Sunday, Bloody Sunday

Nice way to end the holiday weekend, wasn't it? I kind of knew that it was going to be a bad day when I opened The Plain Dealer and read Mary Kay Cabot's interview of Eric Mangini. I know I complained about him giving interviews to the national media, so I suppose that I should give him his due for sitting down with Cabot, but jeezes -- the guy just comes across so badly.

Unfortunately, whenever he opens his mouth, Coach Mangini consistently manages to create the impression that he's got the integrity of a Cuyahoga County politician and the sincerity of Eddie Haskell. I actually kind of feel bad for the guy -- he's obviously sensitive to the criticism he's received, and even told Cabot that he wanted his critics to "at least give me the opportunity to express the other side."

Okay, fair enough. But then Mangini follows that up with a statement that he's got no idea where the perception that players hate playing for him comes from, because after all, "all of those guys from New York came here and they know exactly how I am..." C'mon coach -- is that the best you can do? Half of those guys came here in trades, and the other half were free agents who didn't exactly have 31 other teams pounding on their doors. The fact that they came here doesn't mean that they like playing for you, it just means that they like getting an NFL paycheck.

Mangini may be unconvincing, but at least he provides some entertainment value, which is more than I can say for his football team. After last week's head fake, the Berea Turds offense returned to form against the Bengals. Yesterday's game featured Brian Daboll's "Screens Gone WILD!" game plan, Grumpy the Aging Tailback, extremely offensive offensive line play, receivers who are so disoriented that they make a compelling argument for in-game drug testing and, last but not least, a noodle-armed QB who couldn't hit the broad side of a barn. In short, it had everything you've come to love about this season's edition of the Turds' offense.

The defense also didn't disappoint. The Bengals may not have passed the ball real well, but you don't have to when you're racking up 210 yards on the ground. As LB David Bowens put it, "They came out and ran the ball, what, 75 times?" It turns out that the Bengals ran the ball 45 times, but it must have seemed like much more than that to the Turds defense, which spent 38:11 on the field yesterday afternoon.

Of course, the Bengals didn't just grind out yardage -- they also ground up defenders. While the apparent season-ending injury to Shaun Rogers is the biggest piece of bad injury news to come out of yesterday's game, a total of four defensive starters left the game with injuries. The Browns have already been hammered by injuries this season, and you got a sense for just how bare the cupboard is when receiver Mike Furrey was brought in to play defensive back after Pool went down. So if you don't think things can possibly get worse, well, stay tuned.

Another week, another hopeless loss. Sunday, bloody Sunday. Like Bono says, I'm so sick of it.