Written by Brian McPeek

---

The last ten years of Browns drafts have been difficult to deal with, to say the least. They've drafted disappointments, deviants, diverticulitis sufferers, general distractions and divas in the first round and have one playoff season to show for their efforts since 1999. Peeker's had enough, and lays out the type of player he'd like to see the Browns pick, regardless of where they end up picking. The last ten years of Browns drafts have been difficult to deal with, to say the least. They've drafted disappointments, deviants, diverticulitis sufferers, general distractions and divas in the first round and have one playoff season to show for their efforts since 1999.

So admit and embrace your fears about the 2009 draft. You've come by them honestly and earned the right to hide when the Browns are on the clock Saturday at 5pm. When you repeatedly get punched in the face you tend to flinch as soon as someone raises their arm for any reason, right?

What has me concerned more than the past is the present though. It may be all smoke and mirrors and measured attempts to create interest in a 5^th spot in the draft order that has all the charm of a fat man in short pants but I can't help but feel that the Browns really don't know who they want in that spot.

I can tell you who they don't want in that spot: any quarterback. 

Regardless of what they say I see no QB named Quinn being dealt Saturday and no QB of any name being drafted. The Browns may be a bit banged up in regard to their draft history since they returned in 1999 but they aren't stone-cold stupid.

I'm willing to forgive the boys in Berea their thinly veiled attempts at creating interest in the fifth pick. It's as transparent as Nicole Richie but that's cool. Give it the old college try. 

But just in case they get stuck, I'm here to help. You know what guy I want regardless of where the Browns pick? I want the football version of Ringo Starr, Jon Bonham and Dave Grohl. I want the damn guy who before anything else happens is holding up the sticks while everyone waits on him before cracking them together in a "1..2..1..2..3..4" and leading the freaking show. He's usually the one with the insane eyes and crazy grin on his face.

That's the guy I want. I want my beat. I want the guy who's going to give my defense and, as usually follows, my football team, its thump, its cadence and its exclamation point and cymbals clashing. I don't care if the guy is a defensive lineman like a Warren Sapp or linebacker like Ray Lewis or a "knock-you-on-your-sorry-ass-and-stand-over-your-fallen-lifeless-body" safety like Brian Dawkins or Troy Polamalu.

I don't care where he plays.

And you know what else I don't care about? I don't give a frog's ass about this perceived "Value at the Five Spot" bullshit. I'm not sure I've ever heard of something so ridiculous. You mean to tell me that if you identify that special guy, that cymbals crashing, bend-your-facemask killer, and he happens to be a linebacker or a safety, that you feel like you're giving up value if you take him 5^th? That, for the sake of putting a name to the game, if Rey Maualuga was the guy you identified as this game changing heartbeat who would define your football team and give your organization an identity, that you'd let that cat slip at #5 because inside linebackers just don't go that high?

Playa please.

If you identify that guy then you grab that guy the minute you go on the clock. Screw conventional wisdom. Conventional wisdom brought us Tim Couch. Conventional wisdom saw the big arms and athletic ability of Courtney Brown and decided a guy that looked like that and ran like that could get by without a heart and balls.  Conventional wisdom brought us William Green and his family history of colitis while Ed Reed and Clinton Portis waited for their names to be called.

And, while we're on the subject, you know what else I'm no longer interested in? I have no feelings whatsoever for character. If this guy you're looking at is my band's big, booming drummer then I simply do not care what havoc he wreaks on society from Monday through Saturday as long as the sick, twisted psychotic bastard doesn't let up an inch on Sunday afternoon.

I don't care if dude reads to kids or screams at them from his SUV. I don't care if the man redecorates bars and clubs by knocking down walls with other patrons as long as he can separate a ball carrier from his senses and the football on game day.

Sorry. I don't have to live with these freaks; I just pay to see them on Sundays.

So here's what I'm telling you gentlemen: go get us some football players to watch on Sundays. Not guys that look like football players, who can lift more than some football players or who run around three cones in Indianapolis faster than some football players.

Get us the real damned thing this time.

They're out there. We've seen them play on Saturdays. It's time for you to get us a couple instead of trying to show everyone around the league how much smarter you are than some other pasty faced hump who never played the game. 40-yard dash times and standing broad jumps haven't ever won shit on a football field. Football players win football games. 

Go get us our drummer. Get that twisted one with the crazy eyes that hits them hard and lives to play and bang.