In the second quarter of Sunday’s Browns-Jets game, we published a post about the Browns shooting themselves in the foot by turning the ball over inside the 10-yard-line and missing a field goal to blow good opportunities to take their first lead of the 2017 season.
The Browns would repeat both of those errors before the half was out. DeShone Kizer was intercepted by Jets rookie safety Marcus Maye on the 2-yard-line and Zane Gonzalez missed a 39-yard field goal to ensure that the Browns would head into halftime without any points.
The Jets had a possession after Gonzalez’s second miss and it looked like they might be left without any points as well, but a couple of Josh McCown completions set up Chandler Catanzaro for a 57-yard field goal on the final play of the half. Catanzaro put it through and the Jets lead 3-0 despite being outgained 175-67 through the first 30 minutes of play.
While the Browns are no strangers to being on the wrong side of the scoreboard, this is a particularly painful Sunday to find themselves trailing. They’ve seen Myles Garrett debut with two sacks, Isaiah Crowell turn in his finest work of the season and Kizer make plays with his feet to keep drives alive, but they’re still losing and still unable to avoid the kind of mistakes that make any positives footnotes to the continued narrative of the Factory of Sadness.