The cuts came and went. Johnny Football is what the Browns told him to act like — a backup quarterback. The preseason passed without major injury, which is a great thing.
Now it’s go time in the NFL.
AFC East: There are few organizations in sports as consistent as the New England Patriots. Sweet Odin’s Raven, forget penciling them in as the East champs, you can do it in Sharpie, cover it with liquid cement and bury it in a time capsule that says, “True until Brady and Belichick retire.” This is the ACC — there’s one really good club, and no matter how much you try to talk yourself into believing that Miami/Miami or Buffalo/Clemson or the New York Jets/UNC could contend, they can’t. And they won’t.
AFC South: No team will get more universal preseason prediction love than the Indy Colts. That has everything to do with luck, as in (a) Andrew Luck, (b) the luck to play in a rebuilding division that is always rebuilding and (c) well, the luck to have six games against the QB accounting firm of Fitzpatrick, Locker and Henne.
AFC Central: Quietly, and way behind the NFC West, this is one of the best divisions in football. Cincinnati has a closing window to make the most of the division’s most talented roster, since Andy Dalton’s affordability-to-talent metric is about to flip in the opposite direction and the Bengals need to make some difficult roster decisions that the Steelers and Ravens did to afford their quarterbacks.