The Cleveland Browns knew that Johnny Manziel would get plenty of attention after being a first round pick in 2014 and so far he has been front and center, getting the spotlight at rookie minicamp, being hit with a hoax harassment lawsuit and now he has been spotted in pictures in Las Vegas at a Memorial Day pool party with Rob Gronkowski and as all this goes on he is competing with Brian Hoyer for the starting quarterback position.
The Browns have made Manziel the third quarterback on the depth chart to start offseason workouts and he will get his chances in training camp this summer, but he will have to work his way up. Over the weekend ESPN.com reported about the party with Gronkowski and on SportsCenter analysts broke down what they thought about the two hanging out over Memorial weekend. While it doesn't mean he isn't working hard, this is just the type of thing that the Browns and Manziel will have to get used to, as he is a lightning rod for the media and for fans.
The national media was clamoring to get into rookie minicamp and they did and now the Browns have to realize that the attention on Manziel likely will not stop. Just as soon as he was in camp he was hit with a fake lawsuit from of course, Florida. NFL.com reported about the news, writing that the filing was a hoax from someone who does this often and it was named under Samantha Schacher, who is a host on the Dr. Drew show. It should have never been filed and it called for $25 million and had a number of ridiculous claims while name dropping Manziel, Jadeveon Clowney and others.
While many have written about how the Browns are using Manziel as a backup to start things off, he will have a legit chance to win the starting job this summer. Mike Pettine is open to the competition and with a new offensive coordinator coming in with Kyle Shanahan, Hoyer and Manziel are on the same page. On top of that, Hoyer is coming in after serious surgery and while he is looking much better, he still may not be at 100 percent and that could give Manziel the edge in the competition.
The Browns are dealing with the possible suspension of Josh Gordon and that could be a massive loss for the team after he led the league in receiving yards and the team in receptions in 2013. Gordon's status remains up in the air and the team signed Miles Austin and Earl Bennett as free agents to make up for it. The team opted not to draft Sammy Watkins and went after Justin Gilbert with their first round pick and they are hoping Austin and Bennett can produce enough to make an impact over Gordon. Last season the Browns finished 4-12 on the year and ended up 27th in rushing yards per game and 11th in passing yards per game and signing Ben Tate as a free agent should help the offense as well.