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Gregg Williams: Baker Mayfield has sparked confidence within Browns’ locker room

Interim coach Gregg Williams believes the Cleveland Browns' confidence comes from quarterback Baker Mayfield.
Credit: Ken Blaze
Cleveland Browns quarterback Baker Mayfield (6) throws a pass during the first quarter against the Carolina Panthers at FirstEnergy Stadium in Cleveland, Ohio.

During his days at the University of Oklahoma, quarterback Baker Mayfield was known as a fiery leader who was not afraid to speak his mind or stand at the front of the line and be a leader for his teammates, and the Sooners certainly rallied behind him, winning the Big 12 Championship and making it to the College Football Playoff following the 2017 season.

Mayfield brought that mindset with him to the Cleveland Browns, and interim coach Gregg Williams believes that passion has bred confidence within the locker room for a team that has won three of their last four games and remain in the hunt for the AFC Playoffs with a 5-7-1 record and three games left in the regular season.

“I think an awful lot of it does come from him,” Williams said. “That would not happen if it was phony. It only happens when everybody sees it being sincere. One of the things that we have talked about for a long time is that leadership comes by example first and voice second.

“Your body language speaks so loud that you can’t hear anything else that anybody else says that comes out of their mouth. He does a really good job with that. I think it starts to bleed or come down to move the team that way. I think it is good.”

Mayfield led the way to Cleveland’s third victory in the last four outings by completing 18 of his 22 throws for 238 yards and one touchdown without a turnover and was sacked only once for a six-yard loss in their 26-20 win over the Carolina Panthers at FirstEnergy Stadium Sunday.

Since taking over the first-team offense in the second quarter of a Week 3 win over the New York Jets, Mayfield has completed 242 of his 376 attempts (64.4 percent) for 2,877 yards and 19 touchdowns against 10 interceptions, which has earned him a 93.4 quarterback rating.

“His arm strength is outstanding,” Williams said. “His accuracy is outstanding.

“It probably won’t be hidden anymore after that first play of the game because that was a rocket and that was a long throw, and it is a long throw on the money. In practices, we have seen longer throws and we have seen even more accurate throws that other people have not seen yet, so not surprised at all because we have seen it in practice.”

Mayfield has the most touchdown passes and third-most passing yards ever by a Browns rookie quarterback and was the first signal-caller since Brandon Weeden in 2012 to throw for 60-yard gains in consecutive games.

Additionally, Mayfield is on pace to break the Browns’ franchise record for passing yards by a rookie, but none of that has come as a surprise to Williams.

“Everything that we saw in college on him and the things that we did, all of the background searches and all of the background studying that we did on him, it does not shock me, no,” Williams said. “He has worked extremely hard for his success. It is not something that has just happened by happenstance.

“The amount of work that he puts in does not shock us that he also takes it to the ball game because he works extremely hard to have an overall understanding of every aspect of the game. That does not come easy.”

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