The Cleveland Browns pulled off a big upset on Thursday night when they knocked off the Pittsburgh Steelers 24-19 in a snowy, mucky game in Cleveland.
The Browns were buoyed by two rushing touchdowns by Nick Chubb and a heroic fourth-down touchdown run by Jameis Winston. Winston scrambled out of the pocket and did his best John Elway helicopter impression to fly into the end zone for a huge score.
After the game, Winston was spotted singing “Jingle Bells” on his way to the Amazon Prime set to do his postgame interview. Later, he went on to explain why he was singing the holiday song.
“Well the only reason I’m singing ‘Jingle Bells’ is because I FaceTimed my wife this morning and my boys were singing in the car on the way to school, so they had it stuck in my head,” Winston said, according to the Browns' official transcript. “When we first got up here to Cleveland, like on the plane, my boys are singing, ‘jingle bells, jingle bells’ because I told him about my first trip in March where it snowed out of the middle of nowhere. I’m getting my physical and it started snowing. So I told them, ‘Hey, Cleveland is a place where it snows.” You know, we were coming from Tampa and New Orleans. They haven’t seen snow, really. The only time they have seen snow is when we were back in Alabama. So they were singing ‘Jingle Bells’. So they had me singing ‘Jingle Bells.’”
Jameis Winston has given this Browns team life
A Browns team that had no energy or urgency for most of this season has been revived since Jameis Winston became the starting quarterback.
Not only is Winston playing better football at the quarterback position than Deshaun Watson was, but his energy and positivity has also injected a new sense of competitiveness in this group. The Browns are playing much better and now provide a much stiffer challenge on both sides of the ball for opponents.
The results speak for themselves. The Browns were just 1-6 this season in games that Watson started, including multiple games where it felt like they had no belief or chance of winning right from the opening kick. Since Winston stepped in after Watson's season-ending Achilles injury, the Browns are 2-2 and have picked up a pair of impressive wins over the Ravens and Steelers.
The Browns will have a chance to play spoiler for a lot of AFC playoff teams down the stretch, even though they aren't competing for one of those spots themselves. Winston and company still have another game against both the Steelers and the Ravens along with matchups against the Kansas City Chiefs, Miami Dolphins and Denver Broncos. With Winston taking snaps now, the Browns will not be an easy out for anyone as the season starts to wind down.
