[Subby]

2008 Cleveland Browns

Year End Score: 79 (100/92/52/71)

No retirements.

We remove the Franchise designation from DT Christian Peter and place it on FB Edwin Bednarik. Bednarik wouldn't renegotiate, but his skill level coupled with his backup's refusal to re-sign left us with no choice.

Both our Scout, Erik Johan, and Coach, Martin Force stay. They are both clearly the creme-de-la-creme at their positions. I recommend giving Johan a raise in the near future.

Fan Loyalty and Support for Stadium are both maxed-out at 100 (again). Since we are coming off a Superbowl year, (but still saw a sharp decrease in revenue), we raise prices between 4%-6% across the board. Still, none of our prices are the highest in the league.

Franchise Value: 716,230,000 (1^st overall, 42/100/99/52)

Free Agency
We go into free agency with precious little cap room and it looks like we are going to lose backups Earnest Astley (FB) and Dan Neil (G). We need a DE, but the prices are still insanely high, and we are close to maxed, so we wait till the latter stages, hoping a solid backup drops down. None does. We lose the aforementioned players, but move confidently into the draft.

The Draft
We begin the draft with a 1st round pick (32), and two 2nd round picks (7 and 32). Our mission is two-fold - get a stud DE by any means necessary and add to our depth on the aging o-line. We have little cap space and lots of aspirations, so we put on our Trader Jack hat.

Trades
Trade #1: Backup QB Sieh, 5th WR Porter, 2008 2nd round pick (32), 2009 5th and 7th round picks to Baltimore for 2008 1st (7) and 3rd (7) rounders and a 2009 1st round pick.

Unhappy with the draft depth, we trade down.

Trade #2: 2008 1st (7) and 3rd (7) rounders to Philly for 2008 1st (10) and 2nd (10) rounders.

Unable to choose between a stud G and a maxed-out LB, we look to pick up another 1st rounder.

Trade #3: Backup LB Conrad Bernstein to Minnesota for 2008 1st rounder (12).

Our 4th trade has several motivations. Backup RB DeStefano is demanding a trade and is int he last year of his contract. This draft is also stacked with Cornerbacks (as are we). So we can probably move a good veteran backup and not lose much in that category.

Trade #4: Backup CB Jerald Mummert and backup RB OJ DeStefano to San Diego for 2008 2nd rounder (17) and 2009 1st rounder.

We draft:

10. Freddie Kobeski, LB, Indiana (94/96/98/72).
12. Cory Corbett, G, Texas Southern (96/90/96).
39. Chuck Coleman, CB, Oklahoma (94/98/90/x/x/96).
42. Buddy Donovan, T, North Texas (70/76/61).
49. Dale Hixson, DE, Hawaii (54/64/45).

We tried for a solid hour to get a stud DE from another team, but the asking price was three 1st rounders - to much in my estimation. Hopefully, the draft cupboard is full for Darkiller for the next two years: 4 1st rounders, 2 2nd, 2 3rd, 2 4th, 5th, 6th, and 7th.

We sign every draftee and renegotiate almost every contract on the roster - re-upping almost every starter for 3 more years. We end up with 6 million dollars in cap flexibility.

After training camp, we receive an interesting offer for Sheen. The first pick in the 2008 draft - who happened to be a DE. We pass.


Exhibition Season
We choose seven studs to sit during the preseason - partly to avoid the injury bug, partly to give our new backups, QB Bucky Chapman and RB Tom Battle a crash course in game day experience.

We finish the exhibition season a respectable 3-1. Chapman and Battle perform well. The magnificent seven are activated and we get ready to start the season. Our passing cohesion drops like a stone though - probably because Davies was moved to third string and Sieh was traded. Hopefully this will normalize after a few games. Hopefully.

Here is a quick peek at our starting lineup on gameday (Bold denotes keeper):

Offense: (current/future/experience)
QB Blaine Davies (18/18/10)
Flanker: Harvey Wallace (17/17/9)
Split End: BJ Bushon (13/14/2)
RB: Donnie Sheen (17/18/7)
FB: Edwin Bednarik (13/12/9)
TE: Ronald Stark (16/16/9)
LT: Jamie Nails (18/19/12)
LG: Raleigh Roundtree (17/17/12)
C: Jeff Smith (15/16/13)
RG: Ruben Brown (13/12/14)
RT: Flozell Adams (16/17/11)

Special Teams
P: Quinn Slay (12/12/10)
K: Corey Rollins (16/15/10)
KR: Dusty Parrish (6/8/3)
PR: Doug Barnette (3/4/2)

Defense
LDE: Jason Taylor (11/10/12)
RDE: Matt Champion (17/17/5)
LDT: BJ Mudgett (18/17/8)
RDT: Tommy Pieper (13/15/3)
OLB: Leon Roose (14/13/8)
MLB: Rufus Duke (17/16/10)
OLB: JR Farmer (13/12/9)
FS: JR Quinn (14/16/4)
SS: Joseph Swift (12/17/2)
CB: Christian Ferderer (17/19/4)
CB: BJ Carr (16/16/9)

Future Stars
LB: Phil West (11/19/2)
LB: Freddie Kobeski (9/19/1)
CB: Chuck Coleman (10/19/1)
CB: Ross Dawson (16/19/3)
T: Willie Guy (15/18/6)
T: Buddy Donovan (7/15/1)
G: Cory Corbett (9/17/1)
C: Cornell Flowers (13/16/3)
G: Harvey Gretzky (12/16/2)
DT: Dwayne James (11/15/2)
QB: Bucky Chapman (9/15/2)

On to the regular season!



[This message has been edited by Subby (edited 10-26-2000).]