Report: Hoyer to start for the Browns week 1

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According to ESPN's Bob Holtzman, the "feeling in the locker room" is the Browns will start Brian Hoyer in Week 1.

Holtzman expects coach Mike Pettine to make the announcement "well before" the third preseason game, which is when camp battles are usually decided. In other words, the Browns may have already internally chosen Hoyer over Johnny Manziel. "We're all expecting Hoyer to start," one player told Holtzman. There were murmurs after the draft that the coaching staff didn't want Manziel, and that he was essentially handpicked by owner Jimmy Haslam. Pettine suggested in an ESPN Cleveland interview earlier this week that Manziel could spend his rookie season as a "package quarterback," similar to how Colin Kaepernick opened his career in San Francisco, and how Donovan McNabb did in Philadelphia.

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Sources tell the Cleveland Plain Dealer the Browns have been "alarmed" by the off-field actions of Johnny Manziel since trading up to select him with the 22nd overall pick in May's draft.

Per the CPD, the team was particularly bothered by a picture that surfaced of Manziel rolling a $20 bill in a bar bathroom, suggestive of someone preparing to use snort cocaine. "Some in the organization feel he's lost ground in the quarterback competition heading into camp," adds beat reporter Mary Kay Cabot. Manziel reportedly "regressed in practice" this spring, and team brass believes it resulted from "not enough dedication to the playbook." Sources also told Cabot the Browns "have been stunned by his non-stop antics" off the field. All signs continue to point to Brian Hoyer starting Week 1.

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