Will Joe Flacco’s lack of mobility be the Cleveland Browns’ downfall against the Packers?

Will Joe Flacco’s lack of mobility be the Cleveland Browns’ downfall against the Packers?

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It, it’s, it’s a little yin and a little yang. They both are playing into the, the issues with the offense not being able to connect on any deep passes. So when you look at this individual matchup. Is the fact that Flacco is essentially a statue in the pocket, probably the least mobile quarterback in football right now, is that your biggest concern about this Browns offense going against this Green Bay defense? Uh, yeah, probably, and I mean, listen, he wasn’t very mobile when he was here before either. It was just, it, it, it felt more noticeable to me last week because, uh, just the way the Ravens were playing them and they would show blitz, they bring 6 to the line and then they would drop 2 and it just felt at times like Cleveland’s offensive line wasn’t entirely sure who was coming and who was dropping. The tackles were awful. It the the problem with the Browns right now is the tackles and In the middle with Joel and with Posse and with Teller, are these guys where they were 5 years ago? No, probably not, but they’re still, it, they’re good, it’s, they’re good enough. That’s not the issue. The issue is on the edges and of course with Micah Parsons coming to town now, yeah, that’s gonna be a real concern. And Shaan Gary’s no slouch on the other end either, for sure. So, I mean Dewuan is the biggest thing, and we can talk about more of him. I don’t wanna keep hammering Deuan. But this is honestly beyond quarterback. I was actually thinking about this this morning. I don’t think it’s hyperbole to say the next biggest decision is Dean because you see it, you, you have an answer you think at running back with, with Judkins, the defense, you, you see it, you see what you’ve got coming. This offensive line going forward beyond this year is in such disarray because of the contract situation. There’s no guaranteed dollars on any of these guys. It is such a huge relief if you could look at Deuan Jones and say that’s our guy for the next 10 years, but he hasn’t shown that yet, so this is, this is. I don’t wanna say it’s a crisis moment. Game 3. I’m not giving up on him yet. He’s gotta be significantly better than what he’s been the 1st 2 games. I told you guys on Monday. Kevin was covering for Dewan. This is, this wasn’t a heat issue. He was terrible. Zach said the same thing yesterday, by the way, yeah, like, yeah, we talked about it on Monday. I haven’t been in since Monday. I don’t know what. I haven’t seen every show what was said and what wasn’t said. I told you guys then Kevin was covering for him, and I think Deloan more or less said that like I was fine. He, he, his run game, he has to know his assignments. And he just doesn’t at times, but all of the physical traits are there. If you’re trying to design like a prototypical franchise left tackle, isn’t that it? If he keeps his weight under control and like he could stay in shape and conditioning, that’s it. So it’s not physical at all with him. He just has to stay on point and know his assignments, uh, but. You know, I think that’s part of the reason. I don’t think these are explosive receivers, but I also think part of the reason that, you know, 20 to 28 completions last week were to the backs on the tight ends was because they’re trying to get the ball out quick because of what you talked about because of Joe’s lack of mobility. Uh, hopefully at some point there’s gonna be some explosive plays within this offense, you would think. Uh, I don’t expect every week to look as bad as last week did with Baltimore and, and Flacco, but the, the fact is they don’t have the luxury. Of on 2nd and 12 if everybody’s covered, just get 4, you know, for the quarterback to just step up if he could just run and get you 4 and put you at 3rd and 8, 3rd and 7 rather than 3rd and 12 or 3rd and 15 because he took a sack, that makes such a big difference, and they just don’t have that luxury right now. Uh, so yeah, I mean this is trying to play in the NFL today with a quarterback that can’t move really hamstrings teams, and that’s just the reality where the Browns are at right now. Gino, you and I were on the panel yesterday, so we kind of gave our thoughts, but when you look at this specific Packers defense and their defensive scheme, is the fact that Flacco can’t move what concerns you most in that offense versus defense matchup? Um, no, um. Because it’s, it’s a, it’s, it’s more than just that, that it’s just like, you know, it’s a compounding type situation when you talk about Joe Flacco and him, his ability to not be able to move, that does, it, it, it highlights some of the deficiencies that you have. So say for instance, you know, places where you may expect to step, step up or buy a little more time to get a guy a couple more extra seconds to throw a ball deep. You don’t have that. So now that compounds situations where now it’s like Jerry Judy and I, you know, I talked to Dustin the other day. I mean, Jerry Judy is a, is a good receiver, but Jerry Judy is not Tyreek Hill in his prime or some of those other guys. He doesn’t have, he’s not AJ Brown, a big physical guy that could just kinda bully, bully you at the top of your route, so. He’s like there’s a lot of things he’s a route runner, so it’s not like you know they they’re gonna be just threatened so I’m, I’m playing, I’m playing close too, so you may need a couple of extra seconds for Judy to get some separation, right? Uh, and then you talk, talk about the run game, the lack of the run game makes everything more constricting so now they’re not, they’re not worried about your play action. And when we said before, hey, Saansky wants to run play action, but you actually have to run the ball in order to somebody respect that type of game. So these are all things that we got that’s, that’s going into it. The Flacco not being able to run, that’s part of it. That’s why it’s paramount to me, um, that Kevin has to get. All the way in his creative bag. Um, he gotta get all the way in his college football bag in terms of figuring out how do we, how can we, is there some way we can manufacture some yards, right? Can we manufacture some cheap stuff like, oh yeah, like, like stuff where I’m gonna be responsible for giving you something that I’m, I just out scheming the defense and, and that’s a great look, so we can get some yards here or there. But so I, I think that’s the way you have to go when you don’t have a quarterback that’s very mobile and can extend plays naturally. Um, and then hopefully after you do those things, it slows the defense down to a point where they have to actually think about their assignments and where the Brown, right now they’re lining up and I, I mean, you go watch the Ravens secondary or, or, or Roquan Smith. They are, they are walking to where they need to be at cause there’s nothing. They already know it. They know the plays, they know what’s coming. And if you got teams that are already more skilled than you, more physically gifted than you, and they got more guys than you like in terms of playmakers, you’re not gonna, you’re not gonna win them games. Yeah, you look at how Baltimore played defense against the Browns. Look at how Cincinnati played defense against the Browns, how I expect Green Bay to play defense tomorrow or Sunday. We’re playing too high safeties and saying just please run the ball. We, we don’t believe you can run the ball on us downfield consistently, so we’re gonna keep you in 2nd and eights, 3rd and longs and force you to beat us with the throw. When you look at this matchup though, I am, I mean, listen, we’ve talked about it yesterday. I’m not gonna harp on the whole thing again. Flacco can’t move. He wasn’t very mobile in 2011 when he was winning Super Bowls with the Ravens. He’s even less mobile at 40 now when you have two pass rushers and Parsons and Rashaw Gary who would know exactly. Where the quarterback’s going to be on almost every dropback, it just makes their job easier against guys like Deuan Jones, and I don’t know if Jack Conklin’s gonna play Jason. I’m not sure if we have an update on that elbow injury, but — you
— know, the last I had heard, it didn’t sound like he was close, but that was a few days ago, — so I don’t
— know if you, buttonio has a practice all week. Am I correct? Yeah, — he said
— he was fine. — He just
— he misses a lot of practice during the season. I would expect Joel to play. Um, but yeah, he has missed the last couple of days with the back. — He’s had a back for years that’s
— that’s called. Yeah, that’s exactly it. The one dude in his last year of his career. The one thing I know I was watching Thursday night football last night, and Josh Allen’s obviously a freak athlete, so they do a little bit with him in Buffalo, but more of how Mike McDaniel uses Tua, who’s not the most mobile quarterback, and they try to avoid him getting hit at all costs. Sure, like we know his history. They avoid him getting hit at all costs. They moved the pocket in subtle ways because their offensive line isn’t good. And I don’t, and, and once again, this is no disrespect to Joe Flacco. I don’t think he’s fast enough to move the pocket with G. by the time he got to his new target spot. The entire route’s been running now they’re in scramble drill, but you know what I’m saying, like I don’t think he has the mobility to actually utilize some of those other options available to a coach to generate more time because I don’t think Flacco gets there quick enough unless you’re running a 40 yard combo route, and I don’t know if we have the receivers to get the separation need on those deep routes. It’s um, you know, I, I liked, if you go back a little bit, I, I don’t know if they’ve changed philosophies in it. But a, a lot of it that I like is when you’re talking about running boots and stretch type schemes, the thing that me as a defensive lineman and I always didn’t, I always didn’t like about those schemes that that were difficult for me to cover was the fact that I, I’m responsible for a gap. So if they’re running stretched this way, my gap is actually condensing, so I have to be able to condense with it because if I don’t condense enough and they hand it to the running back, there’s a cutback lane. The the B and the C gap is widening and, and, and you, and that there’s a gap right there, so I have to crash down. So it makes it essentially on that bootleg it takes one of your defensive ends out of the play because they have to honor that, right? And so they did that a lot with Baker Mayfield. They did a ton of it because, you know, they had guys that could really run the zone and when you’re running zone, you’re just taking your zone step, the zone stretch steps, and then you, it’s easy, easy to figure out who you got. If the guy flashes front side, you know you got him, and if he wants to run that way, take him and run him that way. So now you got to cut back. Lane. So though I like that scheme better right now they’re running a lot of duo play action where it’s just the play action and Flacco still, you know, so run action, he’s still in the pocket, but that’s not the defensive ends, they don’t have to respect that cause their gap isn’t moving. I’m gonna just stay here and be in my gap. So I, I think that they need to get more east and western in some things too. And by the way, I just hate runs out of shotgun. I, I don’t hate them, but It doesn’t. It’s not dramatic enough. It don’t affect me. The, the, the play action ain’t is devastating when it’s here, here, here, here, and then I’ll pull it. It’s crazy cause now I gotta really, really respect that under uh uh play action under uh works though. When you have a Lamar Jackson or Josh Allen or a quarterback that the read — option is now an option in the play action
— RPO game is part of it, right? All that’s up for, but for us that’s not even an option for us. Your explanation of that was perfect because You mentioned Baker, when, when this, when Kevin was really installing this offense. Baker’s numbers on boots were terrific and everything went to crap with DeShawn. It just didn’t work, but so if you gotta go all the way back to the Baker, that’s how it’s supposed to look, and they can’t get there with Joe and that takes out a big portion of this offense when you can’t move the pocket, when you can’t roll the quarterback. So eventually, eventually they are gonna get to Dylan and eventually that’s gonna come back. It for two reasons. One, Kevin’s comfortable calling it. That’s the way the offense is supposed to look. And two, you have to move the pocket because of Dylan’s size. So it, it’s funny how like we talked about it last year. It just felt like they had two identities last year because you had Ken Dorsey trying to call one game, yeah. And it with receivers who you’re right, I mean all the data was there they were slow receivers who don’t create separation and they’re trying to just run vertical routes. It didn’t make sense and then they come back the next week and it almost looked like the offense of two years prior, so they just had this identity crisis. I don’t know it’s to that extent, but you will see when when Dylan and if we get to Shaddoor. You will see an offense that looks different than what they have to run with Joe right now just because of Joe’s lack of mobility. And that goes back to why it’s my biggest concern is I just think they’re playing with, I don’t know, I’m making an arbitrary number, but like 62% of their playbook because there are certain things that they just simply cannot run due to Joe’s lack of mobility. It’s a, it’s a, it’s a, I call it the land of misfit toys like. You know, you got one He-Man, one GI Joe, one Transformer, one Thundercat. It’s like you don’t got the, you ain’t got the whole set of the toys. You just got, you got, you, you ain’t, you got piece here, piece here, piece there. And back then, what they, everything was complimentary cause you had 3 running backs that all did different things that you had a batter. Ramm and Kareem Hunt, that was really great out of the backfield. The Ernest Johnson was a stretch guy, cutback guy. Nick Chubb was Nick Chubb, you know what he was gonna be able to give you. The screen game was at the ultimate high, right? Now, now you’re inviting guys into the backfield. The screen game, he would have it from different angles, and you still had a guy and a guy that Jarvis Landry who was smaller but was a tremendous. Blocker was a tremendous he catch the football underneath and you still, and then for whatever it is worth, you still have guys that would respect Odell Beckham Junior because they like, yo, he could run past us and David and so they had the pieces and parts to kind of do that kind of stuff to be multiple. Now, it, it’s not, it’s not the same parts. You got a nice running back, we’ll, we’ll see how that works, but the, the receiving core. No, no.

Joe Flacco and the Cleveland Browns head into this matchup with the Green Bay Packers facing a serious question: can Flacco’s lack of mobility hold this offense back? The veteran quarterback has never been known for his legs, but with the Browns’ offensive line banged up and the Packers’ pass rush ready to bring pressure, every weakness in protection becomes magnified. If Flacco is stuck in third-and-long situations, Green Bay’s defense will be licking its chops.

That doesn’t mean Cleveland has no path to success. We’ve seen Flacco win games by leaning on quick throws, timing routes, and letting his playmakers do the work. If Kevin Stefanski dials up a balanced attack—establishing the run early and mixing in play-action—the Browns can hide some of Flacco’s mobility issues and keep the Packers guessing. The key is avoiding turnovers and not letting Green Bay’s pass rushers dictate the rhythm of the game.

At the end of the day, this matchup feels like a tug-of-war between experience and athleticism. Flacco brings the steady veteran presence, while the Packers bring speed and disruption off the edge. If the Browns protect him and play clean football, they can steal this one. But if the protection collapses, his lack of mobility could be the very thing that costs Cleveland in a game they badly need.

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