CLEVELAND — Four games into the season, the Browns are 3-1. That sentence would have sounded absurd a month ago.
Cleveland’s 27-24 win over Pittsburgh Thursday night was far from perfect, but it may have been the Browns’ most impressive victory yet. They built a double-digit halftime lead, survived injuries (and far too many penalties), watched the Steelers erase an eight-point lead in the final two minutes, and still found a way to win on Andre Szmyt’s 56-yard field goal.
There was plenty of good, some potentially concerning bad, and enough ugly yellow laundry to make Todd Monken lose sleep during the Browns’ extended weekend.
The Good: Hot Starts
The Browns are 3-1 for the first time since 2021, which is something nobody saw coming after Cleveland was embarrassed, 34-10, in Jacksonville to open the season. Instead of allowing that loss to define the start of the year, the Browns have responded with three consecutive wins over Tampa Bay, Carolina, and Pittsburgh.
Thursday night also showed exactly why starting quickly matters. The Browns were not particularly impressive in the first quarter, as Pittsburgh dominated possession, marched 78 yards on a 17-play opening drive, and took a 7-0 lead while Cleveland’s offense went nowhere on its first two possessions.
Then the second quarter happened.
Denzel Ward intercepted Aaron Rodgers early in the period, Jaleel McLaughlin scored four plays later, and Cleveland suddenly caught fire. Quinshon Judkins added a touchdown, Deshaun Watson found Harold Fannin Jr. for another, and the Browns scored 21 unanswered points before Pittsburgh added a late field goal to make it 21-10 at halftime.
That cushion ended up being everything. Cleveland scored only six points in the second half while Pittsburgh eventually fought all the way back to tie the game at 24, and had the Browns started Thursday the way they did in Jacksonville, this probably would have looked a lot more like Week 1 than a dramatic division victory.
Instead, Cleveland built itself enough room to survive. Four weeks into the season, the Browns are 3-1. It's wild to type that, but it's true. The Cleveland Browns are 3-1.
The Bad: Injuries
The biggest concern coming out of Thursday night has to be Mason Graham.
Graham suffered a knee injury during Pittsburgh’s opening possession and was eventually ruled out for the remainder of the game. His status going forward remains unclear, but losing him for any significant amount of time would be a major blow to a defensive front that has quickly become one of Cleveland’s strengths.
The second-year defensive tackle entered Thursday with four sacks through three games and was coming off a dominant performance against Carolina. His ability to collapse the pocket from the interior has helped make life much easier for the rest of Cleveland’s pass rush.
Graham was not the only defensive player to leave the game. Mike Hall Jr. suffered an ankle injury late in the first half, returned in the second half, and still managed to sack Rodgers despite clearly playing through discomfort. Grant Delpit and Tyson Campbell also briefly left during Pittsburgh’s fourth-quarter comeback before returning.
The good news is most of those players made it back onto the field. The bad news is Graham did not. And with Cleveland suddenly off to a 3-1 start, his health becomes one of the biggest things to watch over the next week.
The Ugly: Penalties
This has to stop.
Cleveland was penalized 14 times for 88 yards Thursday night, just four days after being flagged 12 times for 85 yards against Carolina. That is 26 penalties for 173 yards in two games, and somehow the Browns won both of them.
The flags against Pittsburgh came in just about every variety imaginable: offensive holding, false starts, defensive holding, illegal contact, roughing the passer, neutral-zone infractions, and defensive pass interference. Some extended Pittsburgh drives, while others backed up Cleveland’s offense.
One of the most damaging came with 1:51 remaining, when defensive pass interference gave Pittsburgh first-and-goal at the 3 and helped set up the touchdown and two-point conversion that tied the game.
The Browns survived because they built an 11-point halftime lead, forced two turnovers, got enough stops defensively, and had a kicker capable of drilling a 56-yarder when everything came down to one swing of the leg. That is not a sustainable formula.
At 3-1, it is no longer ridiculous to talk about Cleveland playing meaningful football as the season moves along. The Browns have earned that conversation, but if they want to keep having it, the penalties have to come down dramatically.
Sooner or later, 14 flags are going to turn a game Cleveland should win into one it gives away. Thursday night, they got away with it.
