The payoff: A rare trip to the playoffs
The irony is not lost on anyone, especially Joe Flacco.
Tonight in Cleveland, the quarterback that almost nobody wanted for most of the 2023 NFL season has a chance to lead the one team that did into the playoffs – by beating his former team.
You can’t make this stuff up.
Tonight, the 38-year-old Flacco, who has become an instant folk hero in Cleveland for halting the Browns’ revolving door at the quarterback position this year at four, can, for only the third time in this century, clinch a spot in the playoffs for the Browns by leading Cleveland to a win over the New York Jets – Flacco’s former team.
Prior to being ostracized for most of this season by NFL teams – even the quarterback-needy ones – Flacco had spent the previous three years with the Jets. It was with the Jets, in the second game of the 2022 season, that Flacco, with his team trailing by 13 points, threw two touchdown passes in the last 84 seconds of the game to beat the Browns 31-30.
Tonight in Cleveland, Flacco, now wearing a Browns uniform, will try to beat the team that his current team couldn’t beat a year ago. Given all the quarterback woes the Jets have had this season, it’s curious that they never called the out-of-work Flacco, who spent most of this season waiting for his phone to ring.
“There’s all kinds of things that happen throughout the course of the season and offseason,” Flacco said. “I enjoyed my time while I was there (with the Jets), and it is what it is. I’m happy to be where I am, that’s for sure.”
The Browns are happy that Flacco is happy where he is as well. In his four starts for Cleveland since being signed as a free agent on November 20, Flacco has thrown more touchdown passes (10) than the Browns’ other three quarterbacks – Deshaun Watson, Dorian Thompson-Robinson, and P.
