A recovery pool encounter could doom Browns playoff hopes

[Auggie]

Several Browns players were in the team's recovery pool area recently with linebacker B.J. Goodson, who learned Saturday he tested positive for COVID-19, and the NFL had video showing at least one of those players wasn't wearing a mask correctly during another interaction, per sources.

Those encounters led the NFL to label all those players -- including four of the five receivers on Cleveland's active roster -- as high-risk close contacts, forcing the Browns to place them on the reserve/COVID-19 list and sidelining them for Sunday's game against the Jets.

Sharing the recovery pool -- which includes a hot and cold tub -- isn't itself a violation of COVID protocols. But the NFL's medical experts look at cumulative time, distance, mask use and ventilation in the area where exposure occurred to any positive individual, and if the threshold is exceeded in two or more of those four categories, it's labeled a high-risk close contact.

https://www.nfl.com/news/browns-lose-top-4-receivers-for-sunday-s-game-vs-jets-after-recovery-pool-encoun?fbclid=IwAR1b3sD5jDF5P1oBg3xhuTQN0S4UyCtxXFyJa2HKdsq5jwUaLKrovomUqAQ

Idiot players, or trainers, or both. Now the Browns will have to defeat the Steelers in Week 17, a team that has bedeviled them for decades.

Cleveland will likely get their wideouts back in time for the game. Gordon, one of their impact players on defense, is out indefinitely.

Two other scenarios for making the playoffs, both unlikely (from cleveland.com):

SCENARIO 2

If the Browns tie the Steelers, they get in if:

The Colts or Titans lose or tie, or if the Dolphins lose.

SCENARIO 3

If the Browns lose to the Steelers, they get in if:

The Colts lose to the Jaguars. That alone will clinch it for the Browns, regardless of other outcomes.

Or the Titans lose to the Texans, the Ravens beat the Bengals and the Dolphins beat the Bills.

[Best_man23]

1. Every team that just misses the playoffs

Often looks back and are able to identify a game they lost, even a play they missed, that could have made the difference. This recovery pool may well doom the Browns playoff hopes for 2020.

My bet was TV Execs were hoping for a week 17 Browns-Steelers match to decide the division.

[exboyfil]

2. I am still trying to figure out how a ball

that never hit the ground was ruled a fumble and could not be advanced.

[Auggie]

4. In the final two minutes of a game only the player that fumbles the ball can advance that same ball

It's called the Holy Roller rule and was enacted after the 1978 season to address a controversial play during a Raiders/Chargers game in September ( see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holy_Roller_(American_football) ) Had Mayfield recovered his own fumble he could have advanced the ball.

It was clearly a fumble. Mayfield was running with the ball, not attempting a pass.

[exboyfil]

5. That makes sense if you you clearly determine the intent of

the ball handler. A simpler rule should be it can't go forward if past the line of scrimmage or hit the ground. A backward fumble that never hits the ground should be advanced.

[Auggie]

6. You'll have to take that up with the NFL

[stopbush]

3. The Browns have been great this year.

It will be a shame if they miss the playoffs, especially when the winner of the NFL East could well have a losing record.