Even ESPN Is Trying To Warn You About Tonight's Dreadful Ravens-Browns Game

Tonight, the Ravens and Browns will play what will most likely be the least appealing Monday night game of the season. Look at the schedule. Vikings-49ers was horrid, but at least we had Jim Tomsula reaction shots to entertain us. This game will have nothing.

At the beginning of the season, Ravens-Browns looked like it could be a compelling matchup between divisional rivals. The current Ravens, holding a 3-7 record, have no Joe Flacco or Justin Forsett. Their starting quarterback is Matt Schaub. Here’s how MNF sold this guy:

Two facts you need to know about Matt Schaub, baby: He’s bad, and he hasn’t played in a while. Are you ready for some football?

So, there isn’t much to rave about in Baltimore, despite replacement running back Javorius “Buck” Allen’s wonderful name and nickname. Meanwhile, the 2-8 Browns had Johnny Manziel. Putting aside the arguments about his quality of play, Manziel at least provided a reason to watch the game. Any objective NFL fan could at least be entertained by his successes or failures. Hell, ESPN devoted the entire promo to him (their revised spot is so dull):

And when Mike Tirico sarcastically plugged the game on Monday’s broadcast (“Do you love football? All right, we’ll test ya.”), Jon Gruden did his best to sell it to the viewers, calling it “exciting.”

This was all before Manziel was demoted to third-string quarterback for showing up in a video at a Texas nightclub during the team’s bye week, and explained the footage by saying, “Videos can be old.” Cleveland’s now starting Josh McCown, with Austin Davis backing him up. MNF is busting open the stat books for this showdown:

Please go look at the rest of to plug this game. A few of them involve Manziel, who, again, is not playing:

Earlier in the day, MNF made a public plea to think of the production crew that has worked very hard to bring you this pile of shit:

Those poor souls.

Top photo: AP

Contact the author at samer@deadspin.com.