Everything involving the Browns has become front-page news this offseason. So when Odell Beckham Jr. made what some perceived to be a shot at his former quarterback, Eli Manning, people pounced.
On Wednesday, Beckham praised the arm of his new quarterback, Baker Mayfield, saying he’d “have to get adjusted to the speed” and that Mayfield was “throwing that ball hard.”
Naturally, members of the New York media ran with this, packing it into a story about Beckham slighting Manning. Whatever Beckham's intentions were behind the comment, it only served as another reminder of the intense microscope this team will be under in 2019.
“I don’t think anybody knows what it’s like to be me, what I go through on a daily basis,” Beckham said. “I feel like I’m in a way different position than anybody else in the NFL. I feel like I deal with more. I take more.”
This wasn't Beckham's first time being scrutinized for comments this offseason. Already, he has been criticized for saying he wanted to turn the Browns into a dynasty like the New England Patriots in an interview with GQ Magazine. Skipping OTAs has been another source of ammunition for his critics.
“I feel like I could sit in a corner in a room full of people and not try and bother anybody and it would be like, ‘You’re too good to be out here with the rest of us,’” he said.
Beckham has taken steps this offseason to help him deal with the noise and to mature as a player and an individual. Steps, he hopes, that finally will lead him — and Cleveland — to a championship.
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