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- Browns are all in on Baker Mayfield and won’t be trading for Aaron Rodgers (cleveland.com) - ESPN had tons of fun with this last week after new broke that Aaron Rodgers is unhappy in Green Bay, but the Browns won’t be swapping Baker Mayfield and first round picks for him.
- Browns Jeremiah Owusu-Koramoah should be NFL’s DROY favorite (Bleacher Report) - Jeremiah Owusu-Kormoah is perfectly positioned to take home some hardware as the 2021 NFL Defensive Rookie of the Year due to his natural capabilities, how he fits in today’s game and the way Cleveland is currently tending.
- AFC North draft grades: Browns boost defense (NFL.com) - Considering the makeup of every roster and the factors surrounding each pick, Gennaro Filice and Dan Parr attempt a division-by-division assessment of the 2021 NFL Draft. Keep in mind that these grades are based on draft hauls alone — picks traded for veteran players were not taken into account. Below is Dan’s review of the AFC North.
- Tommy Togiai ‘blessed’ to stay in Ohio, prove himself in DT competition (clevelandbrowns.com) - Tommy Togiai will never forget the smiles he saw from Andrew Berry and Kevin Stefanski when he received the news Saturday shortly after he was drafted. Togiai, the defensive tackle from Ohio State, was coming to Cleveland. The Browns drafted him in the fourth round (132nd overall) and gave Togiai a chance to take his football roots up Interstate 71.
NFL:
- Zach Wilson’s path to the New York Jets: Inside the NFL’s worst-kept secret (ESPN) - The fascination started last October. New York Jets general manager Joe Douglas received word from one of his scouts that there was a college junior out west he needed to watch. The 2021 NFL draft was six months away, but this was his typical starting point for in-depth tape study on potential prospects. So he punched up the video of the Oct. 16 BYU-Houston game, and it changed the course of the franchise.
- Even in Super Bowl-winning Tampa, the Glazers are far from loved (The Guardian) - The Manchester United owners are not as reviled in Florida as they are in Manchester. But US fans rarely erupt into mass protest - especially if the team is successful.
- Did “Browns is the Browns” motivate Cleveland? “Probably a lot,” JuJu Smith-Schuster says (PFT) - In the days before a wild-card playoff game against Cleveland, Steelers receiver JuJu Smith-Schuster was asked whether the 2020 Browns are a different team that what they’ve been in the past. Then came the unintended catchphrase. In a recent appearance on PFT PM, Smith-Schuster was asked how much that comment motivated the opponent.
- Top 10 games of the 2021 NFL season: Bills-Chiefs, Giants-Cowboys make list (NFL.com) - We’ve known for several weeks who each NFL team will play this season, but with next week’s unveiling of the full 2021 NFL schedule, we’ll finally learn the when. The table-setting extravaganza kicks off at 8 p.m. on May 12, on NFL Network, NFL.com and the NFL app. In anticipation of the full release, and in the wake of the 2021 NFL Draft, let’s take a look at the 10 best matchups we know are coming this fall that we can’t wait to watch.