Browns face more questions about benching Flacco for Gabriel after offense struggles again

DETROIT (AP) — After another poor performance by the Cleveland Browns’ offense, coach Kevin Stefanski was once again asked whether he’d consider benching veteran quarterback Joe Flacco for rookie Dillon Gabriel.

“I understand the question, especially when we are struggling the way we are on offense,” Stefanski said after Sunday’s 34-10 loss to the Detroit Lions. “But that’s not our focus right now. To have any success on either side of the ball, you need to play well and play together. Right now, we have too many things going wrong, and we all own that. It isn’t because of one player.”

Flacco got off to a strong start, with going 5-for-5 for 70 yards and leading the Browns to a touchdown on their first series.

“I thought we did a good job of attacking their man coverage on that first drive,” he said. “We won some one-on-one matchups and got some momentum.”

The Lions outscored Cleveland 34-3 in the final 50 minutes.

“Obviously, we didn’t do the things you need to do to beat a good team on the road,” Stefanski said. “It wasn’t one or two people — we all share in that, from the players to the coaches.”

The Browns (1-3) have been solid on defense, but their offense is holding them back. Through four games, Cleveland is averaging 14 points.

After putting up 88 yards on its first drive Sunday, Cleveland only managed 161 the rest of the game. Flacco threw two interceptions and lost a fumble, the Browns’ receivers dropped several passes, and the offensive line allowed three sacks.

“We all made mistakes, and when you do that, you give the Lions a chance to play from the lead,” Flacco said. “That makes them even better. We turned the ball over and put them in position to do what they do so well.”

Gabriel only played in a mop-up role and his lone pass was incomplete.

The special teams didn’t fare much better, allowing Kalif Raymond to take a punt back 65 yards for a touchdown to make it 27-10.

Cleveland’s defense wasn’t bad, holding the Lions to 277 yards after the Lions had averaged 468.5 in wins against Chicago and Baltimore.

The problem was Flacco’s turnovers gave Detroit three possessions that started in Cleveland territory. Those resulted in 17 points.

“I thought the defense competed like crazy, but we put them in too many tough spots with our turnovers,” Stefanski said. “They made enough plays to win a game, but we needed to come through as a complete team.”

Cleveland’s best defensive player didn’t agree with his coach, though.

“Our job is to go out there and stop the other team no matter where they put the ball,” defensive end Myles Garrett said. “It doesn’t matter if a drive starts on their 20 or our 20. We need to go out there and make big plays.

“We didn’t do enough today. We can always do more.”

Injuries

Kick returner DeAndre Carter injured his knee and wide receiver Cedric Tillman left the game with a hamstring issue. Stefanik said he won’t have an update until those players undergo testing over the next couple of days.

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