Browns coach can sense forgotten man Johnny Manziel is frustrated
By now, we were supposed to be in full Johnny Manziel mode, either picking apart his mistakes or praising his incredible plays for the Cleveland Browns. Maybe both.
That hasn’t happened. Brian Hoyer has mostly played very well at quarterback, the Browns are 4-3 and Manziel has played five snaps in two games this season.
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It’s a pretty unusual story, of a highly-anticipated player (he topped the entire NFL in jersey sales this summer) barely seeing the field even though he’s healthy. It’s a bit ironic that among all the highly-touted quarterbacks it’s Manziel who is sitting as a rookie, considering he was the first freshman to win the Heisman Trophy.
Manziel has been fairly quiet. He hasn’t done many media interviews, and he hasn’t tweeted much (Manziel did tweet at 4:31 a.m. about a “Legendary night” on Monday morning, and Browns coach Mike Pettine said he didn’t know if Manziel “was still up or whether he was waking up early and getting ready to come into work,“) so he has mostly dropped out of our consciousness in the first half of the season while the NFL rolls on. It’s strange, considering how he dominated NFL chatter all offseason.
Pettine said he senses Manziel is frustrated he’s not playing, but that’s understandable.
“(T)hat’s a position that can be frustrating,” Pettine said, according to the Cleveland Plain Dealer. “To go from being the guy at (Texas) A&M, that’s a tough thing as the reality of the season has clearly set in. But at the same time, we make sure that he’s preparing like a starter. It can happen in the span of one play. You see it around the league all the time. He has to be ready to go, he has to be prepared and there’s no reason to think that he’s not.”
The Browns have a curious situation with Manziel. They traded up to get him in the first round, so they like his talent. But at this point, with one passing attempt, no rushes and a reception on a trick play that was wiped out because of a penalty, the Browns haven’t seen him play significantly in the regular season. Hoyer is a free agent after the season. The Browns would like to know what they have in Manziel before the offseason, but that might be impossible.
Pettine said Manziel has “certainly shown flashes” of being an NFL quarterback, presumably meaning in preseason games or practice, but the team won’t know until he gets meaningful time.
“I think we all do (wonder how he’ll do),” said Pettine. “I mean, that’s a question that we need to have answered but it’s not something that you can force. Brian’s our starting quarterback. That’s a difficult thing to say let’s just go ahead and.. all the games are meaningful now. If it ever gets to the point whether we’re potentially up big, down big, or if there’s a situation that calls for him to go in, we’ll get an opportunity to see him, but there’s a lot of football left to be played. You’re looking for an evaluation at some point, but what I’m saying is I don’t think you can force it.”
Of the top four quarterbacks selected in last year’s NFL draft, Manziel is the only one who is not his team’s starter yet. Even Zach Mettenberger, the Tennessee Titans’ sixth-round pick, is getting his shot to start.
If Manziel is frustrated, as Pettine said he senses his rookie quarterback is, it’s natural and understandable. But it doesn’t look like he’ll be getting on the field for significant snaps anytime soon this season.
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Frank Schwab is the editor of Shutdown Corner on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter! Follow @YahooSchwab
