Myles Garrett practiced just once throughout the week while he rested a sore ankle. On Sunday, he was off the field more than he was on it because of a knee injury he suffered early in the action of the Browns' 16-6 loss to the Raiders.
Garrett, who is tied for the lead in the NFL with nine sacks, will undergo an MRI on his injured knee Monday. He played through the pain Sunday but couldn't quite get to Derek Carr and the Raiders, who pulled away in the fourth quarter to send the Browns to their first home loss of the 2020 season.
Garrett said he was injured on one of the first plays of the game, and the issue was completely unrelated to the ankle injury he's been nursing.
"It is what it is. It is part of the game," Garrett said. "You get hampered with things like that, and you just try to play through to the best that I can or best that I could. It just started wearing on me.
"Just have to take care of both (injuries) during the bye week."
Garrett and the Browns as a whole certainly aren't complaining about the timing of the team's bye. The Pro Bowl pass rusher is among the key players looking to heal up and gear up for a second half of the season the Browns hope goes even better than the first.
WR Odell Beckham Jr. isn't expected back this season, but a number of other, key players are expected to return at some point during the second half of the year.
"This is not a question on whether we can regroup. Nobody is going to be worried about this two weeks from now," Garrett said. "It is just about getting the guys that we need back healthy and coming back and executing our gameplan. We did not execute today, and they did."
Without Garrett, the Browns got to Carr just twice, both coming on first-half sacks by DE Olivier Vernon. Carr wasn't sacked in the second half, as the Raiders absolutely dominated time of possession and limited Cleveland's offense to just six possessions for the entire game.
Garrett entered Sunday's game on a franchise-record six-game streak of accumulating at least one sack. The reigning AFC Player of the Month nearly extended it to seven early in the first quarter but his opportunities were limited thereafter.
"He was able to play, probably did not play as much as he would have liked or we would have liked definitely," Browns coach Kevin Stefanski said. "Something that we will let the medical staff kind of guide us on that one, pending the MRI we will have more for you."
Garrett is among a handful of key Browns players who will use the next two weeks to rest and prepare for the final eight games.
Cleveland's been without Pro Bowl RB Nick Chubb since Week 4 because of a knee injury and played its third consecutive game Sunday without G Wyatt Teller, who has been sidelined with a calf injury. Both are expected to return at some point after the bye, and it could happen as soon as Week 10 against the Texans.
The Browns led the NFL in rushing through the first part of the season but have been limited to an average of 95.5 rushing yards over their past four games. Another key player in the Browns' running attack, TE Austin Hooper, missed the past two games while recovering from an appendectomy.
A handful of other players, including WR Jarvis Landry, C JC Tretter and RB Kareem Hunt, have been playing through injuries that have limited their practice time throughout the week.
"It is pretty good timing to be honest with you," Browns QB Baker Mayfield said of the team's bye week. "I think everybody needs it. Obviously, we would have loved to have gone into this bye 6-2, if not better, but we are where we are. We can only deal with that, move forward and continue to get better. It is about putting in the work one week at a time until we reach that end goal."
