Jaguars vs. Browns: Halftime Thoughts
The Jacksonville Jaguars are going into halftime trailing the Cleveland Browns 14-7 after a sloppy and mistake-filled first-half.
But what did we see in the first two quarters vs. the Browns? We break it down below.
Jaguars defense is still broken after Monday NIight Football, but turnovers started to pick back up
The Jaguars managed to force three consecutive three-and-outs in the first-half, but the issue is those drives were sandwiched between two easy touchdown drives by the Browns. David Njoku was wide-open for a long touchdown on the first drive of the game after the Jaguars fell for a run-heavy look on 3rd-and-1, and then Njoku caught another 30-yard touchdown after coming wide-open on play-action and then stiff-arming Andre Cisco.
The Jaguars' defense simply wasn't making impact plays on the downs they weren't giving up explosive plays, either,until the Darious Williams interception. This is a defense that built its reputation on takeaways during the first-half of the season, but after just one takeaway in the previous two weeks, the lack of impact plays continued until the Jaguars were already down 14-0.
The offense, meanwhile, looked even worse
The Jaguars' offense simply got nothing going to start the game. They punted it four times in the first quarter alone, with two three-and-outs and just three total first downs in four drives. Drops, missed calls in the secondary, and self-inflicted wounds like a false start and delay of game all factored into the Jaguars' offense doing nothing to move past their injuries.
That isn't even mentioning Lawrence's awful interception after Njoku's second touchdown. The Jaguars' offense looked helpless in the first-half, gaining just 68 yards on their first five drives -- just five more yards than Jnoju gained on his own in the same time span. They got lucky with a short field on their first touchdown drive of the game, something they can't rely on in the scond-half.
The Jaguars are missing Christian Kirk in a big way
If one thing became aggressively clear in the first-half, it was just how badly the Jaguars were missing wide receiver Christian Kirk. They didn't convert their first third-down until their fifth chance of the day, which came almost halfway through the second-quarter. Kirk is Lawrence's security blanket, especially on third downs, and on Sunday the Jaguars didn't look like they had many answers.
In Lawrence's first nine targets to Zay Jones and Calvin Ridley, Lawrence went 3-of-9 for 30 yards and an interception, with several drops and near-misses littered in between. The Jaguars had chances to strike in the first-half, but the offense consistently came up short, and it looked like Lawrence's inability to have a quick-footed man-coverage beater was a huge reason why.
