Browns’ 0-16 season maybe isn’t *quite* as depressing as it sounds

Cleveland has some young talent and four very high draft picks waiting.

You did it, Browns. You managed to get worse after a 1-15 season.

Cleveland sealed the league’s second-ever 0-16 season Sunday, falling to the Steelers in its season finale and matching the 2008 Lions on the league’s barren landscape of ultimate futility. Hue Jackson’s club has won just one of its last 35 games, posting the worst three-year span in NFL history while burning through seven different starting quarterbacks.

It was a brutal loss in an even more brutal season, but there is balm in Gilead, and 2018’s healing process can set the foundation for a turnaround on the shore of Lake Erie.

The 2017 Browns were a young team with no identity besides failure, but the roots of success are buried deep beneath the losses, lack of leadership, and general instability that haunts the franchise. While this team’s tortured history makes it impossible to say for sure next year will be better — even after a winless season — there are still several reasons that allow for a little guarded optimism in Cleveland.

The Browns have a new, angry, and competent general manager in place

Sashi Brown’s tenure in Cleveland was defined by his ability to amass assets without turning them into on-field production. His trades and signings put a high premium on potential, but his talent evaluation failed to pay off, leading to a 1-27 record in his nearly two-year tenure. He was fired on Dec. 7, clearing a path for John Dorsey to take over.

Dorsey’s been extremely motivated in his regime change, even if that’s meant retaining Jackson in what appears to be an elaborate practical joke. It took him less than a week to trash Brown’s personnel moves, saying the old regime “didn’t get real players.” His first move as general manager was to cut Kenny Britt, a $17 million offseason investment who managed 18 catches with the team.

Whether Dorsey’s assessment is overly harsh or not, he’s a polished NFL executive with a track record of success — albeit a limited one. The former Packers linebacker spent four seasons as the Chiefs general manager, building a roster that would reach the playoffs in three of his four seasons at the helm. While Kansas City’s lack of postseason success would lead to the two sides parting ways this June (after he set the nucleus of another AFC West-winning roster), just getting to the playoffs would be a major step forward for Cleveland.

He’s responsible for drafting players like Tyreek Hill, Travis Kelce, Marcus Peters, D.J. Alexander, Chris Jones, and Kareem Hunt for the Chiefs. That’s good news for the Browns, because ...

Cleveland has two top-five draft picks waiting in 2018

The Browns have had multiple opportunities to select their franchise quarterback the past two years, but strategically traded down to amass draft picks and take a shotgun approach to the draft. In the span of two major trades, here’s who they missed out on:

• Carson Wentz
• Deshaun Watson
• Jehu Chesson

That’s a pair of quarterbacks who would have competed for an MVP award in 2017 had their knees not rebelled against them this fall. Also, fourth-rounder Chesson snuck in there. Here’s who Cleveland received in return, in many cases by trading down further from the picks they’d acquired in the first place:

• Corey Coleman
• Shon Coleman
• DeShone Kizer
• Cody Kessler
• Derrick Kindred
• Spencer Drango
• Ricardo Louis
• Jordan Payton
• Jabrill Peppers
• a 2018 first-round pick
• a 2018 second-round pick

You have to sift through pounds and pounds of silt to get to a few gold flakes there, and the immediate lesson should be for Cleveland to hold tight and pay the premium for a top-tier QB prospect. While that may be reactionary — successful teams like the Patriots have thrived trading back and relying on a cache of later-round draftees rather than one or two elites — it’s likely the only way to appease a fan base more checked out than a John Grisham novel at a Boca Raton library.

The good news comes from those last two bullet points. Thanks to Watson’s injury and Houston’s subsequent bottoming out, the Browns will have the No. 4 pick in the draft, in addition to their No. 1 pick. According to our draft expert Dan Kadar, that would return an elite quarterback (UCLA’s Josh Rosen or Heisman winner Baker Mayfield), an elite pass rusher or safety (NC State’s Bradley Chubb or Alabama’s Minkah Fitzpatrick) and still leave room for NCAA game-changers like Damien Harris, Rashaan Evans, or Bryce Love at the top of the second round.

That’s a king’s ransom without even having to trade down this year. Dorsey can turn that into a handful of players who can contribute right away. But they won’t be alone.

There’s talent in the team’s young core

Myles Garrett, despite injuries, has looked worthy of being 2017’s No. 1 overall pick when he was on the field. He led the team in sacks (seven) despite making just nine starts this fall and often being the focus of opposing team’s blocking schemes. He’s joined on a front line that includes useful pieces like Manny Ogbah and Danny Shelton.

Behind them, Christian Kirksey and Joe Schobert have been solid for an overtaxed and understaffed group of linebackers — a group that will improve if it ever gets a full season from former Pro Bowler Jamie Collins. Jabrill Peppers and Larry Ogunjobi remain lottery ticket combinations of potential and inconsistency, but they have the talent to emerge as reliable starters over time.

The offense is in worse shape. Cleveland has three quarterbacks aged 25 or younger, and none of them — DeShone Kizer, Kevin Hogan, or Cody Kessler — has proved to be even moderately below average in 2017. Coleman should be a yards-after-catch machine, but he can’t stay healthy; he’s played in only 20 of the team’s 32 games since being drafted. He also infamously dropped the pass that sealed the Browns’ 0-16 fate. No wide receiver finished the season with more than 400 receiving yards.

But there’s still pieces with which this team can work. Duke Johnson and Isaiah Crowell have teamed up as a formidable tailback platoon — the 24-year-olds had 1,201 rushing yards and 102 receptions between them. The club’s receiving corps has been bolstered by the return of Josh Gordon, whose substance abuse problems have kept him from the field repeatedly over the last three seasons. While he’s not reliable, he’ll certainly be fresh in 2018 after playing just 10 games in the last four seasons.

And while he isn’t young, All-Pro staple Joe Thomas might remain a Brown. Thomas has the chance to opt out of his contract this offseason and escape to a team with more than four wins over the last three seasons, but he’s been Cleveland’s most loyal supporter throughout an 11-season career. While a torn tricep cut his ironman streak at just over 10,000 snaps, a potential 2018 return would protect the blindside of whomever winds up starting at quarterback.

Thomas, for what it’s worth, is optimistic:

Even so, they’re still the 0-16 Browns

There are, of course, still reasons to be worried about this team aside from the recency bias of 19 years of terrible results. Hue Jackson, statistically the worst NFL coach to ever last an entire season or more, has earned owner Jimmy Haslam’s trust and will allegedly return for a third year at the helm. Haslam, a shrewd businessman whose truck stop monolith is currently on trial for massive fraud, may not be the dynamo needed to revive a long-comatose franchise.

Those issues extend onto the field and even to players who aren’t yet Browns. As much as the team wants a franchise quarterback, it will also have to find one who wants them back. Sam Darnold and Josh Rosen, the potential No. 1a and 1b of this year’s QB crop, have each made headlines with reports they want nothing to do with Cleveland. Dorsey’s response so far has been the “well I don’t like you either” card, and there’s still months to go before the issue gets sorted out.

So much of the team’s improvement will count on developing talent and creating an environment that fosters the young players who are paramount to the team’s success. While it’s easy to get excited about the Brown’s upcoming draft haul, any good feelings should be immediately tempered by a list of recent first-round picks that includes busts like Johnny Manziel, Justin Gilbert, Brandon Weeden, Trent Richardson, Barkevious Mingo, Phil Taylor, and Coleman. The team hasn’t drafted a Pro Bowler since 2011 (Jordan Cameron).

And that’s the cycle of Browns fandom. Being consistently bad is painful enough, but to truly suffer you need to have a brief look at a successful future ripped away like razor blades falling from the sky. The 2018 version of this team will have the weaponry available to end this viciously repeating cycle — even if history suggests those picks and that potential will all be for naught.

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A look at just how bad the Browns have been