Myles Garrett has had no problem racking up sacks and accolades but the Cleveland Browns still expect more from their powerful pass-rusher.
Garrett is coming off his first Defensive Player of the Year honor. He recorded 14 sacks while battling a shoulder injury and was a player opposing teams needed to account for every play.
Garrett will have a new defensive line coach next season in Jacques Cesaire. He’s raising the expectations for the Browns’ best defensive player.
“A lot more,” Cesaire said on June 5 in response to the expectations for Garrett.
Cesaire continued: “Myles knows that. Myles is the type of person that he wants to be great. You know, he wants to be great. He’s not just resting on his laurels and what he did last year. He understands that and he’s working.”
Garrett producing even more is a scary prospect for the rest of the NFL. He has tallied double-digit sacks every year since his rookie season. The former No. 1 overall pick has 88.5 sacks in 100 career games and is already the franchise’s career sack leader.
Myles Garrett Not in Attendance for Browns’ OTAs
Garrett has not attended the Browns’ voluntary off-season workouts. However, the Browns are very confident in his offseason plans, which he often shares on social media.
“We’ve been in contact with each other, and I know that he’s been working,” Cesaire said. “He’s working hard. I know he wants to come back, and obviously, when you lose in the playoffs, you don’t feel great about it. He has things that he needs to work on. Everybody’s working on some things, so you’re going to see a drastic improvement from everybody this year.”
Garrett has had great personal success but is eager to lead the Browns to postseason glory. Before last year’s Super Bowl, he expressed that he felt Cleveland could have made it to the big stage if not for multiple key injuries.
“I think if we stay healthy, there’s no reason we’re not playing this Sunday. And, you know, it hurts every time I think about [Deshaun Watson] getting hurt, [Nick] Chubb getting hurt and other big injuries that we had,” Garrett said. “But I’m proud of the men I had in the room. I’m proud of the brotherhood that we created from training camp all throughout the season and everything we had to fight through, the adversity that we saw. It was awesome to see how those guys rallied.”
Browns Return Most of League-Leading Defense
Garrett and the Browns led the NFL in total defense allowed with 270.2 yards per game last season. The team returns almost all the key pieces from that unit. That includes DE Za’Darius Smith, DT Shelby Harris, DT Maurice Hurst II and S Rodney McLeod, who all re-signed in free agency.
That doesn’t mean defensive coordinator Jim Schwartz is taking his foot off the gas.
“We can’t get complacent,” Schwartz said. “We can’t think that last year is going to mean anything. Right now, last year means nothing. Everybody’s right down to the bottom of the hill again, and you got to climb it again. We’re in a little different spot just because we have some experience in the defense, but we can’t act as if anything’s going to carry over from last year. We have to stay hungry that way.”
The Browns open the season on September 8 against the Dallas Cowboys.
J.R. DeGroote covers the NFL and NBA for Heavy.com, with a focus on the Cleveland Browns. He covered local and statewide sports as a reporter for West Hawaii Today and has decades of experience in digital media with previous stops at SB Nation and Bleacher Report. He has won multiple state, regional and national honors for sports reporting and photography. More about J.R. DeGroote
