All good things must come to an end. Josh Cribbs has now ended his “keeping his mouth closed” philosophy and is now on the offensive. The problem is that it can become offensive in a very short period of time to football fans struggling to pay their mortgage or just buy groceries. Now don’t get me wrong. I believe Cribbs deserves a substantial pay increase and is easily the best player on the Browns. However, he is for the most part a punt/kick returner who also plays a little wide receiver. He’s not a guy you build an offense around. And with Mike Holmgren now the President of football operations you have to figure the Wildcat isn’t at the top of his priority list of offensive sets to fill.
Cribbs has decided going on ESPN radio and television along with other networks is the way to put pressure on the Browns to sign him. I’m not sure if this is the best strategy. Frustration has obviously won out over common sense. The latter tells you that Holmgren wants to get his new GM in place and get situated before dealing with Cribbs. It also tells you that since Cribbs is under contract, a deal is also not the end all be all for the Browns at this moment. Josh Cribbs has been the perfect example of work hard, keep you mouth closed and be an example on and off the field. His story is one that no doubt will be told on NFL films one day. A guy who was undrafted out of college, got an opportunity and took advantage of it, worked his ass off and is now in the Hall of Fame as the greatest returner ever. Sounds like a great story and one that I think is still possible. What is also possible is the situation souring and Holmgren deciding to play hardball- forcing Cribbs to say things he’s surely kept to himself. A dicey path to go down.
I just hope this isn’t the first step towards that dreaded cliff a lot of players find themselves at when money takes over reasoning. Hopefully Cribbs remains one of the rare good guys in football and has this situation taken care of–soon. -DM

This entry was posted on Tuesday, January 12th, 2010 at 1:25 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.