[Grossi] Andrew Berry on why he moved on from the team’s former starting QB: ‘He’s doing a terrific job in Tampa. Certainly happy for him. A big part of quarterback’s success and failure can be environment. … There also is individual growth.’

33 comments

  1. (Quarterback) has led the NFL in total touchdown passes since coming to Tampa Bay

  3. Baker regressed in a contract year and was asking for 40m AAV. He then left and got cut by his next two teams. I’m happy for him that it’s worked out in Tampa but the Browns mistake was bringing in Watson, not moving on from Baker. The amount of revisionist history around Baker is insane

    edit: if Baker was viewed as a legit franchise quarterback we would’ve gotten more than a late round conditional pick for him

  4. I get that Baker probably had a bad attitude that led to his departure but I would expect the Browns to be the adults and not jettison their “franchise” QB that we suffered through 0-16 to get.

  6. Still trying to take shots at the guy you fucked up royally by trading after he played with an arm injury your fuck up of a coach shouldn’t have let him play through.

  7. My theory is that they wanted baker to shelf himself after he got the shoulder injury but Baker didn’t want to due to wanting it to affect his next contract. It played out in the locker room and that’s why not a lot of Cleveland players were sticking up for him and it led to the “adult as the qb” and baker even said he needed to grow up too.

    So I’m happy for Baker, bummed it couldn’t have been here

  8. Please refer to Baker’s complete inability to Audible, or rotate protection vs the steelers… Gifting TJ a tie of the sack record… That alone proves that Baker didn’t have any clue, and wasn’t dedicated to the playbook. The fact that he couldn’t read defensive protections, sets and coverage speaks volumes towards his lack of dedication to his craft while here.

    I always said Baker could be a top 10 QB if he dedicated himself, he proved that, but it took being humbled for him to do so.

    Baker never improved here, from his Rookie season, and that was on him. I’m happy for the guy, but pine-ing after the ex isn’t bringing them back, and forgets the reason we broke up in the first place.

    Lastly, throwing to First Ballot HOF Receivers is a boon to average QB’s, just ask Sam Darnold

  9. Baker in playoffs. Baker throwing TD passes all over the place.

    Browns still looking for a QB…

    Rinse wash repeat.

  10. It’s cute how he didn’t seem to mention organizational growth… Which hasn’t seemed to happen.

  11. Baker has openly said that he needed to grow and mature and that us trading him and the panthers cutting him were necessary for that.

    Just be happy that the kid is succeeding

  13. Man, all the hindsight armchair GMs are out in full force today.

    I dare anyone to go back and actually look at Bakers metrics and tape while he was in Cleveland – no, sitting on your couch and watching the TV angle doesnt count – then come back and justify the money he wanted.

    He simply wasnt good enough and nobody wouldve signed him to the deal he wanted, fact.

    He wasnt mature enough, fact.

    It took him almost being out of the league to get his act together and put in the work, fact.

    Hes doing better bow, fact.

  16. Baker bros got absolutely thrown under the bus with Baker. I got fuckin’ heated when one of you guys assumed that I was a Sooner.

    Look at us now. We hardly have a good QB room for a college team. Worst in the NFL. The horrible thing is, we deserve it.

    The maturity thing was 10% truth 90% cope and denial. This era of Browns football is completely cooked due to those series of events and we all know it. Good for Tampa Bay. They got a pro bowl QB and a chance to at least compete

  17. I recently had a dream that we somehow got Baker Mayfield back to the Browns and we all welcomed him with open arms.

  18. Where were all these defenders when OBJs dad was throwing him under the bus? Didn’t the mods have to lock that thread down?

  19. What’s it say about the Browns that most fans and the front office basically think Baker couldn’t have succeeded here

    He put up 4500 passing yards, 41 TDs + 400 rushing yards and 3 TDs

    He’s won his division twice since leaving. He’s won in the playoffs.

    There is no point at all in drafting a QB. We’ve put 7 first rounders combined into Watson, Quinn, Weeden, Manziel, and Couch and got zero starting caliber seasons out of that investment combined. We used a first on Baker and at a minimum hit a double and traded him for a 5th rounder that hasn’t even converted after burning all leverage with his value.

    Our biggest QB success story in 25 years is a young MVP candidate on a different team.

    Invest in defense and running game and use journeymen’s QBs. We do not have the infrastructure to support a competent QB long term.

  21. You could have re-signed him at 25-30 mil a year and had those draft picks to add more talent. Were there issues on Mayfields end? Yes absolutely but it’s frustrating to act like this wasn’t a two part dance, that the current leadership screwed up

  22. This never goes over well but I like to repeat it anyway because it’s the truth.

    Baker’s mechanics deteriorated in his time in Cleveland. When we drafted him, his kinetic chain was almost perfect. Get footwork, would step into throws, keep hips closed, and keep his shoulders closed/level. That’s why, despite his size, he had such great power and accuracy.

    Once Kitchens took over, the mechanics regressed. That’s why Baker started missing throws. It’s also why receivers started dropping a lot more passes: they couldn’t trust Baker would put the ball where it needed to be which meant they were often thinking about where it would be rather than just reacting.

    Baker actually refused to work with a coach to fix his mechanics

    [https://sports.yahoo.com/browns-baker-mayfield-declares-he-wont-work-with-throwing-coach-in-offseason-195337203.html](https://sports.yahoo.com/browns-baker-mayfield-declares-he-wont-work-with-throwing-coach-in-offseason-195337203.html)

    When Stefanski and crew came in, Baker saw improvements across the board, but was still having issues on throws over 10 yards. His bad throw % was also the highest of his career at 18.8% in Stefanski’s first year and 20.9% in year two. To put that in perspective, Baker’s bad throw % in Tampa has been 14.8% and 10.5%.

    In Carolina and LA, Baker’s bad number and habits carried over. Which is why he didn’t stick with either of those teams.

    So what happened?

    Baker finally let a QB coach overhaul his mechanics

    [https://bleacherreport.com/articles/10079761-nfl-rumors-bucs-baker-mayfield-has-a-nice-edge-kyle-trask-overhauled-mechanics](https://bleacherreport.com/articles/10079761-nfl-rumors-bucs-baker-mayfield-has-a-nice-edge-kyle-trask-overhauled-mechanics)

    His kinetic chain in Tampa is the best it’s ever been. They developed him in a way that other teams couldn’t. And maybe that’s because he finally felt the pressure and had his ego knocked down a few pegs. Maybe that’s simply because Tampa had a better coaching staff? Regardless of the reason, the Baker in Tampa isn’t the Baker we had in Cleveland.

    Everyone tries to point to the shoulder issue as what went wrong with Baker. Playing with that injury definitely exacerbated the issues but they were already present, and it’s why the ceiling on Baker was lower in Cleveland than it’s been in TB. I still don’t think he would have ever reached this level with us.

  24. Why not the follow up question: “why couldn’t you or your bozo office keep your mouth shut and explore other options without blowing the whole damn thing up?”

  25. I agree with everyone who says he was a “bad fit” here, but at the end of the day, if you’re talking about a franchise quarterback, then the issue is with the hole and not with the peg. Them not seeing him as a franchise quarterback is not an excuse…in fact, it’s completely inexcusable. I don’t know how people can possibly say that like it somehow absolves the regime.

    If there was a problem with his attitude, then find a way to fucking fix it. That’s why you get paid millions of dollars. You don’t just throw him out, like competent quarterbacks grow on trees. And no, Watson was not close to a sure thing. That’s the biggest myth perpetuated on this sub. No player who has sat for THAT long is ever a sure thing. That’s why it was so fucking dumb to throw the draft capital away. The price was always too high.

  28. Hindsight is 20/20, he looked terrible in his contract year but still had the desire to be paid like a top 10 guy. He had a bad year in 2020 as well and while good in 2021 was obviously a cut below the top guys in the league (Lamar, Allen, Mahomes, etc). Should we have moved off him for Watson, ofcourse not. Would we have been better off giving him 40 a year and sticking with him long term than what we did, of course. But I understand the browns being done with him and I stand by the decision to take a big swing, blew up in their face, but I understand it.

    I like baker but he has similar problems now that he had when he was on the browns (Stull leads the league in INTs), he’s just gotten a fair bit better, humbled himself and is a good qb. A healthy well protected baker with great weapons can easily play like a top 10 guy, which he has this year. I hope he continues playing well as long as the bucs aren’t on our schedule, but I can’t say I wish we stuck with him, if we had the foresight to just grit it out a season with Jacoby or somebody else and wait for the right QB in the draft (CJ Stroud, Jayden Daniels, etc) that would have been a best case, not keeping baker who likely would have stagnated on the browns for at least another year or so before maybe getting it together. But look at our O-Line and weapons the past two years and say that Baker would be crushing it here, cause I don’t think it’s true.

  29. Browns org simply made a huge mistake when they kept playing him with the shoulder injury. That decision was a failure that led to many more.

  30. Baker had 4 HC and (I believe) 5 OCs during his time in Cleveland. Baker was not the problem.

  33. One just needs to look at the difference between the two organizations’ front offices and ownership to see the clear delineation in competence. It has nothing to do with Baker.

    Bucs lean in despite rebuild. Continue winning.

    Browns fuck everything up, even with a franchise QB and then a joke of a QB, with a seriously talented roster. Then think building a dome outside the city will dispel the bad juju. That dome will just be a nicer, cleaner, more modern factory of fucking sadness.

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