Browns ‘Stunned’ By Johnny Manziel’s ‘Antics’—Seriously Though, Did They Just Meet Him?

On Friday the Cleveland Plain Dealer ran a story that makes you wonder if Cleveland Browns owner Jimmy Haslam even knew who Johnny Manziel was before he relied on nothing more than the word of a homeless man and drafted the former Texas A&M quarterback No. 22 overall in May.

Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the last couple of years you have probably noticed that Johnny Football has a knack for generating headlines. Sometimes it’s for football related reasons, but with no football being played and a millions of dollars burning very sizable holes in all his pockets, most of the headlines this year have been decidedly non-football related.

Manziel was known for being a party bro in college—photos of him drinking at frat parties routinely made the rounds on social media during his two years in College Station. And although he denied it, a hangover was widely assumed to be the reason he was asked to leave the Manning Passing Academy in July 2013.

These days he’s taken it up a notch. In June a photo—one that can only be described as absotively, posilutely epic—of Manziel taking a booze-drenched swim with an inflatable swan at the X Games in Austin went viral after an eagle-eyed partygoer tweeted it to Deadspin.

Swigging straight from a bottle of champagne is by far the classiest way to consume the world’s classiest beverage.

One month to the day later Busted Coverage published a photo of what looks to be Manziel rolling up a $20 bill inside the bathroom of an Austin nightclub. Now it’s possible that he was rolling the money up for purposes other than snorting cocaine, but not entirely likely.

Those may be two of the more noteworthy highlights of Manziel’s offseason, but this sort of thing has been the norm ever since he rocketed to superstardom as the first freshman in history to win the Heisman Trophy back in 2012. Manziel revels in his own celebrity and has never once even pretended to be apologetic about it.

He’s friends with Drake. He’s got his own signature hand gesture. He’s single and really loves to mingle—every time Manziel shows up in public with a woman it’s a top story the next day. Earlier this week all he did was tweet out a photo of him with TCU student Colleen Crowley and Fox Sports published an article entitled: “Is Manziel ready to settle down with TCU student?”

Here’s a hint: He’s not! Not that it matters—it still became an international story. Seriously, international. The UK’s Daily Mail ran something the same day as Fox, with a much more negative spin.

With all that in mind, the somewhat surprised tone in the Plain Dealer’s piece is as much cause for concern as anything Manziel has ever done. Mark Kay Cabot notes the Browns have been ‘alarmed’ by his behavior and “stunned by his recent behavior.”

Manziel’s behavior might be questionable for an NFL quarterback—heck, it might be questionable for anyone—but there is, quite simply, nothing surprising about it. There is nothing about his personality or past behavior that suggested his pre-draft promises of reforming his wild ways was anything but lip service aimed at improving his draft stock.

The fact that the Browns seem caught off guard by this makes it hard to believe the organization is legitimately on the verge of turning a corner. They’ve seemed in over their head since the beginning, unable to properly contend with the level of fame they knew—or should’ve known—came part and parcel with their larger than life rookie.

Cleveland coach Mike Pettine attempted to get things back on track after the cocaine photo surfaced by calling Manziel, who was on vacation in Hawaii, for a serious conversation. A conversation that was ‘positive’, but ultimately did nothing.

According to the Plain Dealer, “Manziel regressed in practice after his first week of organized team activities, and some in the organization attributed it to too much jet-setting and not enough dedication to the playbook.” Whatever the issues are with Manziel in Cleveland, this kind of public finger-wagging isn’t likely to quell anything.

Also not likely to quell anything are Manziel’s dismissive comments about a situation serious enough to jeopardize his chance of becoming a starter. While he was quick to admit to “rookie mistakes,” he stopped well short of promising any real change in his behavior. Said Manziel:

“At the end of the day I’ve made some rookie mistakes. There were somet hings I wish I could have gone back and done a little differently. … I talked about [the bathroom photo] with Coach Pettine, talked about it with (general manager) Ray Farmer and the people I need to talk about that with. Moving forward they’re good with everything and I’ve told them everything I need to and everything’s been good. … I don’t think there’s anything wrong with me going out and having a nightlife and social life. I’m 21 years old and it was the offseason and it’s free time for us.”

At this point the Browns seem distressed over the Manziel situation, with the Plain Dealer report suggesting resentment over being sold a false bill of goods. And Manziel’s comments, while somewhat diplomatic, make it clear that he has no intention of acquiescing to any organizational ideals in Cleveland.

There were a lot of high hopes when the Browns moved up to draft Manziel, but there hasn’t even been a single preseason game played and it’s already starting to look like a worst case scenario. The worst case scenario being Manziel quickly flaming out in the NFL and the Browns whiffing on yet another first round quarterback.

Maybe this will turn around…but it’s Cleveland so it probably won’t. At least they’ve got LeBron back.