Cleveland starting running back Jamal Lewis will not play against the Baltimore Ravens. Also out for the Cleveland Browns are kicker Phil Dawson, and offensive lineman Rex and Floyd Womack.

Lewis will be replaced at running back by the tandem of Jerome Harrison and James Davis. Harrison has shown flashes of productivity but his year got off to a stumbling start with injury problems. Davis, a 2009 draft choice out of Clemson, dominated in the preseason but has yet to contribute to the offense and had injury problems himself after getting into a car wreck and later sustained a shoulder injury during a game which limited his action.

Taking over the placekicking duties for the Browns will be Billy Cundiff who was signed as a free agent. The 29 year old journeyman had stints with Tampa Bay Buccaneers, Green Bay Packers, New Orleans Saints, Atlanta Falcons, Kansas City Chiefs and Detroit Lions. Am I the only one who wonders why they Browns didn't sign Matt Stover to add a little bit of intrigue to tomorrows game which will likely be a lopsided affair?

Browns Defensive Coordinator Rob Ryan press conference 9-25-09

(Opening statement)- “How’s everybody doing? Good. I’m real good, ready to go. Guys have worked really hard this week and looking for better results, as I’m sure you are.”

(Opening statement)- “Good morning. Today, nothing Earth shattering here, we are following the normal schedule. I thought yesterday we had a good day. I liked some of the things that we did offensively on third down and the Ravens are a very good third down team. That’s an area we need to improve offensively. Defensively, I thought the level of communication overall was good as well. The point I made to the team is, this is something that consistently has to get better, especially defensively. The communication, the better we get with that, the better chance we give ourselves each week. On special teams, I think we are doing some good things. As we continue to clean up stuff, whether it’s in the punt game, kickoff return game, I think that can be a real strength and we have to be able to maximize that strength. Today, what we are looking for is to finish the week strong, to be able to clean up the stuff from the early part in the week and make sure that we have all our ducks in a row as we head to Baltimore.”

Uh, oh. It may already be starting to unravel for the Cleveland Browns. Rookie defensive back Coye Francies lost his temper and threw a punch at Abe Elam today after being a victim of a rookie prank of getting a Gatorade bath. Even more shocking is that fact it was done while the media was conducting interviews in the locker room. The rookie came flying in with his own bucket to pour over Elam and ended with throwing a punch thrown in his direction.

Francies said after he calmed down that it was all just fun and games. It will be interesting to see if Eric Mangini, who has levied stiff fines on his players this season, will find it funny or make Francies a little lighter in his wallet.

Hopefully the losing hasn't already started getting to the young players on the squad or we may be in for a longer year than we had already thought.

My audition to be a Cleveland Indians PR employee:

Come down to Progressive Field this weekend to see your Cleveland Indians in action against the Baltimore Orioles which have fielded such Hall of Fame players such as Cal Ripken, Eddie Murray and Jim Palmer! In the local sports landscape, the Indians are the winning-est team by far! In fact, the Indians alone have won three times the amount of games the Browns and Cavs have combined to win for the entire month of September.

The Indians offer the freshest option in entertainment and give fans an “anything can happen” attitude with all of the exciting young players in the line-up. People often equate youthfulness with exuberance and America has a cultural fascination with staying young. What better way to feel young than to be at the Prog for a night with some of Cleveland’s youngest athletes!

With the 2009 season coming to an end, this is one of your final opportunities to see the Indians for the next six months. Don’t spend all winter regretting the fact you missed a glimpse into the future. Why watch the hit television show “Flash Forward” when you can Flash Forward to the performances we’ll see for many future ALCS’s to come!

(Opening statement)- “Good morning everybody. Yesterday was a normal Wednesday practice. We were really focusing on the first and second down things that we need to get done. We incorporate some things on a Wednesday’s practice that we want to get a little bit of extra work on or want to emphasize, and I thought there was some good work done in those periods. Today the emphasis shifts to third down, and playing a team like Baltimore who is historically very good on third down. Defensively, you have to be that much sharper. They have a combination of pressures and coverages that they bring, and it is a very creative group. The creativity isn’t just in, say a new blitz that you face, it could be an old blitz that you faced where they moved people around. Some of it is IDing what they are going to do, as opposed to who exactly is doing it. That’s a little bit unique and that’s something that we have to adjust to. Defensively, I think that third down is something we need to improve on, and they’ve done a nice job. Cam (Cameron) always does a nice job of creating some packages that cause difficulty from a coverage perspective.”

If you've been following Cleveland sports for awhile you may remember the old joke "The NCAA is so mad at the Kentucky basketball program that they are going to give Cleveland State two more years of probation". This of course was after Kentucky was caught red handed paying players to play for the Wildcats after a UPS package broke which was being sent to one of their recruits with a sizable amount of money inside. Cleveland State, of course, was put on probation for housing Manute Bol and another would be recruit for two weeks inside an area motel. Hardly the worst offense in the NCAA history but the college sports governing body threw the book at them two years removed from their Cinderella run in the tournament in 1986. The penalty was so harsh that CSU was kicked out of their conference during their probation of three years, unheard of till this day. The historically rich University of Kentucky received the same penalty of three years but remained in eligible for conference play for an offense much harsher and being caught with the proverbial murder weapon. The penalty levied against Cleveland State would help send the once upstart basketball program into a tailspin that lasted nearly two decades before being rescued by current head coach Gary Waters.

Eric Mangini came riding in on his white horse to Cleveland telling the Browns media that was going to install a new culture on the downtrodden team. Mangini made it clear that rules will be followed and malcontents would be shipped away (Kellen Winslow). If you were a player knowing Mangini's track record, how could you really take the young head coach seriously? The 38 year old coach doesn't really practice what he preaches.

If Mangini was so obsessed with following rules how could he have stomached working under Bill Belichick. Belichick, of course, was filming opposing teams for an advantage on getting their signals in what is now known as Spygate. Mangini didn't seem to mind the practice when he was under the New England Patriots head coach but took issue when it was used against him when he was given the head job with the New York Jets.

If you don't like the guilty by association aspect of the last example maybe this one will be a little more clear that Mangini hardly is a choir boy when it comes to the NFL rulebook. Just last week, Mangini was fined by the NFL for failing to list Brett Favre on the injury list despite the fact he knew he was hurt. That my friends, is against the rules.

When you tune into the Cleveland Browns game against Baltimore you will see a notable absence on the Ravens roster. Matt Stover, the last holdover from the Browns on the teams roster last season, lost his job as placekicker this year for the team. The 41 year old kicked for Cleveland from 1991-1995 and continued with Baltimore from 1996-2008. Stover is the third most accurate kicker in the history of the NFL nailing 83.7% of his attempted kicks during his career that spanned nearly two decades. 24 year old Steve Hauschka is the new kicker for the Ravens and as hit 2 of his first three attempts for the team this season.

Stover not making the team will also mean that one of the most strange facts of the Browns/Ravens rivalry will no longer be in play. The Browns current kicker Phil Dawson, who proceeded Stover in Cleveland when the team reentered the league in 1999, kicked for the same high school as Stover - Lake Highlands High in Dallas. If someone can calculate that odds of that happening they would have to be far greater that a million to one.