Before I wrote this, I swore that if the HERO (Hutchison Exuberant Ranking Officialness) System still ranked Houston ahead of the Patriots, I would enact an exception called The Human Element (T.H.E., ironically also the title of a science fiction story I wrote about humans having moved the entirety of their brains to microchips and able to switch from metal robotic bodies to brainless human bodies - shells - at will, and the degradation of the concept of morals or emotions that ensued, but I digress) that would fix that flaw since there's no way on Shiva's Fair Earth that the Texans could be ranked ahead of New England after THAT beatdown.

Fortunately, the corresponding number change allowed for NE to jump the Houstons, so life as we know it can still make sense.

The playoff-bound Cleveland Browns made yet another step up the ladder this week to #19.  They are an impressive 9th in points allowed, and only a -13 in seasonal point differential (Points Scored minus Points Allowed), which ain't bad for a 5-8 team. 

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As is sometimes the case with such things, the symbolic passing of the Cleveland Browns’ running back legacy from Jim Brown to Leroy Kelly became apparent only in retrospect.

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As we struggle to survive another season with the new-era Browns, one way we can try to get through it (besides alcohol or heavy medication) is to look back at the best individual weeks of the Browns’ new era to remember times in recent memory when this particular week didn’t suck.

For as much as we hate driving in it, shoveling it, and generally dealing with it in any way, shape or form, snow has a tendency to make things special.

We dream of white Christmases. We pray for snow days. Showing our kids how to make snowballs and snow forts is more important than imbuing them with the family history.

Maybe it’s because the initial appearance of snow reminds us of being children ourselves, before we reached the point in our lives when a fresh layer of powder simply meant more work and more pains in the ass instead of sledding and snowmen.

Remember that moment in the middle of the morning of an otherwise ordinary day in elementary school when you glanced out the window and saw big, white fluffy flakes swirling through the sky? You’d give yourself epilepsy trying to stay in your seat until recess. You’d do the exact same thing on the playground you would have done anyway, but the whole experience would become genuinely special.

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When is a winning streak something that fans can believe in, rather than just a mirage that helps to mask a team’s ongoing problems?

Just as importantly, how can you tell the difference?

That’s the question facing everyone surrounding the Cleveland Browns, from the front office to the locker room all the way down to the fans.

It’s not a surprise, really, that Browns fans are struggling to decide what the current team’s three-game winning streak really means – after all, we don’t see a lot of winning here in Cleveland.

Is this a sign that the Browns, 5-3 over their past eight games, have finally turned the corner after starting the year at 0-5? How about if they win out to go 8-3 over the season’s final 11 games? While probably unrealistic for this team, it is still hypothetically on the table.

Should those 11 games count more than the 21 games – when the Browns were 4-17 – that preceded them?

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