Having played at That School Up North, you'd think that Braylon Edwards would have little problem fitting in with the Cleveland Browns.

 But Edwards has been having a rough couple of weeks.  First he charters a helicopter against the advice of coaches and teammates so he could take in the OSU-Michigan game from the sidelines on the 18th and eventually turning up late to team meetings the night before the Steelers game - a game for which he all but guaranteed a win.

Then he blindsides his teammate DB Brian Russell with a comment about a clean hit that Russell made on Bengals WR Chad Johnson during the first game with Cincy this year.  What could be next?  How about a sideline flair up caught by network TV cameras and by every beat writer in the pressbox during the second Cincy game.  Yeah, it's been a rough couple weeks and Edwards has no one to blame but himself.

When Phil Savage selected him in the first round 18 months ago, the pick was a no-brainer.  However, the minute I saw a story on one of the cable networks about how Edwards planned to market himself into millions, I could tell that there were other priorities in his life.  The axiom used to be:  play the game to the best of your abilities and the cash from endorsements and acclaim would follow.

Not so in this ESPN driven world.  Everyone wants to make their endorsement dollars now - not later.  Athletes want the acclaim now, not later, despite what they do on the field.  And if you don't perform on the field and you raise a rancor, you can expect the team to cover for you.  That's the impression I got in Berea this morning as General Manager Phil Savage came out to talk to the media for his State of the Browns address. All we heard (you can listen here) from Savage and later Coach Romeo Crennel (listen here) is that the Edwards situation is being handled internally. Great. 

Edwards would be wise to take a lesson from one of his teammates - Kellen Winslow Jr., who has been downright affable in recent months.  He's let his play on the field do the talking for him.  The result:  if he keeps doing it, all of his past transgressions will be forgiven, and many of them may have been already.

Edwards has five games this season to show why the Browns drafted him.

This entry was posted on Thursday, November 30th, 2006 at 1:45 pm and is filed under Cleveland Browns, football, sports. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.