Bittersweet homecoming for Hawks QB

Twenty-two minutes, 8 seconds. That's all the time Charlie Frye got in the Browns pocket this season.

Seven possessions, 10 pass attempts and then a hook halfway through the second quarter of the first game. Sitcoms last longer than Frye's final start for his hometown team.

"I decided in those 20 minutes that we weren't playing well enough," coach Romeo Crennel said. "And I felt like the team needed a change."

The Browns turned to Derek Anderson and Frye was gone. Not just on the bench. Gone. The Browns didn't put him in the recycling bin. They set him out on the curb and traded him three time zones away from the only state he ever called home for a sixth-round draft pick from Seattle.

"Any change like that is hard," Frye said. "It would be hard for anybody. [But] this is the NFL and the way free agency and trades work nowadays, nothing surprises you."

Still, this was unprecedented, the only time since the 1970 merger that an NFL team traded its opening-day starter at quarterback before the second game.

And now Frye is in Seattle, a third-string quarterback with the two suitcases of clothing he brought with him while the man who replaced him ranks second in the NFL in touchdown passes.

That makes Sunday's game a little awkward. Frye is going back to Cleveland with the Seahawks, returning to the stadium where he took so many lumps the past two years. He'll hold a clipboard for Seattle while Anderson stands behind an offensive line that stands stronger than it ever did in front of Frye.

It would be silly to imply the Browns made a mistake. They're on pace to set a franchise record for points. But there's something a little coldhearted about the whole story. Frye grew up in Ohio, went to Akron and played his way into being drafted by the team he cheered for as a kid. He absorbed all sorts of punishment trying to stand tall in the Browns pocket the past two seasons and is now a third-string quarterback across the country while his former team is tasting success.

Frye still owns a house in Cleveland, but this isn't really a homecoming. No one has asked for tickets, he said. He's not playing.

"Going back there a week or two after it happened, it would have been real weird for me," Frye said. "But I've kind of settled in out here."

The Steelers sacked Frye five times in that first game, but the trade two days later was the hit the quarterback never saw coming.

"I don't think anybody realized that rope was going to be that short," he said. "But that's the way it went down."

Able to bounce back

Frye wore a Superman T-shirt beneath his jersey in college at Akron, and that's just how he played.

"He would have played defense if we had let him," said Lee Owens, Frye's college coach.

Frye owed his football career to an ability to rebound from big licks. His high-school team at Willard went 3-7 his junior season, then won 10 games his senior year and reached the third round of the playoffs.

His coach was knocked out of play-calling duties for about three series one game Frye's senior season, suffering a knee injury after a player was blocked into him. Frye called the plays the next three possessions.

"I should have been fired because we scored three touchdowns," joked Chris Hawkins, Frye's high-school coach.

Schools like Iowa State came calling after Frye's senior success, but a sense of commitment was woven deep into Frye's makeup. He stood by Akron.

"He was a real loyal person," Owens said.

Owens was with Frye on draft night when the Browns chose him in the third round.

"It was like a dream," Owens said.

Well, not everything. Frye became the starter the end of his rookie season and won two games, but Cleveland's offensive line functioned more like a turnstile than a wall last year. The Browns gave up 56 sacks and the offense didn't roll so much as it skidded down the street. Only the Raiders gained fewer yards.

The Browns hired a new offensive coordinator in the offseason — their third in Frye's three seasons. They drafted Brady Quinn in the first round this season, but he held out and Crennel held a competition between Anderson and Frye.

"I tried to be as fair as I could about giving them both the opportunity to show what they could do," Crennel said.

He flipped a coin to decide who would start the first exhibition game.

The Browns had a new offensive coordinator and a newfound stiffness along the offensive line with Eric Steinbach and No. 3 overall pick Joe Thomas.

Eventually, Frye was named the starter for the season opener. That lasted 22:08.

No "ill feelings"

Two hours. That's how long Frye got that Tuesday after learning the Browns traded him to Seattle. Two hours to get to the airport for the afternoon flight.

"Just throw as much stuff as I could in a bag and get out here and get to practice," Frye said.

His phone rang at the airport. Safety Brian Russell was on the other end. They were teammates in Cleveland the past two years. Russell's wife heard about the trade on the radio.

"I thought this could be a blessing in disguise for him," Russell said. "At the time he was frustrated. He had just been the starting quarterback for that team, but I think he realizes now that it's a great environment for him to learn and improve.

"It's going to be a long career for Charlie."

A player doesn't get from Akron to the NFL without knowing how to shake off a big hit. How Frye bounces back from this one will determine whether this is a speed bump in his career or an offramp.

"I don't hold any ill feelings," Frye said.

He has a chance to learn the offense of Mike Holmgren, a coach known for his work with quarterbacks. It's a fresh start for a 26-year-old quarterback with 19 NFL starts.

"I'm finally away from the hometown a little bit," he said. "Just to focus really on football. You don't have the people asking you for tickets every week and everybody pulling you one way or another every day."

Twenty-two minutes decided Frye's season in Cleveland, not necessarily the rest of his career. He's not a starter anymore. He's not even a backup. But he's here in Seattle, with plenty of room to grow and some distance from all that history back in Ohio.

Danny O'Neil: 206-464-2364 or doneil@seattletimes.com