The Browns got good news on the injury front Monday as head coach Hue Jackson said quarterbacks Cody Kessler, Josh McCown and center Cameron Erving are expected to practice this week.
The news comes after a tough loss to the Patriots in Kessler left late in the first quarter with a chest/ribs injury, marking the team's third quarterback to go down this season. [
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"It's football and these things are going to happen to players. We just have had our share of bad luck, in my opinion. It's unfortunate, but we'll get this turned around to where we'll have maybe too many quarterbacks standing at some point," Jackson said, referencing setbacks to Kessler, McCown and Robert Griffin III, who was placed on injured reserve last month.
Kessler, who has started the past three games, will be evaluated on a day-to-day basis with the hope he'll be ready for a trip to Tennessee this weekend.
'No worries' from Cam
After a somewhat scary moment following the Ravens game, Erving is eager to potentially return to the field this weekend.
"I feel pretty good now, there's definitely things you've got to fight through," said Erving, who was taken to the hospital Week 2 after suffering a bruised lung, "but we're past the point of worrying about my lung now so just pushing forward and making sure I can do everything within my condition and getting back out there to play ball."
Erving, who has missed the past three weeks, also said he's not going to worry about the chance at re-injuring himself if he can indeed play.
"(If) you go out there worrying, you're going to get hurt again," he said. "I'm going to go out there and be smart, but I'm going to make sure I get the work that I need to get in … leave everything up to coach Jackson but put myself in a position so that I can possibly play this weekend."
Run game hopes to bounce back
Jackson played down the notion the Patriots might have offered the rest of the league a "blueprint" for how to stop Cleveland's powerful run game.
"It's not a concern. I'm sure you guys have all seen games where things just don't go well sometimes. You don't play as well. It's unfortunate it happened yesterday against a good, quality opponent. We wish that that part of our team played extremely well. It's the run game. We were one of the better running teams in football and they shut it down," he said.
The Browns, who entered Sunday with the top-ranked rushing attack at almost 150 yards per game, finished with 27 total yards on 22 carries against New England.
"I don't know if it's a blueprint. I'm sure people will attempt to do those same things, but I didn't think our run game was more shut down. They did a good job. Don't get me wrong. I think they did some things defensively that maybe we didn't adjust to as well. But I think we could've played better. I believe that all around.
"I think our guys know that there is more there for us. I couldn't even look at the stats. I couldn't look at it. I don't know what the number was, but whatever it was, it should've been better than what it was. That's what I would say."
Locking down TEs
The Browns continued to struggle against opposing tight ends, giving up a combined 167 yards and three touchdowns to New England's Martellus Bennett and Rob Gronkowski on Sunday.
"I think we have to get up on them a little tighter. To me, man coverage means that man – guard your man. We have to do that better and with more confidence," Jackson said.
"Some guys have made some plays on us that way, and we have to do better. There is no question about that. People are going to keep exploiting that until we can get it slowed down and stopped. It is an area that we have an emphasis on and we are going to try to get corrected."
So far, Cleveland has had difficulty against four of five opponents. Eagles tight end Zach Ertz caught six passes for 58 yards, Baltimore's Dennis Pitta had nine catches for 102 yards and Washington's Jordan Reed hauled in nine catches for 73 yards and two touchdowns.
Jersey day
If you're on Twitter, then you might've seen a post from Josh McCown that went viral over the weekend.
When your daughter has jersey day at school and she doesn't have enough friends to wear all the teams #2missing pic.twitter.com/KJ7jN6jN8d — Josh McCown (@JoshMcCown12) October 7, 2016
On Monday, the veteran McCown outlined the backstory behind the lighthearted post.
"I kind of had a heads up. My daughter just shot me a text and she said, 'Hey, it's jersey day and my friends were going to wear some of these jerseys that I have of you.' I said, 'you know, absolutely.' I kind of thought, 'I hope you have enough friends,'" he said, laughing.
"They went ahead and did it and went to class. Then, we were sitting at dinner. They flew up here Friday night or Friday afternoon. We were sitting at dinner Friday night at Burntwood in Crocker Park and we were talking. We were talking about tweeting it. Some people in the room suggested I should tweet it maybe.
"I was talking to them about it and I'm not a huge presence on Twitter by any stretch, but my daughter was like, 'Yeah, it would be cool.' We kind of talked about it. She kind of formulated what we should say and we sent it out. That's kind of how it happened."
