By Tom Reed, The Plain Dealer
BEREA, Ohio -- In an effort to save money and trips to the supermarket, the father of Browns rookie Mitchell Schwartz purchased an industrial-sized freezer years ago and filled it with beef, chicken and fish. 
When fully stocked the unit was supposed to hold six months worth of meat for a typical family of four. The Schwartz clan was emptying it in half the time.
If only the producers of "Jon and Kate Plus Eight" had met Lee and Olivia Schwartz earlier. The food required to sate their two future NFL offensive linemen was a reality show in itself.
"I called them the mutants," Lee said. "We understood their height, but we were both surprised with how big the boys were. Geoffrey was born in the 95 (growth) percentile and stayed there. Mitchell was born in the 90 percentile and he stayed there, too."
Everything about the Browns' new offensive tackle seems super-sized, from his 6-foot-5, 318-pound frame to his size 18 feet. But what really transformed a baseball-loving teen into a second-round NFL draft pick was a prodigious appetite for learning.
Schwartz, 23, has reached the pro level, former teammates and rivals said, by focusing on his techniques and studying the tendencies of those who excel at his position.
He watched how his brother Geoff – a Minnesota Vikings offensive lineman -- used his brain as much as his body to repel blitzing linebackers and burrowing nose tackles. While at the University of California, he not only started 51 games and earned first-team All-PAC-12 honors, but welcomed summer projects that included film sessions on a future Browns teammate.
"When I got to college I started to understand how the game worked," said Schwartz, who graduated from Cal with a degree in American Studies. "Things started coming together more. You learn more about what you are doing and how it relates to the whole picture. That became a lot of fun. . . . There is so much strategy to it."
Schwartz hopes to win the starting right tackle spot opposite perennial Pro Bowler Joe Thomas, another lineman who entered the league in 2007 with a reputation for thinking the game as well as he played it.
Whether he can thrive in the punishing AFC North Division is not yet known, but the top offensive lineman taken in this year's draft believes Schwartz will become a Browns' mainstay.
"He's a great offensive lineman," said former USC standout Matt Kalil, selected fourth overall by the Vikings. "He's a very consistent pass protector and a technician. Mitchell is going to be at that position for the next 10 years."
Batter up
Quarterback Brandon Weeden isn't the only rookie in the Browns' looker room who harbored big-league pitching aspirations.
Schwartz never played after high school, but baseball was his sporting passion growing up in West Los Angeles. He was a pitcher/first baseman and a staunch San Francisco Giants supporter in the land of Dodger blue.
One of Schwartz's early conversations with Weeden, a former New York Yankees draft pick, was about their shared love of pitching.
"I couldn't bring it like him, that's for sure," Schwartz said of his quarterback. "My career flamed out way before his did."
Schwartz didn't play football until high school as his brother, now 26, began attracting college recruiters. There were several reasons for his gridiron indifference.
His father, a business consultant, and mother, an attorney, did not push their kids into athletics. They were more focused on the boys' schooling. Schwartz also was preparing for his Bar Mitzvah, a coming-of-age ritual for 13-year-old boys of the Jewish faith. (The brothers are among a handful of Jewish players in the NFL.)
Then, there was the matter of Schwartz's heft. Both brothers were simply too big for the weight requirements of their youth football leagues.
"We were off the charts," Schwartz said.
Prior to his freshman year, he decided to try out for the junior varsity football team at Palisades Charter High School. Naturally, the pitcher wanted to play quarterback.
The coach took one look at a lumberjack trapped in a ninth grader's body and agreed to anything that lured him into the program. Coming off the bench in a mop-up role, Schwartz completed his only JV pass for 30 yards before moving to the offensive line.
"I'm sure they had a plan to move me to the line in a week, they just needed to get me on the field," Schwartz said. "I transitioned pretty quick."
His teams won just nine varsity games over three years but the image of Palisades Charter is not tarnished by sub. 500 football seasons. Founded in 1965, the school has produced two Academy-Award winning actors (Jeff Bridges, Forest Whitaker), a Pulitzer-Prize winning biographer (A. Scott Berg), a five-time NBA champion (Steve Kerr), a super model (Christie Brinkley) and scores of musicians and composers.
The Brothers Schwartz might not even be the most notable sibling alumni from a school that gave pop culture the Doublemint Twins (Jean and Liz Sagel) and The Nelsons (Matthew and Gunnar).
"They have good years and bad years in athletics, but their academic program is one of the best in Los Angeles," Lee said. "That's the reason we sent the boys there."
The youngest Schwartz scored a 34 on his ACT test and was strong enough in the classroom and on the football field to earn scholarship offers from schools such as Cal, Stanford and Virginia.
His affinity for baseball aside, he abandoned the sport after his junior year. He concentrated on football and prepared for a career at Cal, a program that ran a pro-style offense and had a penchant for placing linemen in the NFL.
Yearning for learning
Schwartz's hunger for knowledge grew in Berkeley, Calif.
He took upper-level psychology classes to feed his fascination with the human condition and perused the Golden Bears playbook to understand the responsibilities of those beyond his position. His endless curiosity endeared him to coaches.
"Mitchell is competitive and he's intelligent and he wants to know what the players around him are supposed to be doing," Cal offensive line coach Jim Michalczik said. "He sets very high standards for himself and he's very consistent in his approach."
He started 35 games at left tackle and 16 games at right tackle. He spent the past two seasons on the left side, but isn't worried about making the transition.
Schwartz believes there's a correlation between book smart and football acumen. It's the ability to rapidly process information, he said, and decode the slightest movement of a linebacker or a safety in the moment before the ball is snapped.
"You want your team to be able to rely on you to do the right thing," Schwartz said. "I pride myself on not making mental mistakes."
In the off-season before his senior year, Schwartz dedicated himself to studying the habits of three elite NFL offensive tackles, Michalczik said. He started with Thomas.
"Joe is so smooth out there it almost doesn't look like he's trying," Schwartz said. "Obviously, it's an illusion, but that's how good he is, how consistent he is. There is an effortless quality about his performance."
Valuable resources
It's dangerous to over analyze rookies before they start playing exhibition games, especially on a franchise that has failed so frequently in the draft. But the Browns' best pick since their 1999 rebirth likes what he sees in Schwartz.
Thomas, a three-time All-Pro, contends the young line should be the strength of the offense for the foreseeable future and believes Schwartz's technique is superior to his as a rookie. He is expected to replace Tony Pashos, who spent two injury-filled seasons with the Browns before being released in March. Schwartz has been getting the majority of first-team reps ahead of Oniel Cousins.
"He has everything you need in a right tackle," Thomas said. "He's in meeting rooms already making calls and answering questions that frankly I'm surprised he knows the answers to."
Schwartz arrived in Cleveland armed with plenty of resources. His brother, a four-year NFL veteran, tutored him on the expectations of a first pro camp as they spent several weeks together working out at Geoff's home in Charlotte, N.C. Browns center Alex Mack, a teammate at Cal, offered him immediate locker-room familiarity.
The rookie tackle is facing an athletic pass rusher in Jabaal Sheard every day at practice. The defensive end's speed and explosiveness have given him problems at times, but it figures to ready him for the 16-game challenge ahead.
"Jabaal is a little bit of everything," Schwartz said of a defensive end who registered 8.5 sacks in his rookie season ."He's quick off the ball, he's quick in changing directions and he's got some power behind him so it's not like you can sit on one thing. It's been really good for me to go against a guy who can do so much. . . . [In college] you see guys who can do one thing very well, but it's rare when you can find a guy who can do all of it."
When Schwartz has questions about combating an opponent he won't have to leave the huddle to get them answered. Thomas should be able to counsel him through his rookie moments.
"You are talking about the best tackle in the NFL," Schwartz said. "There is a lot of stuff he does in the NFL that is different than other guys. It's awesome to have him there and to ask him why he does certain things on certain plays."
If all goes well, Weeden will owe his offensive line a few dinners. Lee Schwartz might be willing to sell him an industrial-sized freezer on the cheap.
http://www.cleveland.com/browns/index.ssf/2012/08/cleveland_browns_rookie_tackle.html
