Plenty of Cleveland Browns’ fans flooded out of First Energy Stadium in the third quarter of their 31-7 loss to the AFC North rival Cincinnati Bengals, particularly at the point where the Browns trailed 31-0. And as Mary Kay Cabot of The Cleveland Plain Dealer writes, Browns’ head coach Hue Jackson said afterwards he understands why the fans left:
“It pains me. It does,” Jackson said after Sunday’s 31-7 loss to the Bengals at FirstEnergy Stadium. “I see it all. I saw everything here today because we all want to give them what they deserve. We didn’t today. I understand our fans leaving. I probably would have, too. We weren’t playing good enough. I respect that.
“Hopefully, they’ll be back next week. We have a big game against New York. I know our guys. We are going to go back to work on Monday, and they are going to get ready to play a big time game here at home. We need to give our fans and our football team what they deserve, which is an opportunity to win. That’s what we are trying to do.”
Here’s video of Jackson’s comments, which also includes him saying “This was as bad as we’d played all year”:
The loss dropped Cleveland to 0-4 this season and 1-19 in Jackson’s tenure. So yeah, there hasn’t been a lot for Browns’ fans to be happy about watching recently, and it is understandable why many left in the third quarter. The more amazing thing may be that they showed up to watch this game and this team in the first place.
