BEREA, Ohio — Myles Garrett doesn’t hold Baker Mayfield’s “I’m going to (expletive) them up” comment against him, but says the Browns will certainly use it as motivation for the opener against him Sept. 11 in Carolina.
“We’ve known he has that type of demeanor and that attitude, and for better or for worse, it works for him,” Garrett told cleveland.com on Tuesday after practice. “And I’m not mad at him using that fire and that chip on his shoulder to help him play to the level he has. He’s been successful in what he’s done.’’
Garrett, who had an up-and-down relationship with his fellow No. 1 overall pick, watched Mayfield fire himself up like that during their four seasons together in Cleveland, which included only one playoff campaign in 2020.
“Talking like that and moving the way he does, it’s worked for him,” he said. “He uses that for fire, for motivation and I think speaking like that helps amp him up.”
But, Garrett noted, “It does the same for us as well. We’ll take it and we’ll use it, and I’m hoping for a great matchup. I don’t think any less of him because he’s going out there and doing the same thing he did when he was with us. He’s the same guy personally, and maybe we’ll see a different Baker when we get on the field. Who knows?”
Browns coach Kevin Stefanski said of Mayfield’s remark: “I’m not going to get involved in that type of thing. As you know, it’s Carolina week. I get how unique it is that Baker is the starting quarterback for the Panthers. We’re really going to focus on putting a plan together to beat the Panthers. That is really the focus.”
Asked if there were copies of Mayfield’s quote circulating in the locker room now, he said, “No.’’
He said he doesn’t believe in the concept of posting Mayfield’s comments in the locker room for motivation.
“I don’t,” he said.
After the Panthers’ 21-0 victory over the Bills at Bank of America Stadium, Mayfield had an exchange with Bills sideline reporter Cynthia Frelund, saying of the opener against the Browns, “I’m going to (expletive) them up,” according to Frelund.
Frelund, also the NFL Network analystics expert, shared her postgame conversation with Mayfield during the “Around the NFL” podcast that was posted Monday night.
“You ran into Baker Mayfield, the former Browns quarterback, recently,” host Dan Hanzus said. “I was hoping you could share an exchange that you had.”
Frelund recounted the conversation.
“I walked up to him and said, ‘I’m so excited to see you, like, go kick some butt,’ I didn’t say that word,” she said with a laugh. “... ‘Go kick some butt, especially Week 1, I like cannot wait.’ And he uses some expletives and I was like, ‘I just hope you’re like ready.’ He was like, ‘I’m gonna bleep them up.’”
Hanzus asked Frelund if that was a direct quote, “‘I’m gonna f*** them up,’ is that what the quote was?”
She said, “I don’t say curse words on air. I do not want to get in trouble.”
Hanzus pressed, “But was that the quote?”
Frelund said, “Yes.”
On Tuesday morning, in response to the stories, Frelund tweeted, “Oh boy, this is silly. Don’t make this more than it is. I was wishing him good luck, colorfully. He agreed with me, colorfully. What do you expect anyone to do in this situation…”
Frelund, when challenged by Browns fans on social media about seemingly rooting against Cleveland, tweeted, “I’m not anti Browns, I am just supportive of Baker’s career and want him to succeed.”
The bulletin-board quotes — something Mayfield has been known for since back in his college days — were far different than the politically correct ones coming out of Cleveland last week.
“He’s my former teammate,” Garrett said last week. “But there’s no rivalry between me and him and there’s no rivalry between the Panthers and the Browns. Yes, he was here, but that doesn’t mean I have an added sense of urgency to get to him. I want to play my best and whatever’s in the cards, that’s it for me. If I can help my team win, if I can put them in the best position to win I’m going to do that, and if I can get a couple sacks along the way, I would kind of enjoy that too.”
Left guard Joel Bitonio has kept in touch with his good friend.
“For me, I’m playing against Carolina’s defense, and obviously Baker’s going to be there for us,” Bitonio said last week. “It’s going to be a good challenge for us, I know that the guys will be pumped up for it. But it’s the Carolina Panthers we have to face and we’re going to be ready for that.
“And me and Baker are on good terms. I texted him throughout the offseason and once he got traded there I wished him luck. I’ve always had his back and he was nothing but good to me as a person and so … we’ll be ready though for Week 1 and the Carolina Panthers.”
Linebacker Jacob Phillips echoed those sentiments.
“We still love Baker,” Phillips said. “Obviously he was a past teammate of ours. Basically every teammate we have — you know, it’s a business. People are here one year, a team’s never the same. So obviously with him going there it’s going to be cool that we have kind of an understanding of how he plays obviously competing against him every day on the practice fields so I think it’s going to be a regular game for us.
“Obviously you have more notes written down on the way he plays and different throws he makes and different things like that but it’s going to be like every other week.”
Mayfield, during his press conference in Carolina last week after he was named the Week 1 starter over Sam Darnold, was a lot more tame than he apparently was to Frelund.
“Obviously, there’s a lot of attachment there,’’ Mayfield said. “I’m not going to sit here and be a robot and say it doesn’t mean anything. It will.’’
Mayfield declined to say what could be expected of him in the opener.
“I’m not going to premeditate anything,’’ he said. “Once I step inside the lines I’m a competitor.’’
The Browns traded Mayfield, their 2018 No. 1 overall pick, to the Panthers for a fifth-round pick in 2024 that can improve to a fourth if he plays 70% of the snaps. Mayfield has $3.5 million reasons to want to beat the Browns — the amount of the pay cut he took to get the trade done with the Panthers.
The Browns are paying $10.5 million of his initially fully-guaranteed $18.86 million salary for 2022, and the Panthers picked up about $5 million. It means the Browns will have paid Mayfield $583,333 to beat them if he does, in fact expletive them up.
But Garrett, Jadeveon Clowney, and the rest of the Browns defenders — some of whom were miffed at how he behaved during the Odell Beckham Jr. departure — will have something to say about that.
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