And then the Great Pumpkin woke up and once again for the Cleveland Browns, the sky darkened on that third down pass as Walker's pass bounced off the helmet of blitzing safety Jamal Adams, bounced high into the air before wobbling into the waiting Julian Love.
Instead of a first down that would put the Seahawks in the position of using timeouts or an incompletion that would have pinned Seattle deep in their territory to start their final drive, Seattle started on their own forty-three-yard line and six plays later won the game on a Geno Smith pass to Jaxon Smith-Njigba to give Seattle a 24-20 win.
P.J. Walker threw a touchdown to David Njoku but threw two interceptions and lost a fumble, Kareem Hunt rushed for a touchdown and fifty-five yards, and Amari Cooper caught six passes for eighty-nine yards to lead Cleveland.
Cleveland drops to 4-3 and will host Arizona next Sunday.
Brownie Bits
1) Seattle scored the first fourteen points and led seventeen to seven at the end of the first quarter.
The defense looked to be on its heels and it was fair to wonder if this was another chance to believe the defense was overrated.
2) Instead the defense dominated the remainder of the game until the final game-winning drive.
They may not be the "best in the world" but they are still pretty damn good.
3) This one may not be completely on P.J. Walker or Kevin Stefanski but both have a part of an avoidable loss.
The play call on third and three at the end of the game to throw rather than above with Walker is very questionable to me.
You have a quarterback with accuracy issues that didn't go through training camp and yet you decide to throw?
Literally, if you made a list of all the bad things that you could imagine, only a fumble was possible from any other call while throwing had the highest likelihood of something going wrong with the player most likely to make a mistake.
4) It's my biggest knock on Kevin Stefanski, the constant need to be the smartest man in the room.
In the clutch over the Stefanski era, this has happened far too often with play calls that leave Stefanski after the game talking about "plays that you want back".
5) The running game did work in this game with Kareem Hunt, Pierre Strong, and the unexpectedly available Jerome Ford combining to rush for one hundred thirty-three yards.
All three backs did well and I did like how the Browns rotated the three to have a fresh runner in the lineup for most of the game.
6) I did wonder why Kareem Hunt didn't play in the fourth quarter despite Hunt's ability as the strongest of the backs and the best at running between the tackles.
The Browns didn't have to run Hunt but it made sense at least late in the game to have their most physical back to play at least a little.
7) Amari Cooper had an excellent game and had P.J. Walker not overthrown him on one wide-open pass, Cooper's numbers would have been even better as the throw would have been a touchdown if it was on the numbers.
8) Turnovers make the difference and while that's not groundbreaking information, P.J. Walker didn't play poorly, he still turned the ball over three times and there's your difference.
Competent quarterback play and the Browns win this.
I know the issues and circumstances with the quarterback position but it doesn't change the loss and the reasons behind the loss.
9) I always love defensive lineman interceptions and Maurice Hurst grabbed the first of his career and it led to the Browns taking the lead at 20-17.
Defensive linemen are always celebrating like children on those rare occasions and you have to feel good when those times occur.
10) The draft hasn't been extremely helpful but we did see an appearance from fifth-round cornerback Cameron Mitchell, who just missed a pick-six interception in the second half.
The draft has given the Browns next to nothing this season except for Dawand Jones and getting anything from anyone else has been rare.
11) Cleveland pays a lot of money to Wyatt Teller and Joel Bitonio to be able to run between the tackles and win short-yardage situations.
Yet again, the Browns didn't do that with the game at stake.
It's fair to consider just how much confidence Kevin Stefanski has in a unit with so many resources invested.
12) Seattle used their classic uniforms and they (especially the jersey) are so much better than the various bags of yuck that they usually wear..
I'm not saying Seattle should wear the full uniforms all the time but the jerseys should be a part of the regular togs.
13) This was a missed opportunity to win a game that no one expected the Browns to win on the road against a good team.
4-3 is far from a disaster but Cleveland was so close to stealing a third game in a row with P.J. Walker and then the clock struck midnight.
5-2 would have been tremendous but this isn't a game that crushes the season.
A loss against the Cardinals may.
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