Week 1 of the NFL season seems like forever ago to the fans of the Cleveland Browns, but on Sunday in Cincinnati they were reminded of it at the very worst possible time. The Browns controlled their own fate, by beating the Bengals they would be in the AFC playoffs for the 1st time since 2002. Instead QB Derek Anderson threw 4 interceptions, 3 were in the red zone and 2 on consecutive plays to end the 2nd quarter. The Browns fell into a 19-0 hole that they could not dig out of and fell to the Bengals 19-14 all, but ending their playoff hopes.

Anderson never looked in sync on Sunday. It could have been the wind, gusting at times up to 50 MPH. It could have been the Bengals defense, who had yielded 5 TD passes to Anderson in the teams week 2 meeting. It could have been the play calling, red hot RB Jamal Lewis only carried the ball 11 times in the 1st half. More then likely it was a combination of all those things. For Anderson, ironically, his week 16 performance in 2006 was very similar to his week 16 performance on Sunday. The Bengals defense played a lot of Cover 2 defense and was without it's 2 starting safeties, in fact they were playing 3 rookies in the secondary Sunday, but you would have never known it.

Anderson was not alone in making mistakes though. For the 2nd time this year holder Dave Zastudil mishandled a field goal snap resulting in no points for the Browns. On a 4th and 1 early in the game and a chance to take over the game, the Browns offensive line was manhandled and stopped short. Punt returner Joshua Cribbs really misplayed several punts where he could have saved the team valuable yardage instead he let the ball hit the ground and gave away valuable yardage. Head coach Romeo Crennel only activated 5 defensive linemen Sunday, after 4 of them were on the injury report earlier in the week. DT Ethan Kelley re-injured his knee early in the game and DE Robaire Smith left with a neck injury and the team got ran over by the Bengals ground game for 155 yards on the ground. Rookie LT Joe Thomas was schooled Sunday by Bengals DE Justin Smith, it was by far Thomas' worst day as a pro. So you see the blame can be shared by many for Sunday's failure.

To their credit the Browns defense was exceptional Sunday. The 2 touchdowns the Bengals did score were set up by Anderson interception's that gave them drives starting at the Cleveland 20 and 5 yard lines. If someone said before the game the Browns would hold Bengals QB Carson Palmer to 115 yards passing and intercept him twice you would have sworn the Browns won the game by 15 points and you would have gladly taken it. That's what they did and they would have won by that much had they not turned the ball over. The Bengals were held to 270 yards of offense, only 54 offensive snaps and had the ball for more then 6 minutes less then the Browns. The Browns also forced a fumble with 1:55 to play in the game giving them one last shot to win and trailing by 5. They drove to the Bengals 29 yard line with 1 second to play, but an desperation pass into the endzone by Anderson fell harmlessly to the ground. The drive was marred by terrible clock management by Anderson as the Browns still had 2 timeouts, but lost precious time by not spiking the ball after completing short passing plays.

The Browns now go home to finish the season against the San Francisco 49ers this Sunday. A win would give them 10 for the season and a home record of 7-1. It's very little consolation for the fans at this point, but it would be the most wins in a season by the club since they returned to the NFL in 1999. A win or loss will have no bearing on whether the Browns make the playoffs.

The performance reminded fans that even though week 1 seemed so far ago, the Browns still have miles to go to get to where they want to be. They now must rely on the Indianapolis Colts, who will be resting the majority of their team, to beat a hungry Tennessee Titans team on Sunday night. Not an ideal situation for the Browns, but not entirely impossible. We saw 1st hand Sunday what pressure can do to a team on the road, maybe the Titans will experience the same thing. Maybe.

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