Sunday's Browns win was big albeit not very impressive. But all that matters is the playoffs are still in play for another week. When I played golf with my dad as a kid, if I hacked a drive, made a lousy second shot, a so-so chip, BUT made the putt, it was still a par.  And he would say, "Great job, it's golf not a beauty contest."   True, the result was fine, but the method was not.  You can't play good golf doing that on the regular and the same goes for the NFL. We were fortunate.

That was the Browns game Sunday.  They barely beat a completely depleted Ravens team at home and held on to win against a backup QB.  We won despite ourselves again.  It would sure be nice if this team played to its strengths one of these days and made things a bit less dramatic. In fairness, this game should have been about 34-10. But that's not the way we roll.  If it sounds like I expect a lot from this team, I do.  We all should, all great teams that have big things in mind should not accept moral wins or excuses anymore.  That era is over, it's time to be better.

Thanks to some breaks that went our way, and for an opposing head coach that for some reason made decisions that have probably cost them wins the past two weeks.  I mean, how on God's green earth can you go for two when going for one gets it to a one score game?  Thanks John.  Baffles me, and the entire football community. The Browns should send them a thank you card.  Also, in our defense we didn't run a stupid beer league play at a critical juncture.  So that was a positive.

But with all that, if we win Saturday at home against the Raiders, as we should, and the Ravens lose with Green Bay, suddenly we will be sharing first place in our division. Then we get Green Bay at Lambeau, followed by the Steelers and the Bengals. Can this be done? Yes, but there is one problem.  Right now, the Browns are not a playoff team in any way, but we can still change that.  Barely winning at home recently against bad, or beaten up opponents is not playoff caliber.  And neither is losing consistently to good and/or healthy teams.  But I get it, get in and lots of things can happen in a one game playoff.

Still here we are, very much alive and in the hunt even after all of the self-inflicted shenanigans of this year.  On a real positive, the defense has played well for over a month now, and that is crucial at this time of the year. Now, if they can just make better decisions on offense, things could get interesting.  To win going forward, they need to let their best players make big plays.  That's how great teams do it.  And for some reason we are the only team reluctant to do that. If we are going anywhere else this season, it all runs through Nick Chubb and Kareem Hunt, especially as cold weather and winter is coming.

It wasn't pretty, but we got it done Sunday.  Again, I said last week I didn't care if we won 3-2.  Same for this week.

GO BROWNS!