How Much Do The Cleveland Browns And Baker Mayfield Miss Odell Beckham Jr.?

The Cleveland Browns are at an interesting juncture in their 2020 season. Last week Cleveland beat Deshaun Watson and the Houston Texans. This week they face Carson Wentz and the Philadelphia Eagles. The Browns could have drafted either of those quarterbacks, but they passed.

In the NFL Draft in 2016, the year the Browns would go 1-15, Cleveland had the second overall pick, but traded out of that spot. The Browns traded the pick to the Eagles for five draft picks. The Eagles used that pick to draft Wentz. Cleveland’s quarterback room that year consisted of Cody Kessler, Josh McCown, Robert Griffin III, and Kevin Hogan.

In the NFL Draft in 2017, the year the Browns would go 0-16, they had the 12^th pick in the draft, but traded it to Houston, which used it to draft Watson. Cleveland’s quarterback room that year consisted of DeShone Kizer, Hogan, and Kessler.

In 2018, the Browns had the first pick in the draft, and they kept it. They used it to select Baker Mayfield. They’ve been trying to fairly evaluate him ever since, but the organization’s disorganization has made that difficult. In his three years with Cleveland Mayfield has played for four head coaches and four offensive coordinators.

This year stability has seemingly arrived, with new head coach Kevin Stefanski and his staff, including offensive coordinator Alex Van Pelt. The Browns will take a 6-3 record into Sunday’s game against Philadelphia, and are on pace for their most wins since they went 10-6 in 2007.

The two biggest agendas for the Browns in the remainder of the regular season is to win enough games to qualify for the playoffs for the first time since 2002, and to continue to gather enough information to make a call on their most important personnel decision of the coming offseason: Mayfield’s future with the team. Specifically, whether the Browns, following this season, will pick up the fifth year of Mayfield’s rookie contract, which is expected to be around $25 million.

The evaluation of Mayfield’s progress seemingly took a hit when his top receiver, Odell Beckham Jr., went down with a torn ACL three weeks ago, an injury that required season-ending surgery. At the time, many fans felt that Mayfield was better off without Beckham, the theory being that the pressure of assuaging Beckham’s ego each game by getting him enough touches of the ball was hampering Mayfield’s development, and affecting the continuity of the offense.

The Browns have now played three games without Beckham, after playing the first six games of the season with him. They were 4-2 with Beckham and they are 2-1 without him.

However, a closer look at the numbers, reveals an interesting pattern. The Browns’ offense overall has had a significant dip in production with Beckham out of the lineup, but Mayfield has performed marginally better without him.

In the six games Beckham played, the Browns averaged 364 yards of total offense per game. They’ve averaged 325 in the three games without him. Their average passing yards per game went from 207 with Beckham to 187 without him. Average number of first downs per game: 21 with Beckham, 19 without. And average points per game: 28 with Beckham and 17 without.

It should be mentioned that two of the three games the Browns have played without Beckham were played in Cleveland, under adverse weather conditions: rain, snow, and extremely high winds.

It’s the kind of weather that lends itself to awful quarterback stats. Mayfield, however, has weathered the weather and stabilized his struggles from earlier in the season.

Mayfield’s quarterback rating in six games with Beckham in the lineup: 84.3. His quarterback rating in three games since Beckham got hurt: 103.2. Mayfield’s completion percentage was 60.5 with Beckham and is 63 without him.

Mayfield threw 10 touchdown passes and six interceptions in six games before Beckham got hurt. He’s thrown five touchdown passes with one interception in three games since. Mayfield’s average yards gained per pass attempt with Beckham in the lineup: 6.4. With Beckham out of the lineup: 7.5. Beckham’s catch percentage (53.5%), receiving yards per game (45.6) and receptions per game (3.3) are all career lows.

Make of that what you will, however, since that covers six games instead of the 16 he would have played had he remained healthy all year.

So the evidence so far in the Mayfield/Beckham conundrum is inconclusive. Reduced to its most basic equation, it’s reasonable to assume that any given quarterback is a better quarterback with his best receiver in the lineup rather than out of the lineup.

That sort of is and sort of isn’t the case with Mayfield. So, The Baker Watch continues. As usual, nothing comes easy for the Browns.