ESPN's John Clayton stuck an interesting tidbit about the Cleveland Browns quarterback battle in his latest report from Browns training camp (also known as the Eric Mangini control festival). It seems that young Brady Quinn(notes) is not above a little bit of chicanery in his quest to win the Browns' starting quarterback job.
Clayton said:
Derek Anderson(notes) said the radio receiver in his helmet wasn't working Sunday, so he had to work with hand signals. Anderson said Brady Quinn, who was quarterbacking the White team, schooled White defenders on those hand signals, which made it harder for Anderson to work a drive filled with short passes.
Helping the defense intercept signals during a scrimmage in order to gain an edge in a training camp position battle ... that's kind of awesome.
Quinn has not had a chance to respond to Clayton's report. But if it's true, is what he did cheating? I guess you could call it cheating. Is it unethical? Probably. Would I do it? I would absolutely do it.
And before passing judgment, remember that we don't know all the circumstances here. Maybe it was a scrimmage where something was on the line. For example, maybe the Brown team got out of practice early if they won, or maybe the White team got Popsicles if they won.
Maybe Quinn was just practicing the stealing of signals for the regular season, in which case, it's something that would be beneficial to everyone in the Browns organization, would it not?
Maybe there was a purpose beyond, "Screw Derek Anderson, I'm trying to win this job."
Or maybe there wasn't. Does there have to be? I would guess that Eric Mangini wants his players to be that competitive about their spots. If it's not something that's hurting the team (and it's not, since it's a scrimmage), where's the harm?
