Cleveland Browns: QB job not dependent on ‘finger’ fiasco
By Cory Buck
Johnny Manziel is a polarizing figure to begin with, which means when he flips the bird to an opposing bench during a nationally televised game, people are going to notice and react.
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Cleveland Browns head coach Mike Pettine told the MMQB that despite his disappointment in rookie QB Johnny Manziel’s ‘bird flip’ toward the Washington Redskins bench, Manziel’s actions won’t have an impact on the race for the starting job between him and Brian Hoyer.
Unfortunately, the play of both quarterbacks make this an even murkier decision as neither distinguished themselves in a positive way. Manziel finished 7-for-16 with 65 yards and 1 touchdown against the second-string Redskins defense, struggling mightily against Washingtons first string, while Hoyer started the game and went 2-for-6 for 16 yards against the ‘ones’.
Ultimately, this competition will be won by the better quarterback in the last two preseason games. As much as fans want to pump up certain aspects of Manziel as a detriment or a positive, these factors don’t really don’t affect his spiral, and that’s what Pettine really cares about.
“Neither guy really distinguished himself tonight,” Pettine said, “and we’ll have to go back and study the tape and figure out who to go with. I will lean on [offensive coordinator] Kyle Shanahan and [quarterback coach] Dowell Loggains quite a bit, because they’ve watched them every day.’’