Pro Football Focus released its tiers of NFL offenses on Thursday, and the Cleveland Browns were among the league’s best offensive units.
PFF included the following teams among its list of NFL elite offenses: The Kansas City Chiefs, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, the Green Bay Packers and Buffalo Bills.
The Browns’ inclusion among PFF’s tier-one offenses prompted some criticism from Fox Sports analyst Chris Broussard during Friday’s edition of FS1’s “Undisputed.”
“Cleveland is the question mark,” Broussard said. “We haven’t seen them do it.
“They’re the one team in this tear that doesn’t have a tier-one quarterback. Right? Baker was different with [Odell Beckham Jr]. I think he’ll be able to play well with OBJ this year.”
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Broussard pointed to the fact that the Browns averaged 25.5 points per game during the 2020 regular season, which ranked 14th in the NFL.
Last season, the Browns averaged 369.6 yards per game, which ranked 16th in the NFL.
Broussard said he thinks the Browns will win the AFC North in 2021.
However, Broussard said he would put the Tennessee Titans in the NFL’s top tier of offenses instead of the Browns.
PFF named the Titans at the very top of its second tier.
Last season, the Titans ranked fourth in the NFL in scoring at 30.7 points per game.
In 2020, the Titans averaged 396.4 yards per game, which ranked third in the league.
“Tennessee has a running back who can equal what Cleveland [can do],” Broussard said. “I know Cleveland’s got (Nick) Chubb and Kareem Hunt, but the best running back in the league is Derrick Henry.
“Unless he falls off, I know he’s been hit a lot lately. Unless he falls off, they’re going to be powerful and punishing folks.”
In 2020, Henry led the NFL in touches with 397.
To compare, Chubb had 206 touches last season and Hunt had 236 touches.
Broussard also said Titans quarterback Ryan Tannehill is “at least” as good as Browns quarterback Baker Mayfield.
Fellow FS1 analyst and former NFL linebacker LaVar Arrington said he believed the Browns deserved to be considered among the NFL’s best offensive units.
“If you look at the Browns, they might be the ones that you say, ‘are they really?’” Arrington said. “But, when you look at their offensive front, and you look at their backfield, they just gave Chubb his new contract, he’s probably happy and rearing and ready to go.
“Baker Mayfield, I continue to say, the confidence that Baker Mayfield took away from that playoff run last year, I saw a different a different Baker Mayfield going into the last part of the season and into the playoffs. I think that that’s going to make a tremendous difference in this team coming up this season. I think the familiarity that they have an amount of players the amount of talent that they have, I think that this is going to be a pretty efficient offensive team.”
Fox Sports analyst Jason McIntyre agreed with Arrington that the Browns’ offensive unit should be considered in the top tier.
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