Cleveland Browns Training Camp Report: Thursday 8/6 Practice

Written by Daniel Wolf

This article was originally posted on Dawg Scooper: An Unofficial Cleveland Browns News Source.

To start, there will be an added feature in this article due to many requests to see some actual stats from the quarterback competition. Please understand the stats included in this article are not exact, but are pretty darn close to it.

Bad news first: Offensive lineman Rex Hadnot was injured and had to be carted off of the field.

At the start of practice, the players went through their normal warmups and stretching, then headed over to begin high-stepping drills.

What was entertaining is while other players were zig-zagging around, Rogers was just running straight every time, and the coaches didn't seem to really care that he wasn't doing the same techniques as the other players. Some of the crowd found this humorous.

A couple players had to run some laps during the practice like Paul Hubbard and Rod Hood, to name a few.

After that, the special teams were practicing their punt protection inside the five-yard line, then inside the 10.

Nick Sorenson did take a punt snap for a fake and took off without the players on the other side of the ball realizing it, gaining a good 10-15 yards on the fake.

Immediately after that, the coach that was posing as the punter took a snap and ran straight up the middle and gained a good 20 yards. The players, coaches, and fans were all laughing because it was just a joke. Dave Zastudil did the same on a punt fake later in the practice.

The next drill was a passing drill, which had the receivers against the defensive backs but without the offensive and defensive lines.

This drill was not tracking statistically, because without the lines, there is no rush and pressure and therefore would not have been an accurate representation of a real game experience.

Anyway, the passing drill was very exciting. There were multiple long bombs that went for touchdowns to Brian Robiskie, Braylon Edwards, Josh Cribbs and Lance Leggett.

There was another deep pass to Edwards where he had to jump up for the ball. He out-jumped the defender to come down with the catch, but unfortunately, he did not have both feet down in bounds.

Next, the team practiced the Wildcat formation, with Cribbs at quarterback and Brady Quinn spread outside at wide receiver. There were no passes to Quinn, so get that thought out of your mind right now.

Cribbs ran a good dozen snaps from the Wildcat, but they were mostly runs by him or a misdirection play where Cribbs handed off to the running back and they both went opposite ways to confuse the defense.

Now, the moment everyone is waiting for: The first set of 11-on-11 scrimmage.

First up is Quinn, who did not look good at all. He was not throwing the ball deeper than 20 yards and his timing seemed to be off. He finished with one completion on four attempts for eight yards and one pick to safety Brodney Pool.

Anderson did not look much better, and you could tell that as the practice went on, the more frustrated he got. He had one completion on four attempts for 10 yards and one interception to cornerback Rod Hood, who took it back for a touchdown.

Anderson was extremely angry with himself, and you could hear his anger from the crowd.

The brightest moment in the first round of 11-on-11 was rookie running back James Davis, who juked, bobbed, and weaved through the defense and ran the ball for about a 45-yard touchdown. He is the real deal.

Now, onto the 7-on-7 drills.

This was much better for both quarterbacks, with Quinn completing three of five passes for 40 yards, and Anderson connecting on all four of his passes for 36 yards.

Running back Jamal Lewis did fumble a short pass and had to run a lap, and Robiskie made yet another great catch over the middle of the field for about 20 yards.

The second set of 11-on-11 drills was a little better for the quarterbacks, but not by much. Quinn was 2-for-3 for 27 yards, while Anderson was 2-for-4 for 14 yards.

The final part of practice was the most disappointing not only for the fans, but probably for the coaches two: The 11-on-11 one-minute drill.

This was all bad for both guys.

Quinn went first. He had a pass to tight end Steve Heiden for eight yards, two incompletions, and on fourth down threw a completion to Heiden for five yards for a first down.

The problem was that Quinn took too much time on the previous plays and there were only 13 seconds left on the clock. On the next snap, Quinn found Heiden, but only for three yards, and Heiden fumbled, which the defense took for a score.

Overall, Quinn looked shaken and didn't even try to take a chance downfield.

Anderson wasn't any better. He was looking downfield, but after three incompletions in a row, it was fourth down, and he was sacked by rookie linebacker David Veikune.

Both quarterbacks looked pretty bad overall, and the stats do not lie.

On a final brighter note, Veikune was playing inside linebacker with the second-team defense. He was all over the field making many tackles and ended practice with that sack of Anderson.

(Next training camp practice to be covered will be Friday at 8:45 a.m.)