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PITTSBURGH – If you thought it was difficult to watch Baker Mayfield play in Sunday's 33-18 loss to the Steelers, you should have tried to watch him afterwards.
The young quarterback of the Cleveland Brown looked like a tired old man when this one was over. He walked carefully from the cloakroom to the podium. He sighed a few times before answering. At the end of his press conference, he looked uncomfortable to bend over to pick up his bag. He walked very slowly and limped slightly up to the bus at the end of the long concrete corridor under Heinz Field.
Mayfield was the 12th Brown to be the starting quarterback since 2003 trying not to win a match in that city. And this loss was painful – not just a missed, painful or disappointing opportunity, but physically painful.
"I have seen better days," said Mayfield. "But it's the nature of playing a good team.They are physical."
The Steelers hit Mayfield seven times and fired it twice Sunday, which does not sound so bad (as long as you're not hit), but these things accumulate. Mayfield has struggled with an ankle problem for a few weeks now, since he launched it in a loss to the Chargers on Oct. 14. He was sacked 20 times in the six games he played.
"One thing I know about Baker, is that he's fighting," said Browns coach Hue Jackson. "He's tough, he's had a lot of blows, and he kept getting up, coming back, I just think he has to keep working."
That's the problem. Whenever someone looks at a rookie quarterback situation and asks him: "What do they have to lose by playing it?", They do not think about the physical consequences that can lead to the learning process. Mayfield is a rookie quarterback in a young offensive with essentially a reliable receiver, a rookie forward on the left, a rookie coming back, a tight end for the second year … we could go on, but you understand the point. This trick is difficult for the best and most experienced quarters. We are far from knowing if Mayfield is one of the first, but we know for a fact that he is not one of them.
"He's fine," Browns keeps Joel Bitonio said. "We have to give him all the time he needs, it's difficult when he's hit and he has to fight for his life, we have to do better for him, but he's fine. knows the offensive, and he will continue to get better. "
You may remember Mayfield burst onto the scene replacing a wounded Tyrod Taylor and bringing the Browns back to the Jets in the third week. It was Cleveland's first victory in almost 21 months. -for 23 for 201 yards in relief. His QBR for this match was an excellent 94.9.
But in the five games he's started since, Mayfield's best QBR was beaten the following week against Oakland. It was a more complicated defeat of 58.2 points in overtime. That dropped to 34.5 the following week in a victory over Baltimore, peaking at 12.7 against the Chargers, returning to 19.9 in Week 7 against Tampa Bay and 23.5 Sunday in Pittsburgh. Mayfield has eight touchdowns and six interceptions. The young man struggles.
Seattle moves to 4-3 after a consecutive win for the second time, allowing it to gain momentum. The NFL Nation is immersed in the 8th week.
With the malfunction increasing, the Browns have little resistance to the Steelers, losing their 25th consecutive game on the road.
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When asked if he planned to fire Taylor on Sunday and give Mayfield a break, Jackson said succinctly, "I did not do it." At this point, the Browns seem intent on letting Mayfield take his revenge, and as long as he behaves satisfactorily, it is probably the best way to proceed.
But what we are learning with these rookie quarterback situations this year in Cleveland, Buffalo, Arizona and New York is that hope is sometimes served with an ugly accompaniment. Progress is rarely, if ever, an uninterrupted arc in greatness. The Browns are trying to allow Mayfield to improve while playing while allowing him to cross the season without really hurting him. As the group around him struggles with his own growth problems, the task becomes more and more difficult each week.
Mayfield's teammates believe in him.
"I am a big fan", Browns defensive lineman Larry Ogunjobi said. "All you want on Sunday is to have a chance, and with a guy like him at the quarterback I have the impression that we have a chance." He plays a coin comes back, taps the defense, "Let's go get another one. It means a lot. "
There are a lot of good things in the bad, and it's quite possible that Mayfield still has a lot of good things to come in the second half of his rookie season. What he learns, if he did not already know it, is that it will not come easily or painlessly. Mayfield's career will be determined not by the little adversity he faces, but by how he will overcome the inevitable adversities that his chosen profession presents. More days like Sunday are coming, and while this may not be what Mayfield and the Browns want to hear, the plan is to let him continue and try again. This is the only way to grow.
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