the Browns as a journeyman veteran. And poor EJ Manuel is the only player Cleveland passed on to have a losing record against the AFC’s punching bag.
Meanwhile, Cleveland’s quarterback situation has been as dire as ever in 2016.
No team in the NFL has been as bad as the Browns this fall — America’s only winless team. Injuries have forced Cleveland to cycle through six quarterbacks this season, none of whom have been able to lead his team to the promised land. While rookie Cody Kessler looked like the team’s best option, he found himself riding the pine in the second half of last week’s game against the Ravens. Josh McCown took his place and was ... uninspiring in relief.
McCown, the veteran journeyman who was supposed to back up Robert Griffin III this season, entered a 13-7 game and guided his Browns to a 28-7 defeat. His second pass of the night was an interception. His second drive of the night traveled -9 yards. He finished the game with just six complete passes and three total turnovers.
Those returns suggest head coach Hue Jackson will stick with Kessler in Week 11 should he want to avoid the 0-16 embarrassment previously exclusive to Detroit. Griffin III could soon be available to lead the team should the rookie falter, but it’s clear this game of rotating quarterbacks has had nothing but an adverse effect on a team with enough problems already.
And one of those problems is a defense as effective as the French army in World War II. The Browns rank in the NFL’s bottom two when it comes to total defense (419 yards allowed per game), third-down conversion percentage (50 percent), points allowed (30.1), and red zone touchdown percentage (69 percent).
That combination of ineffectiveness gives Pittsburgh an excellent opportunity to snap its recent losing streak. The Steelers haven’t won in over a month, thanks in part to a Roethlisberger injury and a brutal schedule. The team’s four losses came all came against teams with winning records — Miami, New England, Baltimore, and Dallas.
It’s how the team played in that last defeat that should give the Steelers hope. Pittsburgh dragged the NFL’s top team through the fire in one of the league’s best games of 2016. Roethlisberger proved his surgically repaired meniscus was no longer a problem by throwing for 408 yards and three touchdowns in one of his best outings of the year.
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