The Cleveland Browns were in a tough spot heading into this season when it comes to the trenches as they had to find five new starters on the offensive line. It’s not a position you want to be in when you already have the league’s worst offense, but for the most part, the front office and coaching staff did a nice job rebuilding up front, most notably with the draft selections of Spencer Fano and Austin Barber, who look like long-term anchors at left tackle and right guard.
Of course, you can’t expect to have five new starters up front without going through some growing pains. Deshaun Watson has gotten sacked a lot, but a lot of those sacks have been his fault more than the offensive line’s.
Where the growing pains have shown up most have been in the penalty department. The Browns lead the league by a decent margin with 82 penalties overall through nine games after committing ten against the New Orleans Saints last week.
Of those penalties, Cleveland has committed 17 false starts and 18 holds on offense, both of which are fourth most in the NFL. The penalties have caused some to wonder whether or not head coach Todd Monken plans on making any lineup adjustments, but Cleveland.com’s Mary Kay Cabot shut that down on Wednesday.
“#Browns Todd Monken plans no changes on the offensive line despite all the penalties,” Cabot said.
#Browns Todd Monken plans no changes on the offensive line despite all the penalties.
— Mary Kay Cabot (@MaryKayCabot) November 11, 2026
The Browns have shown plenty of improvement on offense this year, but they aren’t good enough to consistently overcome shooting themselves in the foot. The Browns haven’t had a game this season where they have committed fewer than six penalties and half of the 82 penalties have come from the offense.
The defense and special teams certainly aren’t blameless in this either. It’s all likely a byproduct of having so many new faces in the building, but over the second half of this season, this would be a great way for the Browns to continue to improve.
Cleveland is still in the AFC playoff mix and has to clean things up after dropping the last two games. It makes sense why a personnel change wouldn’t be an option since there isn’t an obvious lineup switch to be made, but we’ll see if the O-Line can have a better performance against the Houston Texans on Sunday.
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