Browns Reaching Their Peak at Just the Right Time : AFC Central Champions Have Overcome the Death of Don Rogers, Several Key Injuries

Think of the Cleveland Browns and the images are sharp: You have Bernie, the Ice Cube and that horseshoe stadium that invites demonic winds in from Lake Erie.

But perhaps now is the time to broaden the scope. Most of all, the Browns are resilient. They waffled the Bengals, 34-3, on Dec. 14 at Cincinnati’s Riverfront Stadium to rise to 11-4, winning the AFC Central Division title for the second consecutive season and raising eyebrows across the league. They then finished off the regular season in style by finishing off San Diego, 47-17, last Sunday. The Browns will finish as the pre-eminent team in the American conference with the home-field advantage throughout the playoffs.

This is pretty heady stuff for Coach Marty Schottenheimer’s team, which, before Sunday, didn’t have a receiver in the league’s top 40 or a running back in the top 25.

“I see the same things in this team that we had in 1982,” said the Browns’ kicker of three weeks, Mark Moseley, referring to the Washington Redskins’ Super Bowl-winning season. Sensing his new team’s rising pulse, Moseley added, “I have room on my other hand for a Super Bowl ring.”

But to fully comprehend the magnitude of the Browns’ accomplishments this season you have to realize the obstacles they have overcome. Their mean-hitting free safety, Don Rogers, died last summer of cocaine intoxication, a loss that tore at the roots of the organization. Their strong safety, Al Gross, broke his ankle in the season opener, was lost for 10 weeks before recently returning in a reserve role. Their two 1,000-yard running backs from last season, Kevin Mack and the still-sidelined Earnest Byner, have been alternating injuries and have played together for the equivalent of less than two games all season. And their dependable kicker of eight years, Matt Bahr, suffered what may be a career-ending knee injury in Week 12.

By all rights, the Browns’ world should have gone to pieces. Instead, they’ve gone straight to the top. They sent packing veteran linebacker Tom Cousineau and brought in, as replacements, Anthony Griggs from Philadelphia and Mike Johnson from the U.S. Football League. They made linebacker Sam Clancy, a former basketball and USFL player, a weight-room project, and he has panned out just fine with 5 1/2 sacks and 53 tackles, and they gave a ninth life to 34-year-old pass rusher Carl Hairston, who has responded with 7 1/2 sacks.

They have received supreme fill-in-the-blank performances from running back Curtis Dickey (for Byner), free safety Chris Rockins (for Rogers), strong safety Ray Ellis (for Gross) and Moseley (for Bahr), who has converted four of five field-goal attempts. The Browns also possess arguably the finest pair of cornerbacks in the league, two haughty, come-at-us, bump-and-runners named Frank Minnifield and Hanford Dixon.

“Hanford and Mini definitely don’t have an inferiority complex,” Browns’ nose tackle Bob Golic said.

Gerald McNeil, also known as the Ice Cube, arrived from the USFL this season to become the first player in the NFL since the Washington Redskins’ Tony Green in 1978 to return a punt and a kickoff for a touchdown in the same season, before an accumulation of pounding on his 146-pound frame seemed to make his numbers melt some.

Yet, club owner Art Modell said this week that quarterback Bernie Kosar “is the one person who has galvanized it all, who has served as the catalyst. In my 26 years, I’ve never seen a quarterback grow in stature game by game, pass by pass, as Bernie has. It gets back to his native intellect. If he hadn’t graduated (from the University of Miami) early, he’d be playing against Penn State in a couple weeks.”

Kosar, just 23 and in his second pro season, is hardly the paragon of quarterbacks. He has a unique sidearm delivery that has produced 15 scoring passes, two 400-yard efforts this season and an average of 240 yards passing per game. His mobility is slack, but he has proven evasive, anyway.

Furthermore, Kosar is famous in the locker room for his humble nature. His idol is former Brown quarterback Brian Sipe, and how much more humble can you get than that?

As his rough edges are smoothed out by offensive coordinator Lindy Infante, Kosar spreads his passes around to a band of unknown receivers named Brian Brennan, Webster Slaughter, Clarence Weathers and Herman Fontenot, guys who, according to Weathers, call Kosar “just plain B.K.”

Mostly, though, Kosar is smart. That, above all, accounts for his league-low 2.0% interception rate (10 in 503 passes). “I knew from day one that Bernie was going to be a great one,” said Gary Danielson, the Browns’ 10-year quarterback who is ready to come off the injured list. “The coaches put a play on the board in the meeting room and I was ready to ask the question, ‘What type of flare control do we have?’

“But Bernie asked the question first. Here’s a guy who is just out of college, and he took the words right out of my mouth.”

A pin was removed from Byner’s ankle last week and some in the organization say it’s conceivable, although not likely, he could be back by the playoffs. Byner is the one-time 10th-round draft pick who caught 45 passes and ran for 1,002 yards last season when he defined the Browns’ fighting spirit.

Meanwhile, the city of Cleveland slowly seems to be taking note of the Browns and especially of Kosar. One Cleveland cab driver, a self-proclaimed Browns fan for life, recently put it this way: “See, the Browns have had the best guys ever at certain positions. You can check it out. They had Jim Brown at running back and, way before him, they had Marion Motley. Bobby Mitchell was the all-time great as the running back-flanker. They had Lou Groza as a kicker and Ozzie Newsome, one of the greatest ever at tight end, and Otto Graham as a quarterback. I think Bernie Kosar could replace him some day.

“And maybe that kick returner they got could be a great, too,” he added, “that guy, what’s his name, the Iceberg?”