BEREA — Coach Romeo Crennel placed eliminating penalties near the top of his to-do list for the bye week, right after getting injured players healthy. The Browns have committed 37 penalties for 237 yards in four games, an average of nine for 59.
“None of it is excusable because we know that penalties hurt and cause you to lose games,” he said Monday.
The Browns entered the win Sunday over the Bengals tied for the most penalties in the league with 28. They committed nine for 52 yards in Cincinnati, including three neutral zone infractions and an offsides.
“I think at the beginning of the game they tried to focus on the penalties and not have the ones that we have been having early on in the game,” Crennel said, referring to alignment and illegal shift penalties. “It turned out that it flipped to the defensive guys. I know they want to get as (close to) the ball as they can to try to get closer to the quarterback, but the rule says you can’t line up in the neutral zone.
“We work on it, talk about it, emphasize it in practice and try to get those guys to understand that penalties hurt the team, but we are not doing a good enough job with it because we are up there in the league as far as penalties are concerned.
“I’m the head coach. The buck stops with me.”

Donte optimistic

Receiver Donte Stallworth, who hasn’t played this season after pulling a quadriceps, said he expects to be back for the Giants game following the bye week. In fact, he thinks he could’ve played if the Browns had a game scheduled for Sunday.
“I was pretty close to being ready yesterday, but it just wasn’t quite there,” he said. “My biggest thing is I didn’t want to become a liability. I’m excited to take my cheerleading outfit off and put on a Cleveland Browns uniform.”

Injury report

Crennel said tight end Kellen Winslow banged his knee during the game but was able to return. Crennel said he’ll be further evaluated.
• Right tackle Kevin Shaffer suffered a concussion, which Crennel called “probably mild.”
• Defensive lineman Shaun Smith, who’s been playing with a cast, was scheduled for surgery today to fix a bone in the hand. Crennel said he should be able to play against the Giants if everything goes well.
• Offensive lineman Ryan Tucker is expected to be available against the Giants for the first time this year after breaking a hip in the offseason. General manager Phil Savage said he could play guard or tackle.
• Savage said receiver Joe Jurevicius, who had a series of offseason knee surgeries, has done some jogging but no football activities and isn’t close to returning.
• Safety Sean Jones is likely a couple of weeks from returning, according to Savage. He played the opener, then had arthroscopic knee surgery.

Beer goggles

Fullback Lawrence Vickers was lying on the ground in the end zone after blocking on Jamal Lewis’ 1-yard touchdown run when he felt something hit his face.
“The bottle flew out of the stands,” Vickers said. “It hit the top of my helmet and the top of the bottle, the part you drink out of, came across my eye and I had beer all over my face.
“I didn’t know exactly what it was. I thought maybe somebody poked me in the eye. I kind of snapped because why would somebody throw a bottle on the field. I smelled like beer for the rest of the game.”
The bottle was plastic and the eye looked fine Monday, but Vickers was still steaming. He didn’t think stadium security reacted quickly enough.

Second guess

Crennel was questioned about his decision not to call timeout with 47 seconds left in the second quarter. He allowed the clock to run to 13 seconds before the Bengals called timeout and kicked a field goal. Crennel could’ve stopped the clock at 47 seconds, let Cincinnati kick the field goal and gotten the ball back with a chance to score before halftime.
“Depending on where you get the ball, I just felt I would let him kick the field goal and we would go into the half with the score being what it was. That was fine with me,” he said of the 6-3 deficit.
Contact Scott Petrak at 329-7253 or spetrak@chroniclet.com. 

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