Johnny Manziel explains laughing on sidelines when Browns were losing

Johnny Manziel has dealt with a mini-controversy this week after cameras caught him laughing on the sidelines while his Cleveland Browns were trailing 28-3 to the Tennessee Titans during Week 5.

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Manziel has now spoken up on the matter and is defending himself to Cleveland.com:

"“I guess when things are kind of going that bad, you can almost — instead of getting mad — you kind of have to laugh it off every now and then,” Manziel told cleveland.com. “Luckily for us, we turned it around, and the outcome was a lot better than it was then.”"

So why was Manziel laughing? Well, even he doesn’t know.

"Manziel said he doesn’t recall exactly what he and practice-squad quarterback Connor Shaw were talking about that Manziel found funny at that particular moment.“It was something maybe a play that happened a series before or something with our offense — or maybe just something me and Connor were talking about,” he said. “It definitely didn’t have anything to do with the play that just happened or the current situation.”"

Luckily for Manziel, the Browns eventually came back to beat the Titans 29-28. Manziel has caught some heat for his laughing, but the noise certainly would have been louder had Cleveland lost.

Regardless, this is the sort of thing Manziel will catch flak for, despite it being completely innocent and unworthy of criticism. Players are likely laughing on the sidelines all the time, but Manziel, because of his high-profile, always has a camera on him. That can lead to ridiculous controversies such as this.

The Browns drafted Manziel in the first-round of the 2014 NFL Draft out of Texas A&M, but he has seen limited playing time this season with Brian Hoyer playing well as Cleveland’s starting quarterback.