Defensive end Myles Garrett typically addresses the Browns before games, but he stepped aside before they took on the Bengals on Sunday.
Garrett said he pointed at quarterback Baker Mayfield and gave him the chance to speak to the team after a long week spent focused on the end of wide receiver Odell Beckham’s run with the team. Garrett said that he believed it “was kind of important for him to talk to address the team and show that this is not bothering him.”
Once that was out of the way, Garrett said he was confident that Mayfield was going to have the kind of game that the Browns needed to get a win over their divisional rivals.
“There was no doubt. He’s mentally tough and he responds to things well,” Garrett said, via Marla Ridenour of the Akron Beacon Journal. “He responds to adversity well. I knew when he got out there, when he spoke to us before the game, that he was going to go out there and have a really good game.”
Mayfield was 14-of-21 for 218 yards and two touchdowns in the 41-16 win. One of the touchdowns was a 60-yarder to Donovan Peoples-Jones, who stepped into the spot Beckham used to fill in an offense that didn’t miss him at all on Sunday.