 Believe it or not, Brown's quarterback Baker Mayfield has been under a lot of scrutiny his entire career. Being a number one overall pick, that automatically puts you into so much pressure from the jump because as a number one overall pick, the team that selects you with that draft selection, they envision you being the guy, they envision you turning around their franchise for the better and you being an impact player right away and for years to come. But with Baker Mayfield, it hasn't been that with the Cleveland Brown so much. It has gotten off to a rough start while in his rookie season he did show some flashes. He certainly did. But he also did throw a lot of interception. And then it only got worse in his sophomore season. Him and the entire Browns organization, they just went through a very, very rough patch so to speak. But there's some people who feel like the patch is barely holding on right now. And the way that it's sewn together, the strings are sort of coming apart at the scene. And a reason that a lot of people feel that way is because hey, you're number one overall pick. It's put up a shut up time. And I've seen a lot of Browns fans have talked to a lot of Browns fans that feel the same way. About Baker Mayfield like hey, it's either now or never. It's now or never. And I question it a little bit because I'm thinking hey, this guy had like 80 different coaches in just a couple of years that he's been in the league. And obviously that's an exaggeration. But he's on his fourth coach. This is third year and he's on his fourth coach. And Browns have been an organization that have been known. They have been known for turmoil. They have been known for turnover. They have been known for just absolute chaos, consistent chaos. Things have not been run smoothly with the Browns organization for a very long time. Outsiders know that. Insiders know that. We see it in as clear as day. While some stuff does get exaggerated with the Browns every single season from the media, we can still see it's just a poorly run organization for the most part. They lack quality consistency. So when I first heard about that Baker Mayfield was under a short leash, it didn't really come as a surprise to me, but at the same time I was thinking like does he really deserve it? But let's see what exactly what Mike Tannenbaum said from a GM. Let's play that clip. If, say, he goes out first game of the season and throws, let's say, three picks. A very, very short leash. I know Kevin Stefanski really well. He's smart. He's deliberate. He's disciplined. He will have zero compunction to bench Baker Mayfield. Baker Mayfield will not throw 21 interceptions because when he's on track to do that, he'll be standing next to Kevin on the sidelines. Look at what Kirk Cousins did last year. Great offense. Six interceptions. So I know Kevin, the standards are going to be high. His timeline is a lot longer in Cleveland than Baker Mayfield's is, and Baker plays well, which we all hope, and you talked about the additions. Great. But as soon as those picks start, he will be on the sidelines and Kevin will not flinch. There's one other interesting... Interesting. Very, very interesting. And hearing Mike Tannenbaum talk about that, it made me sort of look at it in a different light because it does make sense. And while I don't think it's necessarily fair to Baker Mayfield, it still makes sense. Now the reason, like I said before, I don't think it's fair to Baker Mayfield because there has just been this constant turnover in Cleveland and under Baker Mayfield, it has been no different. You go from Hugh Jackson, then you go to Greg Williams, then you go to Freddie Kitchens, and now you ask the fans. So it's like he hasn't been able to have consistency with his coaching staff. And me, I always feel for the players who fall under that because it's almost not fair to them. Some people look at it the other way, which I can understand too. They can be like, hey, well, if the players were performing better, then there wouldn't be all this turnover at the coaching staff. So it all depends on which lens you're looking at it from. But something that makes sense with what Tannenbaum said with Baker Mayfield being on a short leash is Stafansky. And the reason that it is Stafansky is because it's not like he doesn't like Baker Mayfield. It isn't like he dislikes Baker Mayfield. It isn't like he comes into Cleveland with some hate for Baker Mayfield. No, that's not the reason. It's because he is the new coach. This is a new regime. They're under new coach, new staff, new GM. So when you have a new GM, a new staff, a new regime with old players, those old players are not safe. And recently, because contracts are not the contracts that they used to be. So even though somebody is a number one overall pick and they're still getting paid a substantial amount of money, that does not guarantee that they remain with your team. Rookies in the first round, they signed four year contracts with fifth year options. And in that fifth year, they get a substantial raise if they aren't already signed to an extension. But what the new contracts under the new CBA have done and have allowed the teams is to give them more opportunity and more of a chance to really see if this first round draft pick is the real deal. And with Baker Mayfield and the Cleveland Browns, they're going into that third year to really see if Baker Mayfield is the real deal. If he can sort of turn this thing around. But he's got some things working against him. He's also got some things working for him. Working against him again, new system. You got to learn whole new set of rules, whole new set of plays, whole new offense. But working for him, you have Nick Chubb. Your offensive line got upgraded. You still got Odell Beckham, Junior Jarvis Landry. You got Davina Joku, and you got Hooper now too. And you still got Kareem Hunt as well. So you got plenty of weapons. But something back against them, they learn a new offense as well. So it can be a growth process, but you all can be possibly growing together. So we'll just see how it all works out. But Mike Tannenbaum also compared the Browns and the the Stafansky system to what they had over with the Vikings. And Kirk Cousins was very efficient last year in that system. So I think he he likened it to that system because he wanted to prove that Baker Mayfield doesn't have any excuses because the system, if you execute correctly, you can be very productive and efficient all at the same time. And who's to say that the Browns playmakers aren't better than the Vikings playmakers because you think about it. Look, Nick Chubb versus Dalvin Cook. I'm taking Nick Chubb nine times out of 10. And that's not a shot at Dalvin Cook at all because he's good too. But I'm thinking about health. That's the biggest thing. That's the biggest difference between the two health. Nick Chubb is healthy and a baller. Dalvin Cook is a baller, but he's just been unhealthy. Then you look at the receiver situation from last year because we know Diggs got traded. But from last year, Adam Thielen and Stefan Diggs. Or Odell Beckham, Jr. and Jarvis Landry. I mean, depending on how you look at it, you can make a case for either the two. But if it was up to me, I'm taking Odell and Jarvis over that. And then with the with the tight end situation, Kyle Rudolph, I forget who the other tight end is. But versus David Najoku and Austin Hooper. So that it all just depends on how you look at it. But the point is that with the Brown situation, with the players that they have under contract and with the playmakers that they have under contract, the way that a lot of people are looking at this, Mike Tannenbaum and a lot of Browns fans and possibly even the Browns coaching staff is that Baker Mayfield could be on a short lease because it is put up or shut up time. And again, some people may think. That hey, he's a number one overall pick. He's safe. He ain't going nowhere. But then again, the contracts, the way that those contracts are set up now, these teams, they can get rid of you. And there will be minimal impact, minimal negative impact on the salary cap because you're on your rookie deal. And while it is a high rookie deal, it's still a rookie deal, nonetheless. Because before there was a time when these rookies would get signed, these first round draft picks, number one overall picks like 60 mil, 70 mil contracts. And they hadn't even played a snapper football yet. And that was absolutely crushing teams because since since these guys were your number one overall picks, a lot of them were signed before the draft. It was signed before the draft because they they were the number one overall picks. So they had to change that. And that again, and I felt they make a lot of changes for the worse. But that was one of the changes that they absolutely made for the better. That was definitely for the better. But with with Baker Mayfield, he is obviously under the new CBA, so he can be moved, whether it's traded or whether it's just outright released. So you've seen it time in and time out where first round draft picks, they in panning out. OK, moving on. And one of the most recent examples of that you look at the Cardinals. Cardinals drafted Josh Rosen. That's their quarterback of the future now. OK, let's go, Cardinals. You got your guy after what, one season? Oh, Calamari. Are you available? Oh, Cliff Stingberg, you available? OK, all right. Let's get this regime out of here, springing the new guys. Boom. And we got the number one overall pick. We're set out with the old and in with the new. And just like that, Josh Rosen, shipped to Miami, shipped to Miami. And he still ended up being a backup. So things can change in the NFL in the heartbeat. The drop of a hat, they can change like that. So with Baker Mayfield, it's time, man. It is time. And again, while he is up against a lot and a lot of this stuff, I feel like it might not be fair. Hey, life really is not fair. It's not fair. And you can liken it to getting a new manager at your job. Your new manager, you might have been working at your job for a long time or a short period of time, whatever. And you may have felt like things were fine under the previous management. And that's whether you were doing good or bad. But if you get new management for whatever position you are, whoever's going to be managing you now moving forward, they may do things differently. They usually do do things differently from a previous manager, whether you like it or not. But you still have a job to do. You still have to perform, regardless of whatever the situation is, regardless of how the new manager may do stuff as opposed to the old manager. So that's the situation that Baker Mayfield finds himself in right now. So we will see exactly how he performs. We have.