While the Cleveland Browns play the waiting game on receiver Josh Gordon's availability in 2014, general manager Ray Farmer is downplaying the importance of a dominant receiver.
"I would say 'how important are those guys?'" Farmer told WKRK-FM in Cleveland, per The Plain Dealer. "Name the last big-time receiver to win a Super Bowl. Name the last mega-guy. (Gordon) matters to me because I like the guy and I think he's a really good player, but at the end of the day, when you look at the teams that have these mega-receivers, name the last guy that won a Super Bowl?... There are none. The last guy that really helped his team get there was T.O. (Terrell Owens)."
It's true that a superstar receiver isn't a panacea. Calvin Johnson hasn't cured the decades of illness the Detroit Lions have suffered.
Farmer's comments, however, downplay the significance of Gordon in the Browns' offense. The plan to plug in the likes of Nate Burleson, Miles Austin and Earl Bennett is a faulty one. However, sprinkling sugar on the rotten situation is the only way for Farmer to stomach it.
"If a guy is a mega-talent, you're not just going to go out on the street and find another one," he said. "If a guy is not there, you've got to parcel it... You've got to take a guy that can play a variety of roles and then you hodgepodge it. You move guys around, you put them in different situations, you use a rotation.''
Thursday morning on "NFL AM," coach Mike Pettine said that not just one receiver will be looked at to replace Gordon if he's forced to miss time.
"We know that there is not any one player out there that would potentially replace Josh if that is the case," he said. "And we'll have to do it a little bit by committee, but that's something that we've certainly planned for."
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