Football centers are most valuable when not noticed. Their job is to make it easier for other players to receive glory – usually a running back or a quarterback. When a center is noticed, it is usually not a good thing. When the center malfunctions, plays break down.

And when a mainstay center like Alex Mack finally is knocked out of the lineup, the equilibrium of the offense backs up like a blocked toilet. It happened last year in Game 5 against Pittsburgh after Mack had performed for 5,189 consecutive plays — never missing a play even during an appendicitis attack in a 2010 game.

Mack was at the center of the highest and the lowest moments of the Browns’ season last year. He suffered a broken leg during the Browns’ 31-10 defeat of the Pittsburgh Steelers – their biggest rout at home of their chief rival in 25 years.

via Tony Grossi of ESPNCleveland.com