CLEVELAND — Halloween seems to come early when young NFL quarterbacks play the New England Patriots.
The Cleveland Browns are expecting “a tremendous challenge” from the Patriots, and nowhere is that more daunting than in preparing quarterback Baker Mayfield to face a vaunted defense that has a penchant for forcing young signal-callers into turnovers.
The Patriots are undefeated in their last 20 games against first and second-year quarterbacks, and in their most recent outing, a 33-0 win over the New York Jets on Monday Night Football, they generated four interceptions against Sam Darnold.
“When you start talking about quarterback play, everything’s about putting pressure on the quarterback and making him make decisions before he’s ready to make them, and they do an excellent job, the best in the league of doing that,” Browns coach Freddie Kitchens said.
“It was evident the other night. They continued to put pressure on the quarterback, and that’s the name of the game in defensive football. They challenge you. They play man coverage. They make you win one-on-one matchups, and then, they get the ball out of the quarterback’s hands as quick as possible from their pressures.”
During the lopsided loss to the Patriots, Darnold was caught on camera on the sideline saying he was “seeing ghosts” on the field, which meant he could not find throwing windows to get the ball to his playmakers while thinking a defender would be in the passing lanes.
Kitchens is doing what he can to have Mayfield avoid making the same mistakes as Darnold.
“We’ve got to take care of ourselves in not turning the ball over and giving them easy access to the football,” Kitchens said. “If we do that, we’ll be okay, but they do a tremendous job of making the ball come out of the quarterback’s hands before it’s ready to come out, so you have to be precise with your routes, you have to be precise with your decision-making.
“All of the things that a quarterback is taught to do, they speed up that process for him very quickly. That’s what you strive to do defensively. To me, the numbers are more than staggering. They’re on a record pace and a pace that I don’t know if it’ll ever be matched.”
The Patriots have generated four interceptions in a game three times in just seven outings this year and already find themselves more than halfway to the record-setting franchise mark of 31 set in the 1964 season.
And throwing interceptions is something Mayfield has struggled with this season.
Mayfield has completed 112 of his 198 attempts (56.6 percent) for 1,496 yards and five touchdowns, but of his 86 incompletions, 11 have been intercepted.
“You strive every week to make your quarterback comfortable in the things you are calling and try to make him comfortable in the things he sees and where his eyes go and things like that,” Kitchens said.
“New England does a tremendous job -- I am not going to comment too much on what was said there -- but I know they do a tremendous job of affecting the quarterback, and you try to eliminate that as much as possible.”