As Joe Flacco prepares to play his first home game as a member of the Browns, the veteran signal caller recognizes a something special about playing games in Cleveland.
Joe Flacco is no stranger to football in the AFC North.
The 16-year vet famously spent the first 11 years of his career playing for the Baltimore Ravens, winning Super Bowl 47 with the franchise. Over the course of his career he’s played 63 games against the Steelers, Bengals and his current team the Browns combined. He played the only game of his career against his former team last year as a member of the Jets.
Now, as the 38-year-old prepares for his first game in Cleveland as a member of the Browns, he can’t help but romanticize the environment he’s about to play in.
“The thing that playing in this division you know it’s not an indoor stadium,” Flacco said. “It’s an old school. Not an old school, obviously, but it’s a grass field, outdoors, you feel the city of Cleveland. You usually have some kind of weather so you know where you are and I don’t know. That’s the way you like it. You smell the grass. It just feels like football.”
Known for being a division built on defense and running the football, there certainly is an old school feel to the AFC North. At times it’s a rugged, group of teams that test you week in and week out. That’s especially true this year with all four teams above 500 and three of them in the thick of the AFC Playoff Picture in Baltimore, Pittsburgh, and Cleveland.
At 7-5 and currently in the AFC’s fifth seed, the games have a critical stretch of five games to go. It starts with the Jacksonville Jaguars visiting the shores of Lake Erie this weekend. In typical AFC North football fashion, there’s incliment weather in the forecast.
“I think when you play in this division, which I have most of my career, you just have to get used to the fact that’s going to be the case,” Flacco said of the looming questionable weather.” Both teams have to deal with it. And I don’t care how long and how much you tell yourself that you love playing in this kind of stuff and try to convince yourself that you can do it. I don’t think anybody loves it, but you get used to doing it and you have your ways.”
At 7-5 and currently in the AFC’s fifth seed, the games have a critical stretch of five games to go. It starts with the Jacksonville Jaguars visiting the shores of Lake Erie this weekend. In typical AFC North football fashion, there’s incliment weather in the forecast.
“I think when you play in this division, which I have most of my career, you just have to get used to the fact that’s going to be the case,” Flacco said of the looming questionable weather.” Both teams have to deal with it. And I don’t care how long and how much you tell yourself that you love playing in this kind of stuff and try to convince yourself that you can do it. I don’t think anybody loves it, but you get used to doing it and you have your ways.”
“That’s kind of been attractive to myself,” Flacco said of his decision to come to Cleveland. “It’s like when you can go out there and like I said, smell the grass and feel like it’s football weather and that’s the time of year we’re in. We’re in December and we’re in Cleveland and it should be a lot of fun.”
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