The Cleveland Browns‘ Cinderella run ended on Sunday against the New York Jets.
The rain made it hard to take anything away from the game, but one thing was clear: The offensive line played its worst game of the year. The Jets’ defensive front had their way with the Browns in the trenches to the tune of containing the Browns to just 96 rushing yards and a whopping eight sacks on Deshaun Watson. This offense will have a lot of adjustments to make before playing a tough Ravens‘ defense in Week 6.
Despite the weather making things tough to evaluate, we are going to drop some grades on position groups from Week 5.
Quarterback: C
Deshaun Watson played his worst game of the season since Week 1 against the Jacksonville Jaguars. The weather didn’t make it easy for a passing game to be effective, but the Jets were really successful in containing him when he was scrambling. The mobility he has had the past few weeks have helped but without that the offense suffered.
Running Back: Incomplete
Raheim Sanders was injured in this game and missed a good portion of it. Also injured, but stayed in the game, was Quinshin Judkins, it turns out. He left the stadium with a walking boot and was seen on the sideline at one point in obvious pain. Even ignoring the injuries, the offensive line did them no favors in allowing them to create or make plays.
Wide Receivers and Tight Ends: D-
Drops, drops, and more drops led to this being one of the worst games from the units as a whole. The passing game was not effective cause the weather, sure, but that’s only so much of an excuse. Denzel Boston made his weekly splash play, but that wasn’t enough to save this grade.
Offensive Line: U
The high school I went to had a grading system that was A, B, C, D, and U. The U was for unacceptable and that is perfect for the Browns’ offensive line. They gave up a whopping eight sacks and allowed Watson to be hit 13 times. This unit cannot have weeks like this again, or it is going to sink the season.
Defensive Line: B+
Maliek Collins stepped up in a big way in the absence of both Mason Graham and Mike Hall Jr. Adin Huntington also contributed some big plays with a sack and fumble recovery of his own, showing that this is one of the deeper groups on the team.
Linebackers: B
Carson Schwesing continues to play like one of the best defenders in the NFL. He was all over the defense on Sunday, and his biggest play came when he was able to come off the edge and force a pivotal sack and turnover, which didn’t help them win, but it made the game come down to the final moments.
Secondary: C
The Jets didn’t do much better passing the ball, but the secondary allowed big plays. Braelon Allen was able to break off long touchdowns of his own, while Garrett Wilson had a big play as well that kicked things off for the Jets. Just one of their lesser performances of the season from what has been a strong group.
This article originally appeared on Browns Wire: Report Card Grades from the Browns’ loss to the Jets in Week 5