Browns running back Robert Turbin is recovered from an ankle injury that kept him out of action for the five weeks of the NFL season and will make his debut with the team this Sunday. Turbin, whose first opponent will be the Broncos and their fifth-ranked run defense, has lofty goals for the season.
“I feel like this is going to be my team,” Turbin said, according to Mary Kay Cabot of the Cleveland Plain-Dealer.
Turbin added that he wants to eclipse the 1,000-yard mark, which will be extra difficult in an 11-game season.
Turbin, a fourth-round pick out of Utah State in 2012, spent the first three years of his career in Seattle. The Seahawks waived him in September and the Browns subsequently claimed him. The 25-year-old has amassed 231 carries and 928 yards, good for 4.0 yards per rush. That’s not great, but it would be an improvement for a Browns offense that currently has the league’s 27th-ranked per-carry average (3.7).
More on the Browns and a couple of notes concerning the 2016 draft:
- Despite his latest off-field issue, the Browns plan to suit up quarterback Johnny Manziel as Josh McCown‘s backup Sunday. That’s the wrong approach, opines the Northeast Ohio Media Group’s Bud Shaw, who believes the Browns should discipline Manziel by deactivating him for Week 6.
- In another piece regarding Manziel, Lindsay H. Jones of USA Today contends that any credibility he reestablished with the team after an offseason that included a rehab stint could be gone. She also wonders whether the second-year man’s career is now in jeopardy.
- Former UCLA linebacker Myles Jack has chosen Octagon Sports as his agency as he prepares for next spring’s draft, according to Liz Mullen of SportsBusiness Journal (Twitter link). John Thornton will represent Jack, who withdrew from UCLA earlier this month after suffering a season-ending knee injury in September. Jack is a potential first-round pick.
- There’s talk among agents that junior Arizona linebacker Scooby Wright will turn pro after this season, according to Jason Cole of Bleacher Report (via Twitter). Wright’s standout performance last year earned him All-America honors, the Pac-12 Defensive Player of the Year Award, the Jack Lambert Award (nation’s best linebacker), and the Chuck Bednarik Award (nation’s top defender).