Players defuse Browns brawl

Francies: Locker room scuffle

He's a rookie, he's young. He should have put it in the right context. I trust the guys I talked to. I talked to him afterward, and he said, 'I should have handled it differently.'

Eric Mangini
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Cleveland Browns players were involved in a surprising locker room scuffle in front of the watching media - but later insisted it was all just a prank gone wrong.

Rookie cornerback Coye Francies was the man angered by a prank played on him, and responded by throwing some ice and throwing a punch during the ensuing scuffle.

To make matters worse, the incident took place after practice when the locker room was still open to the media.

Francies was soaked with water by team-mates, and was furious as he entered the locker room and threw a bucket of ice cubs at cornerback Brandon McDonald and safety Mike Adams before swinging some punches at safety Abram Elam.

He was then grabbed and dragged out of the room threw a side door by as other players converged on the scene.

Atmosphere

Although the atmosphere inside the locker room has been described as turning serious by observers, the players were keen to play down the incident later.

"It was just guys having fun," McDonald said. "I was the first one he saw. He got a little aggressive, it's no big deal.

"We handled it. It's over now, and we're going to worry about the Ravens. We don't want to have any misconceptions in the locker room.

"So that's it. We took care of it, and we're moving on."

Francies took some time to calm down, but before heading to coach Eric Mangini's office to explain himself, he too tried to defuse the situation.

"It's all just fun and games," he insisted. "We were just playing around."

Coach call

Coach Mangini says he has talked with all the players and is confident it was just a prank gone wrong - maybe the pressure of starting the season 0-2 is starting to tell on the team.

"I said, 'Was there anything malicious about this? Is there something deeper here?'" Mangini said. "And to a man, they said, 'No, it was nothing like that.'

"He's a rookie, he's young. He should have put it in the right context. I trust the guys I talked to. I talked to him afterward, and he said, 'I should have handled it differently.'"

After losing both games so far this season, Cleveland now have to take on the tough Baltimore Ravens on Sunday.

Star running back Jamal Lewis is a big doubt for the game after failing to practice all week through injury.