Happy Holidays Browns fans, welcome to week 13 of the season. This week the 3-8 Browns will play their second consecutive nationally televised game as they travel to Denver’s Empower Field at Mile High to take on the 7-5 Denver Broncos on Monday Night Football, game time is 7:15 CST. Unfortunately our usual meeting place, Burke’s Public House will be closed for Monday’s game. The Browns will be trying to win their second consecutive game for the first time this season and raise their record to 3-2 with Jameis Winston as the starting QB. The Browns will probably be without 3 starters for the game as WR Cedric Tillman, S Juan Thornhill and LT Jedrick Wills Jr. didn’t practice all week. In contrast, the Broncos have remained remarkably healthy this season, of their 22 starters 16 have played in 12 of their games. The Browns offense will be facing one of its biggest challenges of the season against a Denver defense that’s ranked #1 allowing opponents just 4.7 yards per play, #1 in red zone defense allowing TD’s on 39.4% of red zone possessions and #2 in scoring defense giving up only 16.8 points per game. Last Thursday night the Browns offensive line played extremely well, allowing only 1 sack against the third ranked Pittsburgh defense. Monday night they’ll need to be even better at protecting Jameis Winston against a Broncos front 7 that leads the NFL with 44 sacks and a 9.6% sack rate that’s third highest in the league. In his 6 games this season Jameis Winston has completed 62.2% of his passes, averaging 7.4 yards per pass with 7 TD’s against 4 interceptions for a QB rating of 88.5. However when pressured Winston’s completion rate drops to 47.2% while his average time to throw increases from 2.3 seconds when not pressured to 3.5 seconds when pressured. Despite averaging the third lowest yards per rushing attempt at 3.9 yards, the Browns will need to continue to run the ball to set up their play action passing game. When using play action, Winston averages 13.3 yards per pass with 3 TD’s against no interceptions for an outstanding QB rating of 137.5. The Denver offense has been led all season by their first round draft pick rookie QB Bo Nix. After a slow start in the first 3 weeks of the season when he threw 4 interceptions with no TD’s Nix has steadily improved, throwing only 2 interceptions since week 3 with 16 TD passes. Overall, Nix has completed almost 65% of his passes averaging 6.4 yards per pass for a QB rating of 89.9. Nix likes to get the ball out quickly with an average time to throw of 3 seconds. However, when pressured his completion rate drops to 44.3% and his time to throw increases to 3.9 seconds yielding a QB rating of 55.9. Currently the Browns defense has the 5th highest sack rate at 9% and Myles Garrett is 3rd in the NFL with 10 sacks. Denver’s big receiving group will present a unique challenge for the Browns defensive backfield. They are all at least 6’4” and over 215 lbs and when pressured Nix likes to just throw the ball up to them downfield hoping they will win the jump ball. Nix’s favorite receiver is wide out Courtlan Sutton who’s 744 receiving yards are 9th in the NFL. Sutton averages 13.1 yards per reception with 5 TD’s and according to Pro Football Focus (PFF) despite dropping 6 passes Sutton wins 54.5% of his contested catches. Sutton is joined by rookie WR DeVaughn Vele who has 32 receptions with 1 TD and slot receiver Lil’Jordan Humprey who has 29 catches with 1 TD. Denver utilizes RB Javonte Williams to both their running and passing game plans. He averages 3.7 yards a carry with 3 rushing TD’s to go along with 37 receptions and 3 receiving TD’s. Overall, Denver converts 37.3% of their third downs and scores TD’s on 57.5 of their red zone possessions. Denver has an excellent defensive front led by LB/DE Nik Bonitto who is tied with Myles Garrett for third in the league with 10 sacks. Opposite Bonitto is former Buckeye Jonathon Cooper who has 8 sacks along with 40 QB pressures. In the middle Denver has DT’s John Franklin-Myers, 5 sacks, and Zack Allen who has 7 sacks. The defensive backfield is led by 2-time Pro Bowl CB Patrick Surtain II who has 3 interceptions with 1 TD return and S Brandon Jones who has 2 interceptions. The Browns will probably need kicker Dustin Hopkins to have a big game as Denver’s opponents average only 1.6 TD’s per game, so successful field goal tries will be critical to a Browns victory. The Browns punt coverage team will also need to contain Denver’s punt returner, Marvin Mims who’s averaging 13.7 yards per return, fifth best in the league. GO BROWNS….GO CAVS