Something that continues to gnaw at me

The Cleveland Browns last season had the worst passing game in the NFL. So their off-season plans should have been pretty simple, right? Improve the passing game, improve our scoring, win more games.

Ahh, but see you're not a Mensa-level genius like Mike Holmgren. His first order of business was to make a change at QB. Pretty reasonable, since the passing game was worst in the league and the QB tends to be the most important part of the passing game. But, amazingly, Holmgren changed QBs and actually got worse. He traded Brady Quinn and let Derek Anderson walk, and then brought in Jake Delhomme and Seneca Wallace. Delhomme will be the starter, which he earned by posting a 59 QB rating last season and throwing an astonishing 18 INTs against 8 TDs. Wallace posted decent numbers in backup duty in Seattle, but he's never been an NFL-quality QB and, frankly, his career probably would have been better served had he switched to WR right away.

Granted, Derek Anderson was pretty god-awful last season (competing with JaMarcus Russell all year for the title of worst starting QB), but Quinn at least showed a semblance of competence last season, and besides they're both young QBs who mostly just need a better supporting cast around them. So anyways, let's measure this all up. We'll forget about Anderson and Wallace, who never were or are going to be long-term starters, and focus on Delhomme and Quinn.

Delhomme is much older...he was the worse player last season...he played in a much better offense last season (his top receiver was Steve Smith, while Quinn has never started a game in which his top receiver wasn't either stone-hands Braylon Edwards or 2nd round rookie Mohammed Massaquoi)...he appears to have a mental block after melting down in a playoff game against Arizona over a year ago...and he's the one handed the starting job while Quinn is traded out of town. How does any of this make sense? If you're going to replace Quinn, fine, but actually upgrade over him please.

And then there's the supporting cast. As you may have guessed with the worst passing game in the league, they also have the worst collection of receivers in the league. Mohammed Massaquoi, Josh Cribbs, Chansi Stuckey, Mike Furrey...are you scared yet? Massaquoi actually does have some potential at this level, but he's severely miscast as a team's top receiver, and for a receiver Cribbs makes a hell of a special teamer. Stuckey and Furrey aren't even worth talking about.

This is all a joke, right? You're telling me the Cleveland Browns went into this offseason with the worst passing game in the league, downgraded their QB position and did nothing at receiver? Do they expect their passing game to improve through osmosis? I feel terrible for Cleveland fans right now. Not only did LeBron leave their basketball team and their baseball team is currently hopeless, but they also have to talk themselves into a Delhomme-to-Massaquoi combination.

Mike Holmgren, I know you've coached in three Super Bowls and you developed Brett Favre, but you sir are a fucking idiot. Why did you not go out and get a real QB and some actual receivers? Why are you subjecting your fans to another season of the worst passing game in the league? It's not often you have the worst passing game in the league (have I said that enough yet? I feel like that needs to sink in, because the Cleveland front office apparently doesn't realize it) and standing pat actually turns out to be a better option than what you actually did to improve it, but that certainly appears to be the case. Brady Quinn at least still has some potential (not to mention he actually was better than Delhomme last season), while Delhomme is on the downside of his career and, barring a miraculous late-career renaissance, is finished as an NFL QB.

It's pretty incredible what happened in Cleveland over this offseason. I don't mean LeBron leaving, but the complete ignorance of their passing game incompetence. You would think Holmgren, being a passing game guy, would be the first to recognize it, but instead he actually made things worse. It's not often a team is 32nd in the league in something and actually takes a step backwards, but that's what happened in Cleveland. If they win 4 games, I'll be shocked.

(Additional thought; the Browns actually do have pretty decent offensive line. The right side isn't much, but the other three are Joe Thomas, Eric Steinbach and Alex Mack. Jerome Harrison really ran well late in the season, and they drafted Montario Hardesty to split carries with him. If this team had actually upgraded at QB and brought in another receiver to play with Massaquoi, this offense might not be half-bad. As it is, they're tapped out at about 17 points per game.)