The Browns Defense is Championship Caliber

The Browns defense has been dominant through the first 3 weeks of the season. Cleveland leads the NFL in points allowed (32), which includes 14 points that came via their own offense.

Under new defensive coordinator Jim Schwartz, this has been an aggressive unit. I’m not just talking about their blitz and man coverage frequencies (which both hover around the top-10). It’s a defense that is constantly attacking in everything they do. They tackle aggressively. They shoot gaps. They swarm the ball carrier. They have speed and talent at all three levels.

It all starts with Myles Garrett, though. Arguably the best pass rusher in the league, Garrett already has 4.5 sacks on the season. 3.5 of those came against the Titans in Week 3.

Below, you can see how badly he beat and then broke Tennessee’s offense.

For much of the afternoon, Garrett saw 1-on-1’s against left tackle Andre Dillard. That didn’t end well for the Titans:

It wasn’t always by choice that Tennessee left Garrett in so many 1-on-1’s. Often times, the Browns forced them into it with their fronts. On this next example, notice how Ogbo Okoronkwo (#54) was aligned outside the left tackle, with Garrett aligned outside of him:

That put Garrett on an island against Dillard with a great angle to the quarterback:

The Titans did try to provide help on Garrett at times. Below, they used a tight end to chip him. He still ended up getting a half sack:

Tennessee even got to a point where they had two tight ends follow Garrett everywhere he went:

The Titans were forced to use a timeout as the playclock expired there.

Even when Garrett wasn’t getting quarterback Ryan Tannehill to the ground, he was still able to derail the Titans offense.