tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-303001362024-03-15T15:36:03.986-04:00Wait 'til Next Year, Again...The lifelong lament of the Cleveland Sports FanGary Benzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10578834252235902676noreply@blogger.comBlogger877125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30300136.post-77176365479213122412017-12-20T17:30:00.000-05:002017-12-20T18:01:32.709-05:00Running Out of Paths Forward<br />
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There are many ways to measure the depths to which the
Cleveland Browns’ franchise has sunk as of December, 2017. You could count
quarterbacks or head coaches, offensive coordinators or general managers.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You could even count owners.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Mostly though it’s just been the losses.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Losses and more losses and then more after
that.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It used to be that this team could
be counted on to win 3 games a year.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Now
it can’t even win three games in two years. </div>
<br />
<div style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
Too many to count at this point have had a hand in creating
the single worst franchise in all of professional sports.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Yet the alarming, almost inconceivable
consistency in making the exact wrong decision every single fucking time is
perhaps the best way to capture not just the ineptness that is the Browns but
the serial incompetence that permeates each and every pore on each and every
coach, player and front office worker, that has seeped into the brick and
marble, wood and stone that hold together the Berea complex. </div>
<br />
<div style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
You’d think that simply going full tilt George Costanza and
doing the opposite of what their instincts otherwise tell them is the right
thing to do would be enough to at least make this franchise competitive.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But at its core those in charge, from owner
Jimmy Haslam on down, lack even a modicum of Costanza’s fleeting self-awareness.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Not to be too impolite here, but they are
just too stupid to recognize all that they don’t know. </div>
<br />
<div style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
That’s why it should concern the few remaining chuckleheads
with an interest in this team’s success that newly hired general manager John
Dorsey shut down any talk about head coach Hue Jackson being fired at season’s
end.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Let me give you two data points. </div>
<br />
<div style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
In 2006, in this very same space, I wrote that Romeo
Crennel, then head coach, had to be fired.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>It was clear that Crennel had lost the team and that its trajectory was
headed, again, in the wrong direction.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>You don’t need to look it up.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Crennel won 6 games in 2005 and 4 in 2006.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He held on to his job anyway.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The next year he took the Browns to their
Browns 2.0 high water mark by winning 10 games, a record grossly inflated by weird
scheduling quirks that gave the team the easiest schedule in the NFL that
season.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Still it was a real glimmer of
hope even if the Browns didn’t make the playoffs that year.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But the flaws in the team were apparent when
a 10-win season gave them a tougher schedule the following year.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Crennel and the Browns sunk back to 4 wins and
he was fired for all the reasons that still existed two years later: he couldn’t
control the team, he was disorganized.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>In short he proved out exactly why after having such success as a
defensive coordinator no team but Cleveland was willing to make him a head
coach. </div>
<br />
<div style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
Meanwhile, by hanging on to Crennel, the Browns lost two
more seasons to progress, two more seasons of choosing the wrong players for a
system that wasn’t going to last anyway. </div>
<br />
<div style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
Fast forward, but just a little bit.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>After Crennel was fired, then owner Randy
Lerner jumped at the chance to hire Eric Mangini about 5 minutes after Mangini
had been fired by the New York Jets.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Mangini flamed out in New York for much the same reason he can’t get
another head coaching job today.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He’s arrogant
to a fault without a scintilla of accomplishment to justify it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Mangini came in and alienated players and
fans before he even had a chance to rent a place to live. He was allowed to
essentially hire his own boss as the general manager and then summarily fired
him and acted as his own general manager instead.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A wave of poor personnel decisions inevitably
followed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>His first season was a
disaster and not just because he won only 5 games.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He was a dick to the players and the media
which only served to create further separation between a struggling team and its
way-to-loyal fan base. </div>
<br />
<div style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
Late in the season even Lerner could see that the wheels had
fallen off and decided that this team needed a real “football” mind.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He brought in Mike Holmgren, not as the head
coach, but as the team’s effective CEO.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Holmgren was a good concept poorly executed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He had a chance to observe Mangini’s
pettiness in action and while nearly everyone thought Holmgren would fire Mangini
and replace him, Holmgren, in a fit of empathy as a former coach himself,
decided Mangini should have another year to prove himself, never mind the
smoldering embers of a franchise that already had been lit on fire once again. </div>
<br />
<div style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
All that did was delay, again, putting this franchise on
better footing. </div>
<br />
<div style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
One of the lessons of these two episodes is that holding on
to the wrong coach in the pursuit of continuity is as much a fool’s errand as turning
over a team’s personnel department to a group that had never made a football
decision in its life.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Stability,
continuity, consistency, whatever you want to call it, is a laudable goal.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But it shouldn’t serve to obscure the fact that
if things aren’t right they’re wrong. </div>
<br />
<div style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
The question now, of course, is whether Jackson should
retain his job.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Those arguing for him
point out the obvious: this team has the worst collection of players ever to
grace any NFL roster ever.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Those calling
for his firing point out the obvious:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Jackson has the worst record of any head coach ever.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s the most Cleveland of dilemmas,
complicated, of course, by Haslam bringing on a general manager and yet giving
him no authority to find a coach that can win a game. </div>
<br />
<div style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
Maybe Haslam is just tired of paying coaches no longer on
the payroll.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Maybe Haslam is just being
Haslam, meaning telling someone what he wants to hear in the moment.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But the most likely explanation is that
Haslam meant it when he said it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Which,
as it usually does with Haslman, means that it may not be true the next
moment.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He’s as impetuous as anything
and everything associated with the Browns.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>It would be useful if that could be counted on just one more time. </div>
<br />
<div style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
Jackson should be fired.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>There’s no way to know definitively but I doubt that any other coach
currently in the NFL would have ended up with only one win in two years.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The roster is as bad as it looks each
week.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Outside of Joe Thomas there isn’t
another player on this team who would be a sure starter on any other team in
the league.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But not every loss has
simply been an issue of talent. Jackson is overmatched. He’s not a good enough
head coach even if he was just concentrating on being a head coach.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Acting as his own offensive coordinator has
been a colossal failure but more to the point is that Jackson lacks the
self-assessment skills to realize it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<br />
<div style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
You could literally cite any game in Jackson’s tenure to
make the point but just look at Sunday’s loss to Baltimore.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Crowell had 1 carry in the first quarter that
went for 59 yards.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He had 6 more carries
the rest of the game.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Jackson may be
calling plays but it can hardly be said that he’s coordinating the
offense.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There is no theme, there is no
approach.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s almost as if he doesn’t
watch game film on the upcoming opponent to create a plan of attack.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<br />
<div style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
There’s probably a more practical reason, however, that
Jackson will get fired: attendance.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Losing
so much for so long has deteriorated the base of this franchise.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There was a point where it looked as if
nothing would keep Browns fans from the ‘80s from filling the Stadium no matter
how bad the product got.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s not
true.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Indeed what is true is that
attendance has continued to deteriorate and the clip, just since Haslam arrived,
has accelerated.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<br />
<div style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
During Haslam’s tenure, this team has lost around 59,000
fans year over year.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>To put that in
perspective, the attendance at Sunday’s game against Baltimore, the last home
game of the season, was a little over 57,000.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>In other words, Haslam is losing the equivalent of another home game’s
worth of attendance.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s not just
money out of his pocket.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s costing other
NFL owners as well.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Haslam must account
for that to his brethren. Always a short term thinker anyway, expect Haslam to
choose the quickest path in front of him and fire the coach.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It will create a year’s worth of enthusiasm
if nothing else.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<span style="font-family: "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 12pt;"> Fundamentally, though, the issues are more
systemic.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Jackson’s firing will probably
feel like a pardon to him and the fans who have no one else to complain about
on a regular basis.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Jackson will survive
in the league as an assistant somewhere and the Browns will once again find
another coach, another system and another start.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But the fixes that need to get made are
longer term in nature and start with Haslam.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>He’s a terrible decision maker, at least when it comes to football, and
he needs to embrace his own level of incompetence.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If he truly believes that John Dorsey is the
right football person to run the team then, dammit, let him run the team.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Change the org chart.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Let him hire a legitimate head coach.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Make everyone report to Dorsey and Dorsey to
Haslam. Then Haslam should sell the house in Bratenhal and commute every Sunday
from Tennessee.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It really is the only
hope.</span><div class="blogger-post-footer">google_ad_client = "pub-0329689737263823";
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google_ad_channel ="";</div>Gary Benzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10578834252235902676noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30300136.post-25871113320703098392017-10-24T18:00:00.000-04:002017-10-25T09:17:30.949-04:00Springsteen on Broadway<br />
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<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-jrXZpXQfwr8/We-IASO5iwI/AAAAAAAACB4/-J3_I1lNie49gFzusAJlnKQiRn2ipinhwCLcBGAs/s1600/springsteen%2Bon%2Bbroadway%2B2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="789" data-original-width="700" height="400" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-jrXZpXQfwr8/We-IASO5iwI/AAAAAAAACB4/-J3_I1lNie49gFzusAJlnKQiRn2ipinhwCLcBGAs/s400/springsteen%2Bon%2Bbroadway%2B2.jpg" width="354" /></a>Sometimes it all just makes sense.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s the most dominant thought I’ve been contemplating
for the last few days following the remarkable, stunning, beautiful show Bruce
Springsteen performed at Broadway’s Walter Kerr Theater on Saturday night.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There was clarity achieved, a state of mind deeply
contrasted with the usual unsettled mind that had invaded nearly a year ago. </div>
<br />
<div style="border-image: none; margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
I can’t tell you exactly how the pieces all fell into place,
can’t tell you if they’ll stay there and can’t really say it wasn’t all just a
dream.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I do know that for those two plus
hours on Saturday night and for the many hours since, life made sense for all
the reasons life doesn’t seem to make much sense most of the time these
days.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You can fall wherever you want on
the political spectrum, I tilt decidedly left, but you can’t help but
acknowledge how unsettled each day seems to be.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>A candidate who promised to disrupt the Washington D.C. status quo if
elected has instead disrupted much of the status quo of the nation.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Nothing seems safe, nothing seems sacred and
it’s becoming increasingly difficult to understand who we are, what we’ll do
and what we won’t. </div>
<br />
<div style="border-image: none; margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
Yet somewhere around 8:15 p.m. on Saturday night, life
gelled again and the feeling carried over and into the next day and then the
next, dissipating some but resilient enough to keep comfort still.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I imagine with time the mostly jumbled mess
will return.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For now, though, I’ll
enjoy. </div>
<br />
<div style="border-image: none; margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
To say that Springsteen’s performance was a revelation is
far too much of an understatement.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s
probably not even the right word.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Springsteen is a known commodity after all.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But there is still the power to amaze, to
educate and, yes, to reveal greater truths, to shake you out of the stupor and
haze that envelops. </div>
<br />
<div style="border-image: none; margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
I’ll admit, I’m an uber fan, unquestionably.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Another writer once chastised others who
tried to establish street cred by tossing out the number of Springsteen shows
attended, so I won’t.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Let’s just say
that this is a carnival I’ve followed many, many times from the late
1970s.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And while I’ve borne witness to
every kind of Springsteen show imaginable, nothing before it and yet everything
before it set me up for what’s taking place 5 times a week on Broadway. </div>
<br />
<div style="border-image: none; margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
It’s not a spoiler alert to say that Springsteen on Broadway
is no rock concert or greatest hits show.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>It owes far more to the tradition of great Broadway musicals than one
might suspect and yet it’s bent and twisted that typical construct in ways that
could influence musical theater for years to come. </div>
<br />
<div style="border-image: none; margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
The show is Springsteen’s recent autobiography, Born to Run,
come alive in wholly unanticipated ways. In almost linear fashion it follows
Springsteen’s rise from a young misfit in Freehold, NJ, molded mostly by the
dynamic of a late-in-life discovered mentally ill father and preternaturally
cheerful and optimistic mother.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s not
the usual celebrity biopic arc of a talented kid driven off course by drugs or
booze or evil management only to rehabilitate and rise again.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s the story that’s far more typical to
most everyone’s existence.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You get the
sense as he tells the story that Springsteen is as much mystified by not just
its roots but its outcome as anyone. </div>
<br />
<div style="border-image: none; margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
Threaded through the various soliloquies are roughly 14 or
so songs chosen, in the tradition of great musical theater, specifically to
advance the larger narrative.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is
not a concert. It’s a drama, it’s a comedy, it’s life and it’s punctuated with
the best soundtrack imaginable.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“Growin’
Up,” the lead single from his first album provides the overview of the story
but throughout the music, familiar to the hardcore fans but perhaps much less
known to the more casual fans, perfectly captured the essence of life that
remains mostly a mystery to Springsteen.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>There were songs of life, love, sex, hope, dread and daily living. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Playing either his guitar or seated at the
piano and accompanied by his wife, Patty Scialfa for two songs, Springsteen
coaxed deceptively ornate arrangements from the simplified acoustic set up. </div>
<br />
<div style="border-image: none; margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
There wasn’t necessarily any one moment when your jaw just
dropped because, frankly, the jaw dropped from the opening words to the closing
chords of Born to Run and didn’t fully engage until hours later.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It was a Halley’s Comet kind of night.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You knew you were witnessing something that
occurs maybe once in a lifetime and it’s almost impossible to place it into
historical context except as an outlier. </div>
<br />
<div style="border-image: none; margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
But what is very clear is that this really isn’t a show that
Springsteen could have performed at any other time in his life.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Springsteen’s story isn’t completed,
certainly.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But the life that’s been
lived is full and rich enough to inform whatever chapters remain without
disrupting the overarching themes.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The
sheer bravery of the performance is likely what I’ll remember most.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Springsteen spent some time talking about the
masks one wears in life as a suggestion for a philosophy he adopted long ago,
trust the art not the artist.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But the
ability to honestly connect requires equal measures of bravery and
honesty.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So much of what it takes to be
a master performer is the ability to create that credible façade.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That ability is hard earned, indeed only
earned, if you’re willing to lay your truth bare for others to see and
contemplate for themselves. You wear the mask but sooner or later it just
becomes your life. </div>
<br />
<div style="border-image: none; margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
That Springsteen recognizes this inherent irony is evident
from the outset.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Self-deprecating almost
to a fault, he “jokes” at various points about being a person who has written
extensively about the working man without ever having held an honest job; about
writing about cars while not even having a driver’s license; about running and
yearning to be free and now living about 10 minutes from where he grew up. </div>
<br />
<div style="border-image: none; margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
The audience, of course, gets the joke while also giving him
supreme credit for doing the incredibly hard work of being a gifted observer
and journalist, finding the truth in every day life and communicating it in a
way that resonates.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If his songs aren’t
purely autobiographical, they are well informed by his life and the many that
surround him.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>To take the little truths
and broaden them into something more universal for others to learn their own
truths is every bit as honest and hard labor as those that dig the ditches. </div>
<br />
<div style="border-image: none; margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
When it’s over, though, you’re left in the same place he is:
contemplating the magic and mystery of life.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Why him and how?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Malcolm
Gladwell, in his book “Blink,” writes about the ability to create seemingly out
of thin air, about not letting your conscious self interfere too much with the
internal computer that guides one’s ability to think, judge, and react.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s a difficult task for most but leaves you
almost gasping for air when you see it in others.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span> </div>
<br />
<div style="border-image: none; margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
And that’s where it left me, two hours later, gasping for
air.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There were any number of moments
when I was left teary-eyed by not just the moment but the collection of moments
from all the shows, all the music, all the time, really, that I had invested
over the decades. It was life affirming and not because any greater truths were
necessarily revealed but because all the truths on which I had relied were
confirmed. </div>
<br />
<div style="border-image: none; margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
In a particularly poignant moment in a night built on
poignancy, Springsteen alludes to the current political strife without naming
names.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>While acknowledging how
unsettling it all is, he sees it as just a dark chapter in a much larger book
while then launching into perhaps both his greatest and most underrated song, “Long
Walk Home.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That was the moment I
realized that it all made sense.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Days
later, it still does.</div>
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<br />
<div style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
If you’re going to come out of retirement, even briefly, it
should be for a very good reason.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A year
ago, almost to the day, I took a break.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The Cleveland Browns were setting themselves for historic failure,
again, and the numbing sameness became too much.</div>
<br />
<div style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
</div>
<br />
<div style="border-image: none; margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
<a href="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-cj7VqJOy7QM/WaclO5pLRLI/AAAAAAAACBg/fLC925WH4jwluFWQBq5lAMqqk6AE7_E3ACLcBGAs/s1600/Joe_Haden_2015.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1479" data-original-width="1200" height="320" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-cj7VqJOy7QM/WaclO5pLRLI/AAAAAAAACBg/fLC925WH4jwluFWQBq5lAMqqk6AE7_E3ACLcBGAs/s320/Joe_Haden_2015.jpg" width="259" /></a>The Cleveland Indians got themselves to the very edge of a
World Series victory and that didn’t pull me back in, although the victory
probably would have.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Cleveland
Cavaliers getting into the NBA Finals didn’t do it either.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And yet here we are a year later and I was
pulled back in by this:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Today the Browns
released beloved cornerback and all around good guy Joe Haden.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s not the loss of Haden so much as what it
represents.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s the clearest signal
that Browns finally are serious about improving.</div>
<br />
<div style="border-image: none; margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
</div>
<br />
<div style="border-image: none; margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
This shouldn’t be a pitchfork moment for anyone.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Stripped of sentimentality Haden has been in
decline for years. That decline accelerated most certainly because of injuries
but the decline has been clear nonetheless.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>It’s been a bit sad watching it because Haden was one of the few
positive things about watching the Browns for many, many seasons.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But the game takes its toll on all players
and Haden’s time has come. He wasn’t worth the $11 million he would have been
paid for this year and he wasn’t willing to take a pay cut to a more reasonable
number. </div>
<br />
<div style="border-image: none; margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
</div>
<br />
<div style="border-image: none; margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
By releasing Haden now the Browns showed the cold
heartedness best exhibited by Bill Belichick and the New England Patriots, the
benchmark for the entire league.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s
better to move on from a player just before he’s done then after.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Many consider Belichick the consummate prick
because he is so willing to cast aside team and fan favorites in the pursuit of
victory.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The list is long and
distinguished but know this much: Belichick has rarely if ever been wrong.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The players he’s discarded have not gone on
to prolonged glory anywhere else.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Either
will Haden, despite all the nonguaranteed and less money showered on him by the
Pittsburgh Steelers.</div>
<br />
<div style="border-image: none; margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
</div>
<br />
<div style="border-image: none; margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
There’s little doubt that Haden would probably have
contributed something to this year’s defense.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>He’s a good player to have in the locker room and was a visible and
positive influence in the community. There’s also little doubt that his
contributions, whatever they may have been, wouldn’t have made a lick of
difference in the won/loss column which, as Belichick knows, cures fans’ hurt
feelings more quickly than anything else. The Browns may be improving, slowly,
but having Haden simply doesn’t move the needle.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What his release does do, for once, is give
the Browns an opportunity to find a replacement without the baggage and temptation
to appease a complaining fan base to play a fan favorite at the expense of
developing the future.</div>
<br />
<div style="border-image: none; margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
</div>
<br />
<div style="border-image: none; margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
The other news the Browns made today was the dumping of a
number one draft pick, offensive linemen Cameron Erving, to Kansas City for a 5<sup>th</sup>
round pick.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s good value any way
you slice it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If/when the Chiefs have to
play Erving they’ll find out something every Browns quarterback who lined up
behind him did.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Don’t run any plays in
his direction.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Design every quarterback
rollout to go in the opposite direction.</div>
<br />
<div style="border-image: none; margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
</div>
<br />
<div style="border-image: none; margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
Dumping Erving will make far less noise than when the team
parted ways with Johnny Football but it’s no less noteworthy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When it comes to offensive linemen, first
round busts are hard to find.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They
exist, certainly, and there’s little doubt that the Browns would be the one
team to find one.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But they are hard to
find.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Indeed it’s one of the easier
positions to scout.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Cleveland.com posted
the press conference when a leading candidate for worst general manager in
Browns’ history, Ray Farmer, touted Ervin’s incredible versatility.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That video is revealing also for the shell-shocked
look on former head coach Mike Pettine’s face as he tried in vain to support
that thesis.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<br />
<div style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
</div>
<br />
<div style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
That commentary aged about as well as a Trump tweet.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The only versatility Erving showed was that
he was an unworthy first round pick at any position along the offensive
line.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But know this.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Erving was every bit the bust as
Manziel.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He simply went about being so
in a much quieter fashion.</div>
<br />
<div style="border-image: none; margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
</div>
<br />
<div style="border-image: none; margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
None of this means the Browns will necessarily show
significant improvement this season.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The
team does have an incredible number of upcoming draft picks though and while
virtually every regime since the Browns 2.0 were launched has blown the vast
majority of picks they’ve had, there still is hope.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Success in the NFL is a slow, steady
climb.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It takes the kind of thinking
that understands the value of draft picks, the need to not be ruled by
sentimentality and the courage to correct mistakes quickly.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Let’s hope all of this doesn’t end up being
an anomaly, you know like it’s been in the past.</div>
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<a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-TSCQ3BO6g1k/V8RdTZ5bdBI/AAAAAAAACAo/7xm3JkbVA-s_81BZRHhFe41UBqJ_wwxsgCLcB/s1600/Hue%2BJackson.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="225" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-TSCQ3BO6g1k/V8RdTZ5bdBI/AAAAAAAACAo/7xm3JkbVA-s_81BZRHhFe41UBqJ_wwxsgCLcB/s400/Hue%2BJackson.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
If Cleveland Browns head coach Hue Jackson doesn’t think that the sky is falling in after Friday night’s preseason debacle against the Tampa Bay Bucaneers it’s only because he knows the sky fell in long before he got here. Indeed, if you’re a big picture person you could say the sky collapsed the very first game of the Browns 2.0 reboot, a 43-0 loss to Pittsburgh, and the ensuing 17 years have been about trying to find a way to prop it back up.<br />
<br />
Don’t look for Jackson and the latest excavation crew he’s leading to add many support beams this season. Either the Browns are the least talented team I’ve ever seen or the least prepared. It doesn’t matter, really, just as it doesn’t matter if it’s really a combination of both. This is a team that went 3-13 in 1999, went 3-13 last season, and will struggle to get to that record this season. This version of the Browns, as woeful as any in franchise history, will not be favored in any game this season, of course. But perusing their schedule I can’t find a game where they’re likely to be less than a 7-point underdog. I’m sure that’s happened in the NFL at some other point, probably this same franchise in 1999.<br />
<br />
What’s most intriguing though is that despite this franchise consistently offering its fans zero reasons to remain invested in their fortunes, interest is far higher in the Browns right now that the Indians who enter the last month of the season with a 4 ½ game lead in their division. Not that local sports talk radio is any sort of accurate barometer, but Browns fans and questions seem to run at least 2-1 vs. Indians fans and questions. Attendance on the other hand is a more accurate barometer and the Browns outdrew the Indians and it had nothing to do with the larger capacity at FirstEnergy Stadium.<br />
But this isn’t a screed about misplaced fan priorities. It’s not even a screed of any sort. It’s just the resignation that once again the fans with all their misplaced priorities are going to be misused, abused and told that despite what their eyes can see this is a team with a future.<br />
<br />
At some point this might actually be a team with a future. But that future can’t ever arrive if the team doesn’t ever draft one. This preseason has been about purging the team of the previous regime’s awful draft choices, creating openings for this regime’s shaky draft choices. And while it is well too early to judge whether Corey Coleman or any of the 13 others drafted will be able to meaningfully contribute not just this season but ever, the trend is clear making the chances slim.<br />
<br />
But because almost every draft pick from a previous regime has been sent packing, along with most of their free agent signings, this is a team that lacks not just depth but any semblance of depth. After Joe Haden and Joe Thomas and Josh Gordon if or when he actually can suit up in a regular season game, you’d be hard pressed to find a player on this team who would start on any other team in the league. What that says about how this team’s been run is plenty, but the larger point for now is that the overwhelming majority of this team’s starters would be back ups elsewhere. Backing up the Browns’ starters, then, are players that might not even be in the league.<br />
<br />
Without any depth anywhere, the team is doomed before it takes the field. Injuries will take their toll, as they do on every team. The next person up for the Browns is most likely a person who’d be scrounging for work in the Arena League.<br />
<br />
Jackson is a good coach and thus far his attitude is appropriate. He knows exactly what a shit storm he walked into and seems realistic enough to lower the expectations of not just the fans but the players remaining. In some sense this entire season will play out like an extended preseason schedule. Players will rotate in and out. Combinations will be tried. Some things will work, most won’t. But when the season’s done if there has been measurable growth, if more than a handful of this year’s draft choices remain and are contributing, then from Jackson’s standpoint he’ll likely label the season a success even if there aren’t any wins to celebrate.<br />
<br />
The problem from the fans’ standpoint, at least those willing to buy tickets, is that they’re being asked to invest full price to witness the continuing sins of bad ownership and lousy front offices. From their perspective they, too, may see some measurable growth but what will remain abundantly clear is that even at that trajectory the Browns remain several years away from being truly competitive, and that’s assuming that this regime, top to bottom, bucks history and stays intact for more than a season or two. Who wants to take that bet at even odds?<br />
<br />
Jackson said after Friday’s game that he wasn’t overwhelmed by the task in front of him even after witnessing his untalented and ill prepared team fail in every possible way. Who knows whether he’s even being truthful with himself. What we do know is that the enormity of the task has swallowed up every owner, general manager and head coach who’s come before him in the last 16 years. What will really be worth watching then is Jackson’s body language as the season wears on and especially after the inevitable beat down at the hands of the Steelers in game 16. If Jackson can keep that spring in his step, then he will be a coach worth watching, at least until the front office fails him in next year’s draft.<br />
<br />
So what we’re all really left with once again is a team that will not just be hard to watch, but almost impossible, particularly in the second half of most early games and both halves of the latter part of the season. We’re also left once again scraping for any hope or even glimmer of hope, a long TD pass from Robert Griffin III to Corey Coleman, a breakout season for Terrelle Pryor, another Joe Thomas Pro Bowl, so that at some point all this time, money and passion will be rewarded. That’s not the best way to start off the Monday leading into the last preseason game, but it’s really all Browns fans have, again.<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div class="blogger-post-footer">google_ad_client = "pub-0329689737263823";
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google_ad_channel ="";</div>Gary Benzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10578834252235902676noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30300136.post-17203559164468729712016-03-12T14:22:00.000-05:002016-03-12T14:22:45.559-05:00Free Agent Follies--Browns Town Edition<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/oMc1Ao8tKQs" width="420"></iframe> <span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 107%;">So ESPN’s
Adam Schefter is mocking the Cleveland Browns because they lost four players
almost as soon as the bell rung to start the free agent season? </span><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 107%;"> </span><br />
<span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 107%;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 107%;">Welcome to the party, Adam.</span><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 107%;"> </span><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 107%;">Just know you’re a late arrival and all the
good slams have long since been taken.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 107%;"><br /></span>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">That the
Browns lost 4 players to free agency doesn’t much qualify as news let alone as
an indictment of the worst franchise in football and likely in all of professional
sports. The Browns already have so many
indictments hanging over their heads that adding one to the mix doesn’t even
move the needle, not even a little, not even at all.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">For this to
even be a concern someone, including Schefter, would have to tell me why losing
any four players on this team could possibly be impactful to the Browns. With these players the team has kept its
yearly win average at around 4, an average that’s been as rock solid as
anything can be when it comes to sports.
Are fans worried this team will actually take a step back? I’ve got news for Schefter and the others who
agree with him. There are no steps back
to take. The Browns are at the very
bottom, whether judged by culture or results.
There’s no place to which to sink and the loss of any 4 players isn’t
going to change that one iota.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">I guess the
best argument one could must is that these four—Alex Mack, Mitchell Swartz,
Travis Benjamin, Tashaun Gipson—are in some sense building blocks, players good
enough to help the team take a meaningful step forward when surrounded by
similar blocks. A couple have been to
the Pro Bowl, a couple are still relatively young. All true, but so what?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Losing them
does create new holes at a time when the latest regime is busy trying to plug
the gaping ones that already existed nearly everywhere else on the team. Nothing new in that, and besides, what’s a
few more holes anyway? Even with the
latest escapees this team wasn’t going to be significantly, and perhaps not
even modestly, better next year anyway.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Let’s try
just once not to get overly involved in that grand Cleveland tradition of
overvaluing the players on our perennially losing team. At the price they played for last year the
team was still awful. It’s hard to
imagine how giving them even more money will suddenly make the team better.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">No one,
including the teams these four signed with, are building teams around any of
these free agents. They’re nice haves,
not have to haves. Eating up cap space
by overpaying your own free agents when there are probably cheaper alternatives
with similar production is a better way to build a team in the long run
anyway. It’s just that in Cleveland fans
have been so beaten down by institutional incompetence that they knee jerk
their way to thinking that this team can’t sustain the loss of Mitchell
Schwartz. Or Tashaun Gipson. Or Travis Benjamin. Or Alex Mack. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Meanwhile
had this happened in, say, New England, no one would be questioning Bill
Belicheck’s wisdom. And for what it’s
worth, it’s pretty telling that none of these four signed with New England, to
use but one example. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">I’m still
waiting for the argument that the Browns need to overpay average talent in
order to prove themselves to their fans.
This organization needs to be rebuilt from the bottom up and if every
player who donned a Browns uniform had been cut, I wouldn’t argue against that
either. At some point this team will get
the total scrub down it really deserves and that doesn’t happen by holding on
to the few flickers of talent it had, particularly at inflated prices.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">It’s not
that these aren’t nice players, but the league is filled with nice
players. Among the list of stupid things
this franchise has done in the last 5 years alone, this doesn’t even make the
top 20.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">What’s of
more interest is that the new regime absolutely added to the team and its
culture through the subtraction of Johnny Manziel from this franchise. Plenty of words have been written about this
train wreck and I’ve written many of those myself commencing with the decision
to draft him. But never has a player in
the history so deserved the fate that’s befallen him.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">I have some
empathy for Manziel because he’s an addict.
His ability to think often isn’t rational. He got help last year and ultimately it wasn’t
successful. That’s not unusual. Many addicts need multiple stints in
rehab. At this point though Manziel is
his own worst enemy as he remains in complete denial about his problems, even
as he spins further and further out of control.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">To blame the
Browns for not dumping Manziel as soon as the new league season started is odd. At least they dumped him. Professional sports, like most businesses,
operates on the greater fool theory. No
matter how dumb a deal you’ve done there’s often a greater fool out there
willing to bail you out of your problems.
When it came to Manziel, the Browns had to at least see if there was a
greater fool willing to part with a draft choice, even one loaded with
conditions. That wasn’t to be. Now they await to see if there’s a greater
fool wiling to at least claim Manziel off waivers in order to get some cap
relief on all the money they owe him.
That isn’t likely to be, either and Manziel will be left to scramble for
a foolish team to take a chance on a player to this point who’s been
poison. That will happen. Teams are always looking to catch lightning
in a bottle, even if it’s a bottle of champagne being wielded by Manziel as he
floats through a nightclub lagoon on a plastic swan.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><br /></span></div>
<span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 107%;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Ultimately, real, sustainable improvement for
the Browns is years away and that’s assuming the latest group of geniuses
running the franchise can actually live up to that description. That improvement is not going to come by over
emphasizing the marginal value of newly expensive players, none of whom would
be nearly as productive as they are right now by the time this team is really
ready to compete. And likewise it won’t
happen by holding on to sociopaths like Manziel. The Browns were neither good nor bad this
past week. In Cleveland that actually
counts as improvement. </span></span><div class="blogger-post-footer">google_ad_client = "pub-0329689737263823";
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-ZOuIkll9xmo/Vq4lYOnumdI/AAAAAAAACAQ/iVl7hwtW5tI/s1600/madmag.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="266" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-ZOuIkll9xmo/Vq4lYOnumdI/AAAAAAAACAQ/iVl7hwtW5tI/s400/madmag.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The Cleveland Browns have their fan worried, again. Maybe the right word isn’t “again” but
“still.” And for once it’s not about the
head coach or even the quarterback they still don’t have. It’s about analytics.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Despite about every possible reason why they couldn’t do it,
the Browns did go ahead and hire a credible head coach in Hue Jackson. But the rejiggering of the front office in a
way that doesn’t otherwise exist in the NFL is an understandable cause for
concern. Of the three people most
responsible for setting next year’s roster, two of them have absolutely no
experience at any level, CYO, middle school, high school, college, semi-pro,
pro, flag, evaluating talent. The other
is 28 years old. In a fit of
inspiration, an algorithm will be the chief evaluator. It can’t be worse.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I’m a proponent of analytics. You should be, too. It’s transformed baseball in a way that in
large measure has dulled the impact of simply having the fattest wallet. And while analytics will certainly improve
decision making, the human element can’t be eliminated entirely, particularly
in making player evaluations.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
At the professional level, many talent decisions make
themselves. Anybody, including the
person who sees one NBA game every decade can draft LeBron James first. Where the far more difficult decisions came
is in filling out roster behind him. The talent difference between players is
often razor thin with the stats giving no clear winner.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The other thing, of course, is that analytic-driven
decisions often seem to defy logic or at least conventional wisdom, which also makes people worry. Look at what just happened with the Cleveland
Cavaliers.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The firing of head coach David Blatt was driven in large
part by analytics. What worried Griffin
was the statistic he quoted, that since 2000-01 season there have been 50 teams
that have finished with a winning percentage of at least .700 but only 8 of
those teams have won championships. He
feared the Cavs were once again on the same path, based on what he was seeing
in the team’s advanced stats and what he was observing in the locker room. As Griffin said, it seemed to be the least
engaged winning team he’d ever been around.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
That may very well be true and that’s the human element to
all this. As good as the Cavs are and
have been, the losses to both San Antonio and particularly to the Golden State
Warriors, while just two of the 82 regular season games the team will play,
told you two things. The first was that
the Cavs still aren’t completely meshing.
The second, quite related and even more telling was that the Spurs and
the Warriors have an “it” factor the Cavs do not. There is something inherent in all great
teams that just doesn’t lie. Even when
the sum of all parts is great, the great teams are still more than the sum of all
those parts. You saw it with the 2014
Ohio State Buckeyes and you see it now with the Warriors. Call it chemistry or black magic. What matters most in team sports is still the
team concept and to Griffin’s eyes and stat sheet at least, the Cavs didn’t
have it and weren’t getting it under Blatt.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The Cavs are all-in on analytics. Now, too, are the Browns. The difference of course is that the Cavs
have the greatest player on the planet.
The Browns don’t have someone in the top 100 of the best players in the
planet, maybe the top 200. They need
more than a good algorithm. To
paraphrase Roy Scheider’s Martin Brody, they’re gonna need a bigger computer.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And if analytics in the hands of really smart people with no
football experience wasn’t enough to spook Browns fans, then owner Jimmy Haslam’s
most recent comments about estranged quarterback Johnny Manziel should make
them petrified because it defies all logic and analytics.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Manziel has mostly been AWOL from the Browns since before
the last game of the season. His bizarre
trip to Las Vegas as his earnest but overmatched teammates played out the
string, his brief visit to the facility afterward and then his party tour in
Texas has been well documented. So, too,
has the fact that Manziel hasn’t reached out to his new head coach nor has the
new head coach reached out to Manziel.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Yet at this week’s Senior Bowl Haslam talked as though the
relationship with Manziel has simply hit a rough patch in the same way a marriage
hits a rough patch, as if divorce is possible but reconciliation more likely. Well, that rough patch just got rougher. Manziel is again under investigation for
domestic violence and irrespective of what the official police report
ultimately concludes I suspect the NFL is going to take this one more seriously
than the last time he got into a public argument with a girlfriend.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Mostly I attribute the talk to Haslam’s ill-conceived
attempt to build value in a player where there is none as a prelude to some
sort of trade. But on the off chance
that Haslam is serious that kind of thinking would qualify him as the biggest lunkhead
to occupy an owner’s box since Ted Stepien.
Manziel is a person with a smattering of NFL skills who lacks both the
maturity and the temperament to ever be anything more than a guy who used to be
somebody in college. And that’s giving
him the benefit of the doubt. More likely
he’s an addict deep within the grips of drugs and booze for whom his first
stint in rehab had no lasting impact. You don’t continue to have the kind of
incidents that surround Manziel without drugs and/or alcohol being at the
center</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It doesn’t matter, at least to most fans. The Browns aren’t running a social services
agency. The team has invested
significant money and resources in Manziel and all it’s received in return is
the attendant league-wide embarrassment that comes with having made such an
awful choice in drafting him in the first place. There is no set of circumstances, not one,
where Manziel returning to the Browns for another disastrous season makes a
lick of sense to anyone. Stated
differently, if Haslam is serious and ends up hanging on to Manziel it will be
at the expense of undoing whatever good will Haslam’s cultivated this
offseason.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
That’s what has me most worried about the Browns’ new
structure. It’s not that there’s
anything theoretically wrong with it. It’s
that the person making the key judgments in putting it together, Haslam, is the
same guy who has botched every other decision he’s made up to this point
regarding the fans.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
Cleveland fans will always worry. It’s a comfortable space. They’ve known no real prosperity and when
fleeting victories come they are just often preludes to bigger letdowns. This franchise is finally trying something
different for which there is no downside.
Having escaped the vicious cycle of their previous insanity, however,
doesn’t put them on the right road. It
just puts them on a different road.
Where it leads is anyone’s guess but at least they’ll have a bunch of algorithms
to explain why they got lost this time.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<div class="separator" style="border-image: none; clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-hpsedf3KyH0/VorlDMzo_zI/AAAAAAAACAA/P8rLHViH-bk/s1600/Haslam.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-hpsedf3KyH0/VorlDMzo_zI/AAAAAAAACAA/P8rLHViH-bk/s400/Haslam.jpg" width="380" /></a></div>
<div style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Cleveland Browns owner Jimmy Haslam is the ultimate stopped
clock.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He’s right twice a day or at
least for one day, which happened to be this past Sunday.</div>
<div style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Haslam was right about firing head coach Mike Pettine and
general manager Ray Farmer.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He
also was right about organizational structure.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>It doesn’t matter if you have the right people all moving in the same
direction.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Whether he’s right about much
else remains, as usual, the dark cloud hanging over his franchise.</div>
<br />
<div style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
But like a broken clock, Haslam has gotten little else right in
his two plus seasons as an owner.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He’s
trusted the wrong people, made the wrong assessments.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He expresses supreme confidence in everyone
he hires and abandons them quickly when people question his own competence.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He stands in the fire with his charges but
only until it starts to get a little hot.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>In short and of his own making, Haslam’s franchise is a mess, the
biggest mess really in North American professional sports.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<br />
<div style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
But let’s suspend for the moment the need to pile on all his
shortcomings and take a slightly longer view.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>In that sense, there is a slight glimmer anyway that perhaps Haslam may
ultimately be building a redemption story.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I said slight glimmer.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Don’t turn
the pitchforks at me.</div>
<br />
<div style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Focusing on the things he got right on Sunday night Pettine
and Farmer were disasters of the first order.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Pettine was an odd hiring in the first place.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>No one in the league thought he was ready to
be a head coach, which is why he was not on anyone’s radar screen when Haslam
suddenly promoted him from Buffalo Bills defensive coordinator to Cleveland
Browns head coach.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Pettine wasn’t even a
compromise hire.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He was a last resort
hire.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>All he did then over the course of
two seasons is look stoic and act inexperienced. Haslam got in kind exactly
what he hired.</div>
<br />
<div style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Pettine’s teams may not have ever completely quit on him but
neither did they go out of their way to make him look good, either.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Their record isn’t just a reflection on the
dearth of talent.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s also a reflection
on the lack of basic fundamentals and discipline a professional team needs to
be competitive.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Browns couldn’t steal
few wins because they were often undone by the kinds of mistakes that plague
players and teams without a sense of purpose.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Pettine never instilled any sense of purpose.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’m not sure he had one himself.</div>
<br />
<div style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Farmer was just an egocentric jerk with neither the pedigree
nor the resume to justify his outsized sense of entitlement.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It wasn’t just that every decision he made
turned out poorly.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It was far more that
his process for making decisions was so flawed that the results were
inevitable.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>His arrogance masked a
laziness that ultimately will have a far more damaging impact on the franchise
then Pettine’s two years could ever have.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Farmer made poor draft decisions because he wouldn’t put the hard work
into really determining the kind of players he was drafting.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It would be easy to go chapter and verse on
Farmer but suffice it to say that the fact that the Browns’ secondary had
virtually no starters and backups available on Sunday and yet Justin Gilbert
could not get on the field.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Yes, Gilbert
is that bad and the person that picked him is worse.</div>
<br />
<div style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
So again, cutting loose the two people that lost 18 of their
last 21 games, the two people that couldn’t mount a running a game or a
defense, seems like any easy decision.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Indeed it’s the kind of decisions that makes itself but give Haslam
credit at least for not missing the layup.</div>
<br />
<div style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
What concerns fans right now is what else Haslam had to say at
the press conference.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Haslam
restructured his front office once again, putting the football operations under
Sashi Brown but having the new head coach, whoever that may be, report directly
to the owner.</div>
<br />
<div style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
It’s a bit of an odd structure, to be sure, but Haslam’s not
wrong when he said that structure matters less than people.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Org structures are the kinds of things
insecure people cling to in times of stress.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>It’s a way to assert authority when respect hasn’t been otherwise
rightfully earned.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Browns’ prior
structure is exactly what Farmer asserted as a way of pushing his own agenda
instead of finding a way to work more closely with Pettine.</div>
<br />
<div style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
In some ways, the structure Haslam has now established is
similar to what many baseball teams are going toward.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In Toronto, for example, Mark Shapiro was
hired to run the baseball operations where he’ll have final say over the
roster.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It was the reason that Toronto
general manager Alex Anthopoulos left the team after Shapiro was hired.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As general manager pre-Shapiro, Anthepoulos
wasn’t just acquiring talent, he had final say over the roster.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Post-Shapiro, Anthepolous had to yield final
say on the roster.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In other words, he
kept his title but otherwise have suffered a demotion. He quit instead.</div>
<br />
<div style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
For the Browns, Sashi Brown will serve in the Shapiro role,
at least when it comes to forming the roster.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The difference is that the head coach will not report to Brown.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He’ll report directly to Haslam, which is
what Bill Belichick has in New England.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Haslam
wants to model successful organizations, certainly, but having the new head
coach report to him is a concession, really, to what would have otherwise been
an entirely intolerable situation for any head coaching candidate of any
substance, reporting to someone with literally no experience running the
football operations of any team at any level.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>With the head coach reporting to Haslam, that coach will have a bigger
say in the organization, maybe a bigger say than most rookie coaches deserve,
and a direct pipeline to the owner should he need to mediate the inevitable
disputes that will arise.</div>
<br />
<div style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
That’s why hiring a head coach first is of no real
consequence this time around.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He won’t
report to the general manager anyway so it is not the same situation as when
Randy Lerner let Eric Mangini hire his own boss.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If the general manager is in charge of talent
acquisition and not the entire football operations, it actually makes a modicum
of sense to have the head coach assist in his hiring.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It has to be a good fit, philosophically and
culturally.</div>
<br />
<div style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
In short, others may have a problem with this structure, I
don’t.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Where I do have a problem is trusting
its execution to Haslam.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Brown may very
well be an undiscovered talent, but why is it that the Browns are the ones that
have to always do the experimenting?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Maybe
that’s the outcome of a bankrupt franchise, but it needn’t be.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> No matter how bad things are in Cleveland, there's still only 32 NFL jobs and far more applicants than openings. </span>This is a franchise deeply in trouble and it’s
probably the exact wrong time to be taking a flyer on someone without a track
record of any kind.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And what is it about
Haslam that gives anyone any confidence that his assessment of Brown is correct?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Haslam hasn’t made an assessment on the
football side of his business that was even in the same zip code as
correct.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But Haslam did, once again,
express his supreme confidence in Brown, just like he did in Farmer.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So there is that.</div>
<br />
<div style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
You also have to be just as nervous that Haslam has put
himself front and center of the search committee for the new head coach.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The structure he created leaves him no other
choice.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> At some point you'd like to think Haslam has enough self awareness to question his own ability to get this decision right. But self awareness is in short supply in Berea. It's how things end up this way.</span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Too bad the
Browns aren’t a publicly traded stock.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The smart money would be shorting it all day long.</div>
<br />
<div style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
The Browns imploding and rebooting every two years used to be as predictable as the swallows returning to Capistrano every February. But then a funny thing happened. Some of the locals there, in their quest to improve the experience, created an inhospitable environment for the swallows and they stopped returning. Now they're scrambling to get them back in much the same way as Haslam will have to scramble to reclaim the fans he's lost every time he's tried to improve the experience. He's on the verge of improving it out of existence.<br />
<br /><br />
Every NFL owner has a built in constituency willing to suffer
any level of abuse but it would be folly for Haslam to conclude that his
actions and those of his predecessors haven’t done significant and in some
cases irreversible damage.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Since the
Browns left, an entire generation of fans have been lost, not having known anything close to resembling a competent, let alone a winning franchise. The previous generations have been completely alienated.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> Haslam</span> can talk about working hard to get things
right but all the fans keep getting are the toxic fumes of another tire fire
being set by a franchise with a seemingly unending supply of waste materials and no shortage of fuel
or matches.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What doesn’t kill you may
make you stronger but it doesn’t make you more engaged.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Haslam’s short tenure has continued the most
disturbing trend of all.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In droves, what
fans that remain have replaced their passion with their indifference, whether
its about the results on the field or the latest travails of Johnny
Disaster.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And that’s the worst
indictment of all.</div>
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<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-AMu8emr981c/VnhfnqcL1vI/AAAAAAAAB_w/71SoQAx118I/s1600/bottomless%252520pit.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="313" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-AMu8emr981c/VnhfnqcL1vI/AAAAAAAAB_w/71SoQAx118I/s400/bottomless%252520pit.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
I’ve been writing about the Cleveland Browns on this little
blog and elsewhere for 9 years, 9 miserable friggin’ years.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>To understand the misery, the pride
swallowing siege that it’s been, when I started the Browns had already been
back from NFL-mandated purgatory for 7 years.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>In those first 7 seasons of Browns 2.0, the team had one winning record
and one playoff appearance.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Both came
under the weird tenure of Butch Davis.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In
retrospect, those were the good time.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
During those first 7 years, there were only two head coaches
for the Browns and two owner.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In
context, that’s not too shabby, the key word being context.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Since then, the Browns have been in a free fall without
end.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Alcoholics and drug addicts hit
rock bottom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Browns never do.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There is no bottom, rock or otherwise.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When you think the franchise can’t get worse,
it does, spectacularly so in fact.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The
Browns haven’t been content being the worst franchise in pro football.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They’ve taken it to the next level, which is
the worst franchise in North American sports.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Only a lack of knowledge on the intricacies of the various European
soccer leagues and southern hemisphere winter baseball prevents me from saying
it’s the worst franchise in the entire world.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I do suspect that’s true, however and if it’s not they are in the top 3.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
In the last 9 years the Browns have had 6 head coaches, 10
offensive coordinators, 11 different quarterbacks (but far more that have
actually started a game) and a third owner. The team has had a losing record, a
deeply losing record, in all but one year.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>In a 16 game season, the Browns typically win about 25% of their games,
which translates to about 4 or 5 a year.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>They won 10 games once.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As befits
everything else about this team, naturally a 10-win season it wasn’t good
enough to make the playoffs even though in almost any other season it would
probably get them a bye.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When it comes
to the Browns, nothing is ever good enough or even close to good enough or even
in the same stratosphere of good enough.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
My point here is to not recount a history you already
understand.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s to let you know that I
know what you know and to let you know that when I say that despite how bad the
last 9 years have been, this season is truly the worst in every measurable and
emotional way, it’s not hyperbole, just fact. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
I can’t tell if Jimmy Haslam is the worst owner ever, the
dumbest owner ever or just the most naïve owner ever.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But he is something and at this point the
label doesn’t matter.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He’s overseeing
such a spectacularly inept enterprise that he bares just as much responsibility
for the mess as the two fools who came before him, Al and Randy Lerner,
separately or together, it doesn’t matter.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
We live in an era of instant gratification, maybe we always
have.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As fans we see incompetence and we
demand that heads roll because we want the satisfaction of knowing that
somebody who has so violated our trust, our patience and our loyalty hasn’t
just been taken out to the woodshed and spanked, hard.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We want to know that those responsible are
forever extricated from our lives, never to be seen or heard from again, except
on the sidelines of our worst enemies, like Michigan.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s the only way we get closure, the only
way we get a measure of accomplishment from a leisure pursuit that has been
tortuous to us.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
In that vein, it’s rather remarkable that Haslam continues
to hold on to anyone in his front office, even with but a few weeks remaining.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Head coach Mike Pettine is earnest in
approach but overwhelmed by the task in front of him. Every week in every way
imaginable he puts it all on display.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The team never seems to have any sort of game plan on either offense or
defense.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Pettine never offers an
adjustment to the circumstances in front of him.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>His teams are undisciplined and lack
focus.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He can’t even manage the clock or
figure out when to call a time out.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He’s
not instilled any sense of culture or ownership within the players he
controls.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They play a lifeless brand of
scattered football, emotionless and generic.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>In every way possible or imaginable, the team reflects the stoic
incompetence of the man in charge each Sunday.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Now some argue that Pettine can only do so much with what
Ray Farmer, the general manager gives him.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>True enough.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s hard to have a
game plan on either side of the ball when you know before the first scheme
crosses your mind you don’t have the players that could execute it with any
sort of precision, let alone competence, let alone consistency<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Pettine is hamstrung in ways that are hard to
fathom, no doubt.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Yet the truly gifted coaches still find a way to make
occasional chicken salad out of the chicken shit they’ve been handed and maybe
that’s the best you can say about last Sunday’s victory over a team and
franchise in just as bad shape, the San Francisco 49ers.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But ask yourself this:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>can you name one instance where Pettine
demonstrated in any measurable way an ability to overcome his circumstances?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You can’t because there isn’t one.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Here’s another way to think about it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If the Browns were to play New England this
weekend and the NFL required that Pettine and Bill Belichick switch jobs that
week, by the game on Sunday the Belichick-coached Browns would be favored over
the Pettine-coached Patriots, mainly because Pettine would find a way to take
the ball out of Tom Brady’s hands.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Pettine doesn’t need to be Belichick to be successful.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But he needs to be better than he is.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Two years, in this context, is enough time to
conclude that for whatever value stability has its pursuit in this case would
just be another fool’s errand.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If
Pettine remains it just delays the ability to try once again to stem the depth
of its constant fall.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Now the other side of that coin is that Pettine is the devil
you know.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>His abilities clearly match
those of the talentless boobs that surround him.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And if he leaves, do you really trust Haslam
with the next selection?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That is the
crux of the matter, isn’t it?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Whatever
else you think of Haslam he’s more than proven to be an incredibly inept
decision maker.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
As for Farmer, he’s actually more incompetent than Pettine
and the comparison isn’t hardly even fair.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>If Pettine is measured only in the context of the idiots that surround
him in Berea then of course he should keep his job.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But that is hardly the measure stick.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Simply because Farmer is the worst general
manager in the history of general managers isn’t the way to judge Pettine.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s the way to judge Farmer.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Fire Farmer now.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The team showed that it could live without
him for 4 games.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Hell, one of their three
wins came when Farmer was on suspension and another win came the week he
returned, meaning he didn’t have time to muck up anything.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Since he’s really been back the team has won
only once. It’s not a coincidence.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
I’ve already detailed chapter and verse in the past as to
what makes Farmer so bad at his job.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He’s
blown every first round pick he’s been given.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>He’s signed no meaningful free agents but did squander valuable cash and
cap space on Dwayne Bowe, the worst free agent acquisition since Andre Rison.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Actually that’s unfair to Rison.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In his one year in Cleveland Rison played in
all 16 games and had 47 receptions. His production didn’t match what the team
paid and they acquired him when they had no money to pay him.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But he did produce, relatively speaking. Bowe
is so bad on a team with but one legitimate receiver and still can’t crack the
game day roster, let alone the starting roster.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>There’s been almost zero production.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>If you really think about it, Bowe is the poster child for the entire
franchise.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Lots of money invested,
nothing to show for it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
But the book on Farmer is so much more.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He’s arrogant to a fault.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The willful disregard for the rules on
texting is one thing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>More damning
though is his almost obstinate refusal to attend pro days last year for many of
the top prospects. Farmer treated it as an activity beneath his pay grade, I
guess.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As a result Farmer lost the
opportunity, on purpose, to offer to his employer the main skill he’s being
paid to exercise—his informed and considered opinion.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Almost everyone else in the world outside of Farmer and
Jerry Jones, apparently, saw the hot mess that was Johnny Manziel.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The guy just didn’t send up red flags from
time to time.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He waved around fistfuls
at almost every hour of every day.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And
yet Farmer ignored every warning sign anyway.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The same is true for Justin Gilbert.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>How Farmer could not have known that Gilbert lacked even the most basic
of work ethics is beyond me, but then again he missed the same thing on Bowe so
there is that.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Cameron Erving and Danny
Shelton, this year’s Manziel and Gilbert, are very average talents at
best.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Erving has been benched on a team
that’s won only three games, one in which he didn’t even play. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Indeed against Seattle, Erving saw the field
only out of necessity.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Browns could
have played with one less linemen and left Erving on the bench and the result
would have been no different.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As for
Shelton, he’s run over so often by opposing centers and guards you’d think he
was auditioning for the Wile E. Coyote role in the live action version of The
Road Runner cartoon series.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
In other words, it’s not just that Farmer is bad at
drafting.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He’s lazy and arrogant and a
significant contributor to the awful culture deeply imbedded within the walls
of Berea.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He’s neither a winner nor
understands what it even means to be a winner or to build a winning
culture.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There’s nothing about Farmer’s
performance, not one hint that suggest he could possibly be part of the long
term answer in turning the franchise around.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Cutting that cord now would be the best possible message to the
franchise.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Keeping him one minute longer
only exacerbates Haslam’s tenuous control over the franchise.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
The ultimate problem with this franchise, and this falls
back to where this all started, is the owner.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>No one publicly understands what Haslam stands for and I’ve heard no one
inside Berea who could articulate Haslam’s specific vision either, outside of amorphous
concepts of building a winner and valuing stability.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Well, Haslam’s done neither in his short
tenure and yet there’s no reason to suggest that valuing stability at this
juncture will lead to building a winner.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
None of that means that Haslam needs to sell the team.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Maybe he can rebuild the trust he never fully
got anyway.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>To do that though he needs
to get the hell out of the way.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He needs
to find a respected franchise guru, someone who knows how to build a structure
and a culture.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That isn’t going to come
easy.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
The intriguing aspect of the ridiculous rumor about Urban
Meyer coming to the Browns was the type of package that was supposedly on the
table.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It included not just a huge
salary but a piece of the ownership pie.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Meyer isn’t coming to Cleveland under any circumstances.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But the kind of package he would garner is
exactly what it would take to get someone as credible as Meyer to come to town.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Randy Lerner thought he had that in Mike Holmgren.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The thought made sense except Holmgren was
simply the wrong guy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>His football
knowledge was top notch but his commitment to the team was middling, at
best.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He never fully relocated to
Cleveland, spending most of his time either in Seattle or Arizona, neither of
which were conducive to building a team in Cleveland.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Holmgren also lacked the brutal honestly of
an architect like Belichick, which is why Holmgren kept Eric Mangini a year
longer than he deserved and then filled the breach with the son of a friend in
Pat Shurmur.<o:p></o:p></div>
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 11pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">I
don’t know who is out there to take on this kind of reclamation project and I’m
not sure Haslam has the wherewithal to come up with the right package to get
him anyway.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I guess what I’m saying is
that it easily could be at least another 9 years of abject frustration and if I’m
still writing about them then, have me committed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Better yet, just drop me a card at whatever
institution I’m a resident as I would have likely voluntarily committed myself
well before then.</span><div class="blogger-post-footer">google_ad_client = "pub-0329689737263823";
google_ad_width = 728;
google_ad_height = 15;
google_ad_format = "728x15_0ads_al";
google_ad_channel ="";</div>Gary Benzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10578834252235902676noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30300136.post-73197666574734316382015-11-23T19:15:00.000-05:002015-11-23T19:15:00.366-05:00Meanwhile, Somewhere In Berea...
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">It’s Sunday of the Cleveland Browns merciful bye week.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The team, the players, the coaches, the owner
and the fans welcome the break like Nordstom’s welcomes a bored housewife with
a clutch full of credit cards.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But
there’s still activity inside Berea. There’s always activity in side Berea. Let’s
take a look:<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-5PAHod-Xg9c/VlN-L5y-leI/AAAAAAAAB_I/2SexKQ-APhg/s1600/movie%2Bset.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-5PAHod-Xg9c/VlN-L5y-leI/AAAAAAAAB_I/2SexKQ-APhg/s320/movie%2Bset.jpg" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Int. Head coach Mike Pettine’s office.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A desk, almost completely uncluttered except
for an opened iPad, is centered in the room.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>There are no pictures of his kids or wife.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The only picture in the entire office sits on
an unused credenza.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s an autographed
picture from Denis O’Leary who played the head coach of the Browns in the movie
“Draft Day.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s enscribed:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“Here’s hoping Brian Hoyer is your Brian
Drew.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The desk chair is pushed in as if
it hadn’t been sat in for days, maybe weeks, maybe ever.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The walls have no permanent reminders or mementos
of its current resident. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There are
however boxes filled with various personal items from other stops Pettine has
made along the way.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>One box has a
Buffalo Bills wool ski cap hanging half way out.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As the camera pans out, we see Pettine
standing stoically looking out the lone window of his office onto the empty
practice fields in the distance.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He is
wearing sunglasses and a mid-weight jacket with the word “Browns” over the left
breast.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>His hands are in the jackets
pockets.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He’s also wearing a headset
though it doesn’t appear to be connected to anything.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The plug end trails behind him.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Pettine doesn’t move for what seems to be
several minutes.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">Ray Farmer, general manager, enters.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He’s wearing a tight, overly tight actually,
Browns sweatshirt as if the point is to accentuate the biceps he cultivated
during a mostly pedestrian career as an itinerant professional football
player.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He’s sweating profusely and
carrying a water bottle.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He’s wearing
slacks, belying the impression that he just came back from a workout.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He’s a man in a hurry but painfully unsure of
where he’s supposed to be next.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Farmer:</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Hey, Pett, what’s up?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Got a minute?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Pettine:</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The usual Ray.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Just working hard.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Trying to get some of our mistakes cleaned
up. Penalties. Execution.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That kind of
thing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Just need to get it all cleaned
up.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Working hard to get a W.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’m pressed for time.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What do you need?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Farmer:</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Not for nothing, Pett, but honestly it just
looks like you’re staring out the window.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>It doesn’t look like you’ve touched anything on your desk in weeks.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Do you even know how to turn on that
iPad?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It has the playbook and game films
right on it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You just touch the Browns
app and it’s all there.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Pettine:</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’m the head coach, Ray.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>My job isn’t to be an electronics wiz.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s to be stoic and that’s what I am, stoic.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>No panic.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Just keep working hard, getting things cleaned up.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Farmer:</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Ok. Right.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Whatever.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Anyway, that’s not why
I stopped by.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I want to run an idea by
you.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Pettine:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></b>Just a second. (Pettine continues staring
out the window for several minutes.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He
doesn’t appear to move a muscle.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Farmer,
continuing to sweat as if he were wearing a parka on a 100 degree day, takes
swig after swig from his water bottle as he watches Pettine.)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Pettine:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></b>Did you say something, Ray?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Farmer:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></b>Uh, yea.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I want to run an idea by you.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’m
thinking of making a few trades, thought I’d run them by you, not for sign-off
of course.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’m the decider here.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I have control over the roster.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But getting your opinion on something makes
it look like we work together all the time.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>You know, just like the Justin Gilbert pick.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Pettine:</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Hasn’t the trade deadline passed?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Farmer:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></b>There’s a deadline? Damn.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Is that written anywhere?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You got some kind of memo on that?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">(Pettine continues staring out the window.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Farmer continues drinking water, occasionally
wiping his bald head with a handkerchief he pulls from his back pocket.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As Farmer ponders his response owner Jimmy
Haslam walks in.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He’s wearing an
expensive brown suit, white shirt with orange and brown tie.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He’s drinking coffee from a Pilot Flying J
mug.)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Haslam:</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Guys, glad you’re both in here.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I wanted to talk with you both.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Farmer:</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What’s up, boss?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I can still call you boss, right?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Haslam:</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Ray, I said no changes during the bye
week.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>No changes means no changes.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(Farmer looks visibly relieved though sweat
continues to pour down him as if he were standing in a Miami rainshower in mid
July.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Pettine remains stoic as he
continues to stare, apparently aimlessly, out the window onto the practice
fields.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Look, I think we need to
talk.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The media is all over us.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The fans are all over us.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We haven’t won a game in months.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In every conceivable way we’re regressing
just from last year and let’s face it, last year wasn’t exactly my definition
of success.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Farmer:</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s an interesting point, boss.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>How do you define success?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>See, the reason I ask is that everyone has
different definitions of success.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For
me, growing up as I did, poor neighborhood, drug dealers on the corner, that
kind of thing, I probably define success differently than you, coming from the
nice background you came from and all.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I’m a pretty big deal in my neighborhood.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I have a nice house, nice car.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In my neighborhood, the guys I grew up with,
they’d say I’m successful. But I’m open to the idea that I may be defining it
differently than you, see, that’s my point.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>How are we defining success here?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Haslam:</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Well, let’s see, Ray.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is professional football.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We exist in a league made up of other teams
just like us.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We play 16 games against
other teams in this league.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You either
win those games or you lose them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And
then you tally up the wins and the losses and you compare that to those other
teams.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The teams with more wins go the
playoffs where they play each other to eventually figure out the championship. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Those teams are what we define as successful,
Ray.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We need to be one of those teams
with more wins than losses.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>One of those
teams that goes to the playoffs and maybe the championship.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Farmer:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></b>I see where you’re going with that,
boss.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That makes sense to me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Glad we’re on the same page now.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So if that’s it then I’ve got to be heading
back to my office. It’s bye week.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It
gives me a chance to tweak my fantasy football rosters.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’m in 4 leagues and frankly I’m not doing
very well in any of them at the moment.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Haslam:</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Not so fast, Ray.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The three of us need to talk, collectively,
about how we fix this, what we’re going to do differently in order to be
successful in this league.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Farmer:</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s fine by me, boss. I got some time before
lunch.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Whatever you want to do.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But remember, you’re the one that no changes,
so now I’m a little confused because it sounds like you’re looking for changes.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Haslam:</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When I said “no changes” I meant I wasn’t
going to fire you or Pett.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Not now anyway.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s what I meant by no changes.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(Farmer again looks visibly relieved as he
wipes even more sweat from his balding head.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Pettine continues to look off into the distance, unfazed by anything
he’s just heard.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s not even clear
he’s heard anything at all.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(Seeing the
relived Farmer) I said right now.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But
unless we figure out how to get better players here, through the draft, through
free agency, and unless we figure out how to better coach those players, I won’t
be able to resist.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’ll make changes faster
than I change the bonus programs at Pilot Flying J. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We’re failing as a franchise. Right now the
only guy on the team anyone cares about is the left tackle and you wanted to
trade him.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Farmer:</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Well, I understand your thinking on that,
boss, about Joe Thomas I mean.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But hear
me out. I was reading on some stats web site how left tackles aren’t as
valuable as they once were so I figured maybe some of the other GMs in the
league hadn’t read that web site yet and maybe were still thinking, you know
old fashioned like, that you need a good left tackle to protect your
quarterback in what’s become a predominately pass league and I could trick them
into giving us a couple or three number 1 picks for Thomas.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>According to our media guide Joe Thomas makes
the Pro Bowl, like a lot.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So if I could
get 3 number 1 picks for him, that would really set us up for the future.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt; tab-stops: 74.25pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Haslam:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></b>(Exasperated and
shaking his head).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is going to be
harder than I thought.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Ray, we’ve blown
the last 4 number one picks.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What’s your
plan for drafting better players?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I mean
just look at this damn roster. Danny Shelton, Cameron Erving, Justin Gilbert,
Johnny Manziel.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You want to go back
further?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>How about Barkevious
Mingo?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>How about Trent Richardson?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s six straight picks and every one has
been a dud, one way or the other.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt; tab-stops: 74.25pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Farmer:</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You can’t pin
Richardson on me.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt; tab-stops: 74.25pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Haslam:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></b>Ray, I’m just
talking about trends here.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We have no
foundation on this team and we aren’t going to get one if we can’t even get
players in the first round who get on the field. Gilbert hasn’t played
meaningful snaps since he was a senior at Alabama.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Manziel is a party boy who already is back
drinking again.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Shelton and Erving at
least start, but it’s not like those units are better for it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In fact, they’re worse. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt; tab-stops: 74.25pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Farmer:</b> I’m not sure I’m getting your point here, boss.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You know the culture I’m trying to get
instilled here, the one where only the best players play each week?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If those guys you mentioned can’t get on the
field or their duty is limited then they aren’t the best players.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The guys beating them out are better.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>See how that works?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s logic.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>It’s the way it should be and I’m proud of instilling that culture.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt; tab-stops: 74.25pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">(Pettine doesn’t flinch)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt; tab-stops: 74.25pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Haslam:</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But aren’t those
four or five players, drafted number one as they were, supposed to beat out the
other players on the team?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Isn’t that
why we draft them number one? Aren’t they supposed to be no-brainer selections,
guys who will be starting for years?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt; tab-stops: 74.25pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Farmer:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></b>I mean, if you want
to look at it like that, I guess you could.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>But it doesn’t always work out that way. I just think the best players
should play each week, doesn’t matter if they were number one picks or
undrafted guys we signed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Everyone
develops at a different rate.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Sometimes
an undrafted free agent adapts more quickly than a number one pick.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That kind of thing’s just going to
happen.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt; tab-stops: 74.25pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Haslam:</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It doesn’t happen
that way in New England.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It doesn’t
happen that way in Pittsburgh.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The only
place that seems to happen every year is Cleveland.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Ray, you do understand your job, right?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt; tab-stops: 74.25pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Farmer:</b> Of course, boss.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And
thanks for sticking with me like this.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I
don’t know what kind of culture they got going on in New England or
Pittsburgh.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They do seem to win, though,
so maybe their best guys are winning the battles during the week.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Just like we’re trying to do.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’ll keep drafting guys and Pett will play
the guys he thinks are best.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s a long
process.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Progress, slow and steady.
We’re on our way.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I really believe that.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt; tab-stops: 74.25pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Haslam:</b> Ray, are you insane?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>You do know that we’re regressing, don’t you?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And we weren’t very good to begin with.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I want to hear your specific plan on how
you’re going to start utilizing the number one draft picks we keep earning to
actually find players that can get on the field.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt; tab-stops: 74.25pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Farmer:</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’m not sure I
understand what you’re saying. The best players are getting on the field.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s the culture I’ve instilled with Pett.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt; tab-stops: 74.25pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Haslam:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></b>The hell with the
culture.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We need better players, lots
more of them. Jesus Christ, Ray, you signed Dwayne Bowe to a multi-million
dollar contract and he can’t get on the field. Do we really want to walk down
that road we want to get this fixed?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt; tab-stops: 74.25pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Farmer:</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I think it’s on the
coaches to coach up Justin and Dwayne.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>That’s on them, not that I’m trying to blame anyone. I think Pett’s
doing a helluva job with the players he’s got.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>But like I was saying, it’s not on me that Gilbert can’t get on the
field.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He’s obviously not one of the
best guys.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s the way these things
go.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt; tab-stops: 74.25pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">(Pettine pulls back the right ear
phone as he begins to listen.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Still
stoic, he offers up some quick observations)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt; tab-stops: 74.25pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Pettine:</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Justin needs to
trust his technique better.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He had some
sloppy habits he developed in college and we’re trying to break him of
them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He’s been good in the meeting
room, though.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He’s trying.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We just got to get him consistent. (Pettine
then puts the right ear phone back into place and resumes staring out the
window, as stoic as ever.)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt; tab-stops: 74.25pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Haslam:</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Something’s
missing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We aren’t doing a good job of
evaluating players and we aren’t doing a good job of coaching up the guys we
have. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(Pettine raises his left eyebrow
as his right one lowers, as if he’s skeptical of what he just heard.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Nonetheless he continues to look out the
window, stoically.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We need to look at all
that and we will and by “we” I mean my wife and me and maybe Alec, not sure yet
on that.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But right now I’m trying to
figure out how we’re making decisions around here.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Every other team, even the Oakland Raiders
for Christ’s sake, seem to be getting better.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Maybe we should have drafted David Carr. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We need to look at the process because I’m not
even sure we have one at this point and if we do it’s more broken than my
reputation with the trucking community. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We’re defying the odds. (Haslam takes a swig
from his coffee cup and purses his lips suggesting that there’s something other
than coffee inside)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt; tab-stops: 74.25pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Farmer:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></b>That can be a good
thing, defying the odds.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It shows that
we’re outside the box.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Now it’s just a
matter of getting outside the box on the right thing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s another piece of the culture I’m
trying to instill, you know what I mean?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt; tab-stops: 74.25pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Haslam:</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What about you,
Pett?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Pett?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Pett? (Pettine continues looking out the
window.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Haslam taps him on the shoulder
to get his attention). Pett?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt; tab-stops: 74.25pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Pettine:</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What’s up, Jimmy?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt; tab-stops: 74.25pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Haslam:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></b>Haven’t you been
listening at all?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’m here to talk about
how we get better week.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Are you even
listening?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt; tab-stops: 74.25pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Pettine:</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I think we all know
that Rome wasn’t built in a day, that nothing good comes easy, and it’s a
marathon, you know, not a sprint.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt; tab-stops: 74.25pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Haslam:</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>How come we can’t
get Gilbert on the field?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Why did we
start an injured Josh McCown instead of evaluating Manziel when it was clear
the season was already lost?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>How come
Shelton never seems to make a tackle?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Why does all the pressure seem to come through Erving’s gap?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And why do we have almost as many penalty
yards this season as rushing yards?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt; tab-stops: 74.25pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Pettine:</b> (still looking out the window, intently): We’re just
trying to win games here, playing the guys we think give us the best chance to
win each week.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As I said, Justin needs to just trust his
technique.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Johnny’s working hard.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He’s good in the quarterback room.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Much more alert than last season.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Shelt’s coming along but the transition from
college is tough, like Justin’s.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Erving
is working hard, we work with him every day.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt; tab-stops: 74.25pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Haslam:</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Not my
question.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>How are we going to get better
as a team, as a franchise?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>How are we
going to be successful and so that I’m clear on this point, a team that
actually wins more than it loses, let’s start there.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt; tab-stops: 74.25pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Pettine:</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We’re just going to
keep working at it, cleaning things up.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Those penalties are frustrating and we just got to get that cleaned up.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt; tab-stops: 74.25pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Haslam:</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So are you saying we
have the right players here?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt; tab-stops: 74.25pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Pettine:</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Jimmy, that’s not
my job to say.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Ray’s got final say over
the 40 man roster.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I was just happy to
get this job.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s not my place to push
boundaries here.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’m just happy to have
the job.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt; tab-stops: 74.25pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Haslam:</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(Clearly talking to
himself at this point) This isn’t getting me anywhere.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Maybe I just need to get this management
group restructured again, maybe rejigger the uniforms again.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’m thinking brown helmets, maybe a logo. I
wonder if Alec’s in his office.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(Haslam
exits, head bowed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Tears in his eyes,
his face expressing the kind of frustration and realization that comes with
having squandered a multi-million dollar investment.)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt; tab-stops: 74.25pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Farmer:</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(to Pettine, who
remains staring out the window, earphones over both ears.) Well, that was
weird.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Nice guy, that Jimmy, but doesn’t
seem to know much about football, that’s for sure.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Don’t you agree, Pett?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(Pettine says nothing, the expression on his
face as determined and blank as ever.)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; line-height: 107%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">Fade out.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Again.</span><div class="blogger-post-footer">google_ad_client = "pub-0329689737263823";
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<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-9F2IEoWNYwI/VjEmlg3Wu4I/AAAAAAAAB-4/p6dhLyGTdvo/s1600/Rowers.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-9F2IEoWNYwI/VjEmlg3Wu4I/AAAAAAAAB-4/p6dhLyGTdvo/s400/Rowers.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
After the Cleveland Browns once again embarrassed themselves
and their fans with a performance as pitiful as any in the 2.0 era, I cleansed
the palate by heading to the movies to see <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Steve
Jobs</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s an excellent movie but
what it tells you about the Browns is probably more useful than the latest iOS
update.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
The point of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Jobs</i> was
more or less made late in the movie when Jobs and his former partner, Steve
Wozniak, were engaged in a heated discussion prior to the launch of the
iMac.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>With Apple in transition following
Jobs’ return and on the verge of laying off hundreds of workers, Wozniak wanted
Jobs to acknowledge at the iMac launch the contributions that the team that
created Apple’s initial signature computer, the Apple II. Wozniak wanted it as
a gift to those being laid off, letting them know, and by proxy the remaining
employees, that all contributions are valued.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Jobs refused because, in many ways, Jobs was an abrasive prick who
valued virtually no one’s input or contributions but his own.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In disgust Wozniak leaves the auditorium as
he tells Jobs that life isn’t binary.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>You can be both a decent human being and a genius at the same time.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
That pretty much sums up the frustration I think most Browns
fans have with this franchise.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is
only binary.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s either one thing or
the other but never all it ought to be at the same time.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And until it figures out that it needs to be
all it can be at the same time, there really is no meaningful path forward,
just more meandering.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
The other thing that struck me about <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Jobs</i> was the fact that the company ultimately became wildly
successful despite the toxic culture that emanated from the top.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Jobs was an unrelenting asshole most of the
time.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He wasn’t demanding but fair.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He was unreasonably demanding and often
unfair.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Undoubtedly that culture had to
permeate the organization.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Subordinates
do follow the leader.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
But the strength of Apple’s products and Jobs’ vision
overcame all the cultural headwinds he deliberately inflicted on that company
although it’s also fair to note that Apple failed miserably and was on the
verge of shutting down because of Jobs as well.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>It was only after the products, not only the iMac but more importantly,
the iPhone were introduced and literally ushered in one of the single biggest
technological advances that the products could overtake whatever toxic culture
had otherwise existed.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
For the Browns, however, there is literally no chance of a
similar change on the horizon.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In the
first place, there is absolutely no geniuses anywhere in the organization or
otherworldly players whose skills and abilities can transcend an otherwise
toxic environment.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There are, however,
various shades and colors of fools.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That
wouldn’t be so bad if those fools were otherwise functional and creating an
environment where the organization could otherwise thrive.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They aren’t and that combination is how you
end up with what amounted to a legal mugging in St. Louis on Sunday.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Culture usually matters.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Most companies spend countless hours and dollars on building and
maintaining a good corporate culture because in life some things simply don’t
change.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The only real way to get a behemoth
of any sort moving in the right direction, be it a billion dollar corporation
or a NFL team is teamwork.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Every oar has
to be moving in rhythm with the other and in the same direction.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Executives get training on leadership and culture.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>These are learned skills and they and,
perhaps outside of the most recent iteration of Apple, among the most critical
to an enterprise’s success.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Jimmy Haslam owns the Browns and perhaps the best you can
say about him is that he’s still learning to be an owner.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He hasn’t yet corralled all the things he
still doesn’t know.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>On any given day and
perhaps on most days he discovers something new about the hobby he undertook
that spins him in still another direction.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
But even as he’s trying to figure this all out, there is
considerable question as to whether or not he’s setting the right tone at the
top.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In his short tenure as the team’s
owner, he’s been impetuous and often knee-jerk in his approach.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He’s already had two of everything and he’s
likely to be on his third set of managers very soon.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The legal problems related to his main
business still aren’t fully behind him and, ultimately, are his responsibility.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Those dog both him and this team.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Haslam may be able to credibly argue that he
neither knew or actively participated in the fraud that enveloped Pilot Flying
J, but he cannot credibly argue that there was something about his leadership,
about the expectations he laid out and the demands he placed on others that
didn’t in whole or part foster a culture where others felt that engaging in the
fraud they did was an acceptable means of servicing his demands and
expectations.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
It’s similar to what happened in New Jersey with Chris
Christie and the George Washington Bridge.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>He may not have directly told any of his minions to close the toll
booths in Fort Lee in order to snarl traffic as punishment to that town’s mayor
who wouldn’t endorse him, but he most surely created the culture that gave
others the idea to do just that.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Anyone
who has spent any time in New Jersey knows that Christie is a vindictive
blowhard with significant inadequacy issues.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>When he doesn't get his way, he bullies the perceived offender by
leveraging his position to delay all sorts of government services.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So when Christie wasn’t getting his way from
the Mayor of Fort Lee it wasn’t much of a leap for his top advisors to concoct
an inelegant and dangerous scheme in retribution.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Christie may have had plausible deniability
on the underlying act but the culture he created is as culpable for what
happened as anything else.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
In the same way, the University of Louisville is confronting
issues of culture when it comes to head basketball coach Rick Pitino.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s hard to imagine that Pitino would ever
directly approve having an assistant coach essentially run a strip joint out of
one of the dorms in order to entice top level recruits to matriculate at
Louisville.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s just as hard to imagine
that he would not have immediately shut it down had he direct knowledge of what
was taking place.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
And yet Pitino’s continued service with the university
should still be in question because the most salient question that has to be
answered when it comes to him is whether he fostered a culture that directly
contributed to what ultimately did take place.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Did Pitino’s intense desire to secure the best recruits and keep them
from arch rival Kentucky so that he could win National Championships give his
assistants the kind of green light where they thought that unethical and/or
illegal conduct was an appropriate way to achieve those goals?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Time will tell.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That investigation continues.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
These are lessons, some very hard, on the same point.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Culture matters and the Browns do not have a
winning culture.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You could cite chapter
and verse about why that is, particularly when you consider the last decade
plus of history.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Wrong hires.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Bad draft choices.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Disaffected owners.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The point remains: every new Browns regime
talks a good game about creating a winning culture.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>None have had anything resembling the ability
to get that done.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It still isn’t.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Haslam can fairly be viewed as a guy running a business
where key employees have been definitively found to have played fast and loose
with not just the rules but the law.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Ray
Farmer, his handpicked general manager, is fairly viewed by those who work for
him directly (his staff) and indirectly (the players) as having an ego that far
exceeds his accomplishments and as being someone who likewise doesn’t’ mind
playing fast and loose with the rules, which led to his suspension.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Then of course he’s also someone who is
objectively lousy at his job. Head coach Mike Pettine is a well-intentioned but
ultimately raw and inexperienced head coach who is fairly viewed as being
completing inept at corralling the team’s most outsized personality, Johnny
Manziel.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
When you combine that level of dysfunction with a team with
the worst culture in the NFL before they arrive and then you sprinkle in the
marginal talents on the field, results like Sunday’s inevitable beat down are,
well, inevitable.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Haslam will reboot again come season’s end.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He’ll have no choice.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But that reboot will be no more successful
than his last two because what he never addresses is what he must address
first, culture.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It does matter.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-6x0opB7SePk/VhV6E3lmVnI/AAAAAAAAB84/-pYk1k-o0Ig/s1600/i_love_history_heart.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-6x0opB7SePk/VhV6E3lmVnI/AAAAAAAAB84/-pYk1k-o0Ig/s320/i_love_history_heart.png" width="320" /></a></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
At this point it seems like a question of when and not if,
as in when will Cleveland Browns owner Jimmy Haslam clean house once again?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
There is simply <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>no
way a knee-jerk owner like Haslam tolerates regression, right?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Well, that’s probably true.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Still the dilemma he faces is a tad
challenging to resolve, assuming you’re willing to give Haslam some credit for
not being a total reactionary.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
The mental gymnastics Haslam must be going through since
watching this supposedly better version of the Browns get embarrassed nearly
every week havsto be exhausting.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Haslam
can’t like what he sees any more than any fans like what they see.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But the strong evidence tells him and you
that the key to long term success in the NFL (and most businesses, actually) is
stability, particularly at the top.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
So does he stay the course out of the need to create
stability within the league’s most unstable franchise or does he once again
turn over the apple cart in the name of finding something or someone who can
turn it back upright and get it going in the right direction?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>With great money comes great
responsibility.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The only thing worth
gambling on is that whatever decision he makes will be wrong because,
Cleveland.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
The NFL out of necessity and union rules, treats most
players as fungible commodities, a balance that takes into account absolute
value, value about or below the potential replacement and salary cap impacts
when deciding in any given season which players stay and which go.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Indeed teams turn over 25-30% of their
rosters each year.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
The team’s that can perform the evaluation tasks well do so
with good management that stays in place from year to year.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The New England Patriots are the gold
standard.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The teams that perform those
tasks poorly often are unstable franchises who hire poor talent evaluators and
mediocre coaches.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Browns are that
gold standard.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
While Haslam should prize stability but that only matters
when you have the right folks in place at the top.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Browns don’t and never do.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Let’s look at the last 15 years for the
clues.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Randy Lerner seemed
to face a housecleaning dilemma every year and history has more than proven
that in every case he actually fostered regression by hanging on to coaches and
general managers who clearly were not suited for the job.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>His biggest fault was that he couldn’t tell the
difference between a Cadillac and a Camry.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>As long as he had someone driving him around I guess it didn’t matter.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Since the Browns returned in 1999 only one fired head coach
of the Browns went on to be a head coach again.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>That would be Romeo Crennel who, incidentally, still has the longest
tenure as a Browns head coach in the 2.0 ERA.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Crennel was an awful head coach overseeing typically awful Browns
personnel.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He won 6 games his first
season, 4 his next.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He should have been
fired then as it led to what came next.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Perhaps
his major accomplishment was to win 10 games in his third season, which made it
look like Lerner was a genius even though the Browns are one of the few teams
in NFL history to have won 10 games and not make the playoffs.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>More to the point though is that while the
NFL is a bottom line league, those 10 wins were soft.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Fans and history will recall that the Browns
had a historically easy schedule that entire season, a point that was proven
the following season when a Browns team supposedly on the come sank back to
Crennel’s set point of 4 wins.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He was
fired and instead of being two years into a new regime and direction the Browns
were set back by those same two years.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
And while Crennel did find a head coaching job again, that
shouldn’t alter Haslam’s view.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>After
getting fired by the Browns Crennel ended up in Kansas City as a defensive
coordinator, a job for which he was uniquely qualified and successful.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He became head coach when the Chiefs fired
Todd Haley.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Crennel continued into the
next season as well, his only full year as a head coach the second time
around.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He promptly won 4 games with a
Kansas City team many also thought was on the come and was fired. (Indeed that
Chiefs team was on the come.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Andy Reid
stepped in the next year and promptly won 11 games with essentially the same
personnel.)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
After that you have Butch Davis who never got another head
coaching gig in the NFL but did land in college at North Carolina and was fired
as part of the stench of an extensive academic cheating scandal that led to the
Browns ultimately drafting Greg Little, but that’s another failed story for
another day.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Then there are the various general managers all with the
same awful track record and not a one of them hired thereafter as a general
manager anywhere else.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That list
includes Dwight Clark, Butch Davis (served as his own GM), Phil Savage, George
Kokinis (although he was a mere puppet for the subordinate that hired him, Eric
Mangini, who also hasn’t worked again as a head coach), Tom Heckert, Mike
Lombardi and now Ray Farmer.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
The point here is that these aren’t just trends to be
interpreted.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Browns have an
unblemished record of hiring awful general managers and head coaches and every
time they held on to one or the other longer than they should have it set the
franchise back even further.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Crennel is
an obvious example but no bigger than Mike Holmgren holding on to Eric Mangini
despite the fact that he literally couldn’t stand him.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
So as Halsam finds himself on the precipice of having to figure
out when housecleaning should commence, the history he need rely on is not that
of the wonderfully ethereal concept of stability but that of a franchise he
owns that has been 100% wrong for 16 straight years.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
I’ve already and repeatedly chronicled general manager Ray
Farmer’s shortcomings.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>His talent
evaluation skills and philosophies are so misguided and inept, the results on
the field can fairly be said to be inevitable.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Holding on to him is worse than holding on to Phil Savage and on par
with holding on to Dwight Clark. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And yet to place all the blame on Farmer is to
ignore Pettine’s massive shortcomings as a head coach. Those, too, are becoming
more pronounced as the weeks roll by and here the parallels with Crennel are eerie.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
In a sense, the first four games of the season, played
against teams of similar caliber, provided a nice experiment where you can
control certain variables to determine where the problems really exist. The
debacle against the Jets, for example, highlighted the difference a coach can
make on a bad team.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Jets were a mess
last season, similar to the Browns.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Yet
week one the Jets, without any significant upgrades in personnel, came out well
prepared and more than ready to play.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The Browns looked like they had just entered the second week of training
camp and were essentially pushed around the field.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The game set a tone for both teams.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You wouldn’t be wrong to note that one of the
hallmarks of Crennel’s teams each week were their lack of preparation.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There seemed to be little sense of a game
plan or even a general direction.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>To
lose the number of games Crennel has consistently lost in his head coaching career
takes the near perfect convergence of awful talent and coaching.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Switch over to Sunday’s loss to the middling San Diego
Chargers.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So much of that loss stems
from exactly what Pettine doesn’t bring to this team.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If Pettine is really as hard-nosed as we’ve
been told, then his biggest failing comes from not instilling a similar mindset
in his team.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s not his biggest
failing.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
As a side note “hard-nosed” is one of those grand football euphemisms,
like “blue collar,” that’s supposed to conjure up an image of a team that
relies less on smarts and more on brawn and work ethic to get the task of
winning accomplished.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s a meaningless
euphemism.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Less talented teams can and
sometimes do succeed by the sheer force of their work ethic and tenacity.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But that’s rarely true in the NFL where
personnel is remarkably similar team to team.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Put it this way and maybe exclude Cleveland in this sentence but if
players at that level weren’t supremely talented, mentally, physically and
emotionally, they would have never made it to the NFL in the first place.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Now what isn’t a euphemism at all and where teams often do
reflect their head coach is in discipline and attention to detail.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>One of the reasons Crennel took so long to
become a head coach and then failed was his inability to bring the necessary
attention and detail to the big picture.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Strong-willed miscreants like Braylon Edwards ran all over Crennel and
it spilled onto the playing field in the form of one dismal penalty-laden
performance after another.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Browns’
failures in Crennel’s last season can most fairly be said to stem directly from
Crennel’s loose grip on the reins of his team.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Pettine’s teams lack the kind of discipline those supposedly
connote the hard-nosed team.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In Pettine’s
year and a half tenure his teams have ranked near the top in the number of
penalties per game, according to the website <a href="http://www.nflpenalties.com/"><span style="color: #0563c1;">www.NFLPenalties.com</span></a><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This ranking doesn’t even factor in penalties
committed, only those accepted by the opposition.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
After 4 games the Browns are averaging nearly 9 penalties a
game.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What’s as interesting is that the
Browns also have one of the highest ratio of pre-snap penalties to overall
penalties in the league under Pettine (and, frankly, basically every other
coach before Pettine in the Browns 2.0 era).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>That speaks to a revolving door of quarterbacks certainly and differing
pre snap cadences.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But it also speaks to
a lack of talent as its often overmatched offensive linemen seek to get a jump
on their defensive counterparts.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Laying all of this at Pettine’s feet probably isn’t
fair.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Much blame goes to the guy who
employs him and supplied him with the players, and that would be Farmer. His
handiwork was well on display against the Raiders a few weeks back.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That game showed the value of good
drafting.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Amari Cooper and Derek Carr
were excellent draft picks, particularly when compared to Johnny Manziel and
Justin Gilbert.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Browns could have
had either or both and chose neither.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Farmer didn’t like Carr and seemingly hates all receivers.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s in essence why the Browns are still
the Browns.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Pettine and Farmer are on borrowed time as it is.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Haslam may very well have already decided to
clean house and now is just wrestling with whether it should be in season or
the day after the season ends. Timing is tricky and keep in mind that midseason
replacements kind of feel good for a minute but also tend to piss off season
ticket holders who, in Cleveland anyway, like to hold on to the illusion that
these games matter at least until the 9<sup><span style="font-size: x-small;">th</span></sup> or 10<sup><span style="font-size: x-small;">th</span></sup> game of
the season. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
It’s also possible that Haslam really is wrestling with
another kind of dilemma.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He knows that
if he holds on to Farmer and Pettine he’ll be trying to defy history that is
absolute.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>On the other hand, if he
respects that history he runs head first into another absolute: he has no
chance of getting the next decisions right, either. Ultimately, that’s probably
what’s keeping him up most nights, the notion that buying the Browns may have
been the dumbest idea he’s had since he set up a bonus program for the sales
force at Pilot Flying J.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br />
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Early in Sunday’s dumpster fire of a loss to the lowly
Oakland Raiders, it was hard to recognize the Cleveland Browns.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Oh the play on the field was very familiar.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That hasn’t changed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What was out of whack was more visual and
took more than a few seconds to pinpoint.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>But there it was.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Stride for
stride with every bad play was a team doing so in the ugliest uniforms in the
entire league.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
There is nothing at all to recommend what the Browns now
look like to the viewing public except in a Value Jet kind of way.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If the purpose of those uniforms is to
distract the fans into thinking they’re actually rooting for a whole different
franchise then, but only then, will the new uniforms be a success. Otherwise in
practice it was the usual way the Browns do things, poorly and without much
thought.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
But why harp on what surely is the least of this team’s
problems?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Browns have played 3
league doormats in 3 consecutive weeks.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>They’ve only been competitive once.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>There are plenty of conclusions to drawn without having to sort through
the visual mess as well.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
The other thing that struck as I watched the crawler on the
screen displaying scores from other games was the performance of <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Tyrod Taylor of the Buffalo Bills had against
another of the league’s many, many doormats, the Miami Dolphins.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s not that just that Taylor played well or
that he played better Sunday (and all season) than anyone on the Browns’ roster
It’s just that it’s hard to imagine a scenario wheere anyone in this Browns’
organization would have had any sense to even give Taylor the kind of shot he’s
getting in Buffalo.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
This really is the essence of what plagues the Browns and it’s
the same as it’s been for years. The barest of strategies, the poorest of
execution. Shoddy, clueless owners who choose incompetent “football men” to run
what’s turned out to be the same old same old with the same old same old
players expecting a different result and complaining that it’s just a matter of
execution when the result is what it’s always been.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Entering the season the Browns had aging journeyman Josh
McCown and the league’s biggest question mark, Johnny Manziel at quarterback.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Just as the Bills added Taylor for depth, the
Browns could have done likewise but stood pat instead.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Taylor may have reached his peak and could
regress.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The point though is that the
Browns don’t think like other teams and that’s always to their disadvantage.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Let’s assume owner Jimmy Haslam is sincere and driven to
bring a prideful, winning franchise to the shores of Lake Erie.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He sure has a funny way of showing it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We all understand how he ended up with Mike
Pettine as his head coach.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>By the time
his front office got done fiddling around with the longest search in NFL head
coach search history, Pettine was essentially the only available candidate left
and he was barely a candidate at that.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The more credible, the more qualified had long since found more stable
environments and at this point even Syria is a more stable environment.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
What is more difficult to understand is why Haslam has any remaining
faith in Ray Farmer, the general manager he seems to trust all evidence to the
contrary notwithstanding.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s hard to
imagine that Farmer, the guy who brought you, in no particular order, Josh
McCown, Justin Gilbert, Johnny Manziel and the relatively expensive Dwayne
Bowe, would remain employed by any other franchise.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Farmer literally has no track record of accomplishment
and nothing he’s done in Cleveland has built his resume except in the most
negative ways possible. He has no eye for talent and, more devastating, no
understanding of how to construct a roster.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I wouldn’t spot him $200 on Draft Kings to run my fantasy team let alone
run an actual team.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Sunday’s loss was like the opening day loss and completely illustrative
of Farmer’s and Pettine’s shortcomings.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Let’s
start with Pettine’s role first.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
The team was once again an undisciplined mess and
irrespective of the talent level there’s no excuse when it comes to either
discipline or effort.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Completely
misreading the vibe of his team, Pettine claimed that McCown gave the Browns
the best chance to win on Sunday despite the fact that Manziel actually led the
team to a victory, it’s only victory, the week before.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The offense seemed hungover by that decision
and responded with a performance so reminiscent of week one it was as if you
CBS was merely playing that week one tape.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Silly penalties, out of position players, bad blocking,
worse tackling, awful coverage, momentum-killing special teams, this game had
it all.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And more!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Pettine is trying to instill a tough-minded,
old school attitude in a team that plays like the point of professional
football is to have fun and not get hurt.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>His teams consistently commit one silly penalty after another.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They often look lost and unmotivated.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Perhaps the worst indictment is that they
play as if pride isn’t part of the equation.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>In short, all the things that fall on the coaching staff went awry,
every single one of them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If you can
tell me exactly what the game plan for the Browns was on either side of the
ball, email me, enlighten me, defend Pettine.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I can’t.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
But let’s also remember that Pettine is playing with a
roster built by Farmer.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There, I’ve
defended him.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That still is no excuse
for all the mental mistakes but it does in large measure explain the lack of
fundamental skills available to Pettine for executing his vision.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Pettine told the media that the theme of this year’s team is
to put words into action, to not just talk about being the best this or the
best that but go out and actually show it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>In truth, this team does not have the talent to be the best at anything
except talking and that’s on Farmer, so let’s focus on him.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
The offensive line, supposedly one of the best in the
league, just ask them, was going to be even better this season with the return
of center Alex Mack from injury.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It isn’t,
proving only that Mack really wasn’t the lynchpin he appeared to be when he
first got hurt.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Because so many on the
line get beat by the defensive line it holds constantly.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It false starts even more often.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It hasn’t opened a legitimate hole for a running
back since Gene Hickerson played and it hasn’t adequately protected a
quarterback since, well, Gene Hickerson played.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Farmer supposedly built this team to be run-centric in order
to minimize the constant shortcomings he and every general manager before him
has in finding a competent quarterback.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Putting aside the incongruity of building a run-centric team in a pass
happy league, if you’re going to be run oriented then you need a line that can
block for a player that can run. The Browns have neither which is why almost
any lead an opponent gets is safe.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
On defense the Browns can’t stop anyone doing anything.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They are dead last in the run, again.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The defensive backfield is a mess, as
usual.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Joe Haden continues to be the
most overrated corner in the league and whoever is second is a distant
second.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Haden seems to have cultivated
his reputation on the backs of the kind of receivers that generally suit up for
the Browns—slow, small, possession-type receivers.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Put a legitimate big-time receiver on him,
say Brandon Marshall or Amari Cooper, and he turns into Buster Skrine.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You can’t be a great cover corner if you can’t
cover the league’s better receivers.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We
can talk about Justin Gilbert, number 1 pick Justin Gilbert, not contributing
at all but those mounds of dirt have been turned over enough.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Farmer lays at the root of every roster
problem on this team and right now it’s hard to see a path to 5 wins, let alone
to 9.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
The Browns put together a good game the previous week.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In many ways it was the polar opposite of the
week before.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But just one week later it’s
as if the win against Tennessee didn’t take place.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This team simply doesn’t progress and there’s
nothing, from the owner’s box to the front office to the coaching staff to the
roster that suggests, let alone gives any hope, that there’s progress to be
made.<o:p></o:p></div>
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 11pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">But
hey, why talk about any of that.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The
Browns have new uniforms and, as Carl Speckler would say, they have that going
for them, which is nice.</span><div class="blogger-post-footer">google_ad_client = "pub-0329689737263823";
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google_ad_channel ="";</div>Gary Benzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10578834252235902676noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30300136.post-1327929667263695492015-09-15T19:00:00.000-04:002015-09-15T19:00:03.040-04:00Failure As High Art
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Xfricz3xa6Y/VfhT8OpJj9I/AAAAAAAAB8I/kvuWWlOmrXg/s1600/Haslam.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Xfricz3xa6Y/VfhT8OpJj9I/AAAAAAAAB8I/kvuWWlOmrXg/s320/Haslam.jpg" width="304" /></a></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
If the competition was intended to measure the most
dysfunctional franchise in the NFL, the Cleveland Browns would be a perennial contender,
running neck and neck for the top of the heap with the likes of the Washington
Redskins.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Unfortunately that’s pretty
much the polar opposite of the competition the Browns ostensibly should be in
which is why once again when the season ends Browns fans will be searching for
a team to root for during the playoffs.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
For what it’s worth, a disclaimer.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That lede was written before the disaster
that was the franchise’s 11<sup><span style="font-size: x-small;">th</span></sup> straight opening day loss.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That loss, institutional failure as high art,
couldn’t have been more timely or prescient or point proving.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Nonetheless, let’s soldier on.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And because this is Cleveland, where
notoriety is treated like success, it takes a special kind of franchise
dysfunction to beat out a team like Washington whose general manager is accused
on Twitter, by his current wife no less, of sleeping with a reporter and then
feeding her stories.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Yet these are your
Cleveland Browns, a team who entered the season with someone at every level of
the franchise suspended and an owner still living under the cloud of potential
criminal activity.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Maybe it’s a close call.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>It doesn’t matter.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It will be
another long season in Cleveland.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Let’s face, it gets no more sublime or ridiculous when you
pause to consider that the team’s best receiver, Josh Gordon, is suspended for
the season, its general manager, Ray Farmer, the team’s second in command, is
suspended for the first four games and its offensive line coach is on
indefinite suspension allegedly for domestic abuse.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
That trifecta ought to remove all doubt about why this team
can’t progress on the field.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is so
busy doing stupid, petty, awful things away from the field (or, in Farmer’s
case, tangential to the field) that it doesn’t have the time to fully focus on
what really matters.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
The Gordon suspension can be viewed through a variety of prisms
but the bottom line is that Gordon was adequately warned to stay away from both
drugs and alcohol and deliberately chose to act otherwise.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s the Browns way.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He claims not to be an addict, which actually
makes what he did to get himself thrown out of the league for a year appear
worse.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s easy to feel compassion for
the addict whose initial deliberate act eventually spirals into a series of
overwhelming physical and psychological cravings as to alter the ability to
think deliberately.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But I’ll take Gordon
at his word.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s not him.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He’s not an addict.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That makes him just a fool.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He ought to be on the cover of the team’s
media guide.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Gordon is the face of the
franchise.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
But Farmer is fighting Gordon for that distinction and
putting up a hell of a fight.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Where
perhaps he has the edge is in age and hence perceived maturity.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A Duke graduate and former linebacker with
the Eagles, Farmer should have the education and sense to know better.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He probably does.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Unfortunately he lacks the ability to use
either.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>His ego far outpaces actual
accomplishment.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
I’ve never understood frankly how Farmer held on to his job
after the texting incident.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s an
incredible embarrassment to the franchise in and of itself not to mention the
hole it puts the team in during those critical first few weeks of the season
when rosters are constantly shifting.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Now the cynic may be thankful for small favors when you consider Farmer’s
abilities as a general manager.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>His
record is so poor on that front Tom Heckert and Phil Savage look like Ernie
Accorsi in comparison.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
No reason to completely re-litigate Farmer’s real calling
card, the bizarre 4-game suspension for spending game days texting his vast
football Xs and Os knowledge to the sideline from the cheap seats.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But what is worth mentioning in this whole
affair is how counterproductive his conduct really was.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>While Farmer was channeling the dream of
every fantasy football owner or head coach wannabe, only with the actual access
and the hierarchal structure to get people to at least look at his messages,
his antics were completely distracting to those on the field actually trying to
do their jobs.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
This is exactly what it means to be dysfunctional. Farmer,
sitting in his box acting like a big shot while the coaches on the field have
to contend with filtering through his idiotic ramblings instead of
concentrating on how to actually win a game in this town. This team needs to
hit on all cylinders and he’s keeping it from hitting on any.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
There may come a point where one of Farmer’s early round draft
picks or free agent acquisitions will actually work out, but that doesn’t look
to happen any time soon.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He’s mostly
pitching a shut out when he ought to instead be hitting at about a .750 clip.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Farmer is quickly losing the excuse of
previous administrations to justify the rancid performances like Sundays that
increasingly less fans are witnessing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>There is not one area where this team is better because of him.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Not one.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Then of course there’s Andy Moeller. I’d say that this is
what you get when you rely on Michigan men when running your business but I don’t
want to feed into Braylon Edwards’ narrative that Cleveland fans never gave him
a fair shake because he was from Michigan.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Moeller’s failings, like Edwards’ were both on field and character
related and where each went to college is irrelevant.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Moeller has well documented issues with his ability to
handle alcohol (like Edwards, actually) and by the latest accounts that led to
his suspension, still does. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Moeller’s
alleged actions, per the 911 call, are reprehensible for all the same reasons
that have been detailed countless times about countless NFL players.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
The biggest problem with Moeller is that he doesn’t
learn.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He hasn’t learned from his past
arrests for alcohol abuse and he hasn’t learned from all the other troubles
players and some coaches have had with domestic abuse.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If head coach Mike Pettine brings Moeller
back then Pettine’s tenure needs to be further evaluated.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Pettine brought this nit wit in but there’s
no reason to continue to invest in that mistake.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
What makes all this so relevant is actually the play on the
field this past Sunday.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A collapse in
the first game of the season at the hands of one of the worst teams in the
league last season isn’t a fluke.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s
the byproduct of a team out of sync at every level.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The team’s owner runs a hair trigger
enterprise.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The front office isn’t
competent in any aspect of its job.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The
head coach is still raw.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The players, at
least those who have been around for years like Joe Thomas, are mostly doing
their professional best while knowing at every minute that there isn’t a chance
in hell that this team can be successful.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
As for Pettine, Sunday’s fiasco only demonstrated that he
isn’t up to the task of being able to overcome all the dysfunction around
him.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Pettine’s team, in game one, was an
undisciplined mess, committing one stupid, drive killing penalty after
another.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And when it wasn’t doing that
it was turning the ball over.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>These are
issues of discipline that must start with the head coach.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s one of the easiest things to fix, or
certainly one of the first at least.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And
yet Pettine’s team came out and played like the platoon from Stripes after Sgt.
Hulka got blown up.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Let’s also not give Pettine a pass for the way the whole
Terelle Pryor mess played itself out.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>From this distance it looked like a palace coup initiated by Pettine
once Farmer was off on his garden leave for the month.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Up until the moment he was cut Pryor was
practicing and plays were being designed around his unique talents.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The excuse from Pettine was that the timing
for Pryor wasn’t right, a more or less empty sentence that likely is papering
over a schism that developed with Farmer signed Pryor in the first place.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Who knows if Pryor could ever be productive?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But isn’t it the point that it’s precisely
guys like Pryor on whom moribund teams like the Browns should be taking
chances?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And when ultimate journeyman
Josh McCown decided to try and helicopter himself in the end zone on the team’s
first drive on Sunday, how stupid did the Browns look by having only the shaky
Johnny Manziel as the remaining quarterback on the roster?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If I’m guessing, and purely guessing, the New
England Patriots will sign Pryor because of course.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s how good teams stay good.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Pettine may be relatively far down on the list of this team’s
problems, but he is on the list.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And the
fact that he’s on the list only speaks to the level of dysfunction that is
keeping this franchise from being mediocre, let alone functional.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Fixing it starts at the very top and given
what fans have seen thus far, that’s hardly the most comforting thought.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="blogger-post-footer">google_ad_client = "pub-0329689737263823";
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<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-hLXSw-5IVtE/VeSw6PgivFI/AAAAAAAAB7s/X_nFyfqjCGM/s1600/Mark%2BShapiro.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="179" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-hLXSw-5IVtE/VeSw6PgivFI/AAAAAAAAB7s/X_nFyfqjCGM/s320/Mark%2BShapiro.jpg" width="320" /></a>It’s pretty significant to the future of the Cleveland
Indians that Mark Shapiro, who’s been with the team longer than the Dolans have
owned it, is packing his kit bag for the move north to Toronto and a similar
role with the Blue Jays.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What is
probably far more significant to that future of the team is the lesser told
story that the Dolans are looking to sell about 30% of the franchise, at an
inflated valuation of course, in order to fund the team at more appropriate
levels.<o:p></o:p></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
According to a story in Monday’s Akron Beacon Journal, the
Dolans have hired an investment advisor to market the team to moneyed owner
wannabees looking to get into the game.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Now under normal circumstances a smart person might ask why anyone would
want to give a quarter of a billion dollars to the Dolans without any
meaningful chance to control the franchise’s fate.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But those kind of smart questions don’t
really apply in the world of professional sports. Really smart investors
generally stay out of sports so the usual math tends to be meaningless.<o:p></o:p></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
What the Dolans are looking for is a lifeline, someone to
fund the team’s salary growth.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In return
they’ll give up a seat in the owner’s box and a seat at the table at the winter
meetings.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Implicit though is the
motivating factor of that minority owner.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>He or she, but likely he, will become a member of the owners’ club and
thus be seen as a potentially viable buyer of a majority interest in a
franchise down the road.<o:p></o:p></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
It’s a construct that tends to work, by the way Jimmy Haslam
never becomes the owner of the Browns if he hadn’t started off owning a small
piece of the Pittsburgh Steelers first.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It
gave the rest of the owners a chance to get used to his glad handing ways.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Steve Biscotti followed a similar path in
Baltimore though he struck a particularly favorable deal against a craven,
bankrupt owner in Art Modell and essentially stole the franchise out from under
the Modell family. And a grateful generation of Clevelanders thank him.<o:p></o:p></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
In the near term this is a bit of good news for Indians
fans, assuming that the Dolans find the well-financed patsy that their plan
requires.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It also demonstrates what I’ve
said for years.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Dolans simply do not
have enough money to compete with most other owners in major league baseball.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The franchise doesn’t generate enough money
and the Dolans don’t have the wherewithal to deficit spend the team back into
the level of competitiveness that would significantly increase revenues.<o:p></o:p></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
This is where the story of Shapiro becomes most
relevant.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For years Shapiro has guided
the direction of this franchise and has had to do it somewhat under unfavorable
battle conditions.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Always trying to
scrape together enough money to make targeted investments without huge
downsides has led the Indians to essentially buy out the arbitration years of
its best prospects while setting the stage for those prospects to leave once
free agency beckoned.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The history with
CC Sabathia and Cliff Lee would be played out once again with the likes of
Corey Kluber, Michael Brantley and Jason Kipnis eventually.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It was always just a matter of time and may
still be.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
This is what Indians fans have been conditioned to expect
and has been a factor, the degree of which one can debate, in the continued
muted interest in this team, assuming one judges interest by such pedestrian metrics
as attendance.<o:p></o:p></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Shapiro has done his best to divert what’s happening with this
left hand by keeping the right hand in constant motion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Indians, under Shapiro, have upgraded
Progressive Field (mostly with Progressive Insurance’s stadium rights money)
and have attempted nearly all manner of low cost distraction in the form of
constant, and branded, giveaways.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Shapiro has been a whiz at using other people’s money (other than the
Dolans, I mean) to cultivate an inviting fan experience even if the games tend
to be boring and the team often on, at best, the fringes of competitiveness.<o:p></o:p></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
It hasn’t worked.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The
Indians consistently rank near the bottom in major league attendance and there’s
only so much for which one can continue to blame “the economy” before you come to
the conclusion that winning matters and winning consistently matters even more.<o:p></o:p></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
You want to understand why Shapiro would leave for what
amounts to the same job somewhere else?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>That’s why.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s not just more
money for him and his family but more money for him and his new team to play
with.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The more puzzling question is why
he stayed so long. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Presumably Shapiro is well respected in baseball
circles.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He’s the quintessential company
man.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>No one speaks more lingo and knows
more metrics.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He’s personable without
being obnoxious.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He’s probably a really
pleasant guy around the office and maybe even fun in the few unguarded moments
when he has a chance to kick back with a beer.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>He’s had enough of success to make him seem competent without being so
competent as to be out of reach.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In
short, the Toronto job couldn’t have been the first opportunity to have come
his way in 23 years with Cleveland.<o:p></o:p></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Maybe it’s as simple as Shapiro being the eternal
optimist.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Maybe he always figured that
at some point the purse strings would loosen and he’d have to stop soliciting
virtually every business near and far to partner up on this promotion or
that.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>At some point, though, life has a
way of turning the most idealistic among us into hard-bitten realists and if
there is one reality that’s well known under this Indians’ ownership it’s that
this team was never going to be funded at a level that would truly allow it to
compete on a regular basis.<o:p></o:p></div>
<br />
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Shapiro’s timing is a little curious though given how the
Dolans are shopping the team.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That seemingly
represents the best chance to really infuse this team with money and would seem
like the opportune time for Shapiro to stick around.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s what actually scares me most. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If Shapiro doesn’t see that as the best chance
to right the team than what hope should the fans continue to cling to?<o:p></o:p></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
In some ways, Shapiro will be missed and in many ways he won’t.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Under his watch he did bring the franchise
forward using analytics.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What will never
be fully known are the decisions he was forced to make that ultimately put this
franchise in a state of suspended animation.<o:p></o:p></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Paul Dolan is taking over the reins as president, content to
take on the role himself rather than look outside.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There’s nothing in that sentence or those
fact that suggests, in and of itself, that fans can expect anything
different.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That will occur, if ever,
when the Dolans find that quarter billion they want for a third of their
franchise.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="blogger-post-footer">google_ad_client = "pub-0329689737263823";
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<br />
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/2Epn-TJSqIM" width="420"></iframe><div class="blogger-post-footer">google_ad_client = "pub-0329689737263823";
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<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<iframe width="320" height="266" class="YOUTUBE-iframe-video" data-thumbnail-src="https://i.ytimg.com/vi/j3m0BXVKPu0/0.jpg" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/j3m0BXVKPu0?feature=player_embedded" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe></div>
<br />
<br />
<br />
<span id="goog_1732716882"></span><span id="goog_1732716883"><br /></span>
<br /><div class="blogger-post-footer">google_ad_client = "pub-0329689737263823";
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-6kWJTIXrJIc/VUazfPBHL_I/AAAAAAAAB60/44GxqS-fFBA/s1600/josh%2Bmccown.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-6kWJTIXrJIc/VUazfPBHL_I/AAAAAAAAB60/44GxqS-fFBA/s1600/josh%2Bmccown.jpg" height="200" width="320" /></a></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The Cleveland Browns had the kind of draft this past week that they should have had given the kind of team they have. It was solid and unspectacular, built around the defensive and offensive lines. In short it was the kind of draft that teams trying to rebuild should have. </div>
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Too bad it’s taken them almost 15 years to put together a draft that probably shouldn’t have otherwise been necessary by this time.</div>
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Always chasing rainbows and coming up short, the Browns have languished for all the reasons that this particular draft highlighted. Faulty draft strategies, raging egos, bad trades, major miscalculations all have conspired for years to keep this team firmly entrenched in the bottom tier of the league. Browns teams for the last 15 years have lacked cohesive, strong offensive or defensive lines and had near zero depth at any position. So even when a player with some skill somehow landed in their laps, the inevitable injury revealed the kind of gaping holes that are the hallmark of all bad teams.</div>
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Filling several holes shouldn’t have been this hard for this long.</div>
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Forget about the actual players the Browns drafted for a moment. Few if any fans can comment intelligently on even Danny Shelton, let alone Charles Gaines or Hayes Pullard. Focus instead on the configuration of the draft. Notice the patterns. This draft was constructed like most teams are supposed to be constructed. It was built from the inside out. That may be easy to do in a sense for a team like Cleveland that has so many overarching needs. Yet it still takes some discipline to do the right thing when it’s oh so easy to do the flashy thing when the person calling the shots walks in loaded with draft picks and oozing ego.</div>
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Credit then should go to general manager Ray Farmer on that aspect of the draft. Whether he chose the right players is not something that’s going to be known any time soon. Given Farmer’s history, there’s every reason to question his player evaluations. But at least you can’t complain about the approach.</div>
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And yet as the Browns enter next season, they’re forced to answer the same lingering question they’ve been forced to answer for most of its 2.0 existence: do they have a quarterback on whom the team can rely? The answer is likely the same as it’s ever been. Probably not.</div>
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What struck me about the post-draft press conference that Farmer and head coach Mike Pettine held was not what they had to say about who they drafted but what they had to say about who they didn’t. Pettine, in one of the stranger answers I’ve ever heard, said that the team is actively working to “try to minimize the importance of the quarterback.” Good luck with that.</div>
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That statement makes some sense in a Trent Dilfer kind of way and if I were Pettine I suppose I’d say the same thing. It’s been shown to work that if the defense is stronger than any other in the league, the offense can afford to be merely serviceable. That’s the formula the Baltimore Ravens used to ride Dilfer to and through a Super Bowl. But it’s not easily replicated for the most obvious of reasons: you have to feature an intimidating and dominating defense. </div>
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The Cleveland Browns aren’t close to being either. One draft isn’t going to turn this Browns’ defense into the second-coming of the Ray Lewi-led Ravens defense and besides this offense isn’t even merely serviceable even if it was.</div>
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<div class="MsoNormal">
Josh McCown, who looks to be the Browns’ starter next season by default, if for no other reason, is the quintessential NFL journeyman. When he starts for the Browns in September, it will be his 14th season. He really has only been a starter for two of those seasons and neither one of those were particularly successful for his team. Indeed he was available to be signed mainly because as Tampa Bay’s starter last season he went 1-10.</div>
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<br /></div>
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When Dilfer signed with the Ravens, he was in just his 7th season. Although you can easily make the case that he too was a journeyman, that’s mostly informed by the back end of his career and not his career to that point. In 5 of the seasons before he joined Baltimore, he was the team’s starter and had some measure of his success, certainly more than McCown can claim. </div>
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<br /></div>
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So when the Ravens asked Dilfer to mostly not throw up on himself so that its defense could intimidate and dominate, there was every reason to think that it was a job Dilfer could handle. And even if he couldn’t, he had a strong running game featuring Jamal Lewis in his prime and an up and coming Priest Holmes. The only deep threat the Ravens had was Qadry Ismail, the kind of receiver that the Browns seems to feature these days, but they did have Shannon Sharpe, one of the top tight ends in the game. Dilfer, a player with plenty of games already under his belt, was the near perfect player for a team trying to “minimize” the importance of the quarterback.</div>
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The same cannot be said for McCown. He isn’t joining a team with a dominant defense and there simply isn’t enough on offense to allow the Browns to “minimize” all of McCown’s shortcomings. The team neither features a strong running game or even a serviceable passing game. It lost its only decent tight end in the offseason and while Brian Hartline is a nice signing, that’s all he is. The team didn’t suddenly get better because of Hartline. His presence mostly allows Farmer to credibly claim that the team hasn’t regressed in its receiving game.</div>
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The Browns may be minimizing the importance of quarterback because it really has no other choice. Pettine and Farmer can talk about how they like where they stand at that position but it rings even hollower than Brian Kelly’s claim that his quarterback situation at Notre Dame is superior to that of Ohio State’s.</div>
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What both Farmer and Pettine well know is that the NFL isn’t a league where a team can be successful minimizing the most important position on the team. It’s like the body saying it’s going to minimize the importance of the heart. If this year’s draft ends up being as successful as the Browns hope it is, it will highlight exactly the flaw in their current thinking. The Browns could conceivably get to 8-8 and maybe even 9-7 with better defense and better offensive line play and depth, but it simply cannot make the leap into the upper tier of this league without a quarterback that causes opponents to worry or at least scheme against.</div>
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This team may not need Tom Brady but it sure as heck is going to need more than Josh McCown to be successful. Perhaps though if the team can find a way to climb out of the hole it’s dug for itself with so many prior lousy drafts then perhaps they will be able to convince a quarterback of more merit and a receiver in his relative prime to join the team for the next phase of its journey.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div class="blogger-post-footer">google_ad_client = "pub-0329689737263823";
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google_ad_channel ="";</div>Gary Benzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10578834252235902676noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30300136.post-55945840225946841942015-03-27T18:23:00.001-04:002015-03-27T18:25:07.063-04:00Reining In The Religious Bigots<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-cb0C7-JwABA/VRXXbhzRuXI/AAAAAAAAB5s/rxlUdx4dYw8/s1600/ew-same-sex-marriage-symbols.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-cb0C7-JwABA/VRXXbhzRuXI/AAAAAAAAB5s/rxlUdx4dYw8/s1600/ew-same-sex-marriage-symbols.jpg" /></a>It’s time to let the free market have its say and the ones
to do the talking are among the biggest players on the block, the NFL and the
NCAA.</div>
<div>
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<o:p></o:p></div>
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Earlier this week Indiana governor Mike Pence signed into
law a so-called religious freedom bill that would specifically allow businesses
in that state to openly, purposely and insidiously discriminate against gays so
long as they assert sincerely held religious beliefs that require them to
reject doing business with homosexuals, bisexuals and transgenders</div>
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.<o:p></o:p></div>
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The NFL, the NCAA and the sponsors of both have substantial
business interests in Indiana. Not only
does the state have an NFL franchise, it also holds the annual circus known as
the combine for several days each March in Indianapolis. The NCAA has its corporate headquarters in
Indianapolis. One of its conferences,
the Big Ten, holds its annual championship in Indianapolis. Together these activities probably yield
hundreds of millions of dollars annually in economic benefits for the
state. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-x7oYtM21D9w/VRXXbhMt-eI/AAAAAAAAB5o/cFAXA8sIvTA/s1600/NFL%2BNCAA.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-x7oYtM21D9w/VRXXbhMt-eI/AAAAAAAAB5o/cFAXA8sIvTA/s1600/NFL%2BNCAA.jpg" height="170" width="320" /></a>The other thing tying these organizations and their sponsors
together is that they both serve the LGBT community. Both the NCAA and the NFL have a smattering
of openly gay players with several more closeted ones sprinkled
throughout. The companies that shower
millions on them for the right to be associated with them have gay
employees. In short, none can afford to
be viewed as homophobic because of the attendant economic consequences that
would bring.<o:p></o:p></div>
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Yet unless all of them stand up to the religious bullies and
far right nut jobs running the government in Indiana, they risk being branded
as complicit in the bigotry the state of Indiana recently institutionalized.<o:p></o:p></div>
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Let’s be clear on this point. Indiana may be the first to get this law
passed and signed by a weak-willed governor more concerned with checking off
the boxes on his far right bona fides in case he should run for President some
day than he is with the rights of all his citizens, but left unchecked these
vile laws will spread like anthrax. <o:p></o:p></div>
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Certainly the U.S. Supreme Court, perhaps unwittingly, gave
birth to these kinds of laws when it found that Hobby Lobby, as a company,
could assert religious claims against contraception as a basis for refusing to
follow the Affordable Care Act’s mandate that contraception must be a covered
benefit under its health plans. And it
will likely take the U.S. Supreme Court to step in, much like it did in Brown
v. The Board of Education, to ultimately put a stop to this latest form of
bigotry. But until then, it falls to
those who have a vested interest in not looking like they sanction discrimination
to effectively stop this in its tracks.<o:p></o:p></div>
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Believe me, if the NFL and the NCAA take a stand in Indiana,
it will give pause to every other state currently considering these ridiculous
laws.<o:p></o:p></div>
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If there’s one thing these religious zealots believe in more
than shunning homosexuals, it’s the power of the free market as the solution to
all of society’s problems. So those that
can should unleash that power by refusing to do business of any kind in a state
that institutionalizes bigotry against any segment of society.<o:p></o:p></div>
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Tech companies, a few organizations and a couple of small
businesses have said they won’t do business in Indiana. The Republican mayor of Indianapolis came out
against the law. That’s a nice start but
it’s not the kind of tsunami that would get unleashed if the NCAA and the NFL
and their sponsors take on the cause. <o:p></o:p></div>
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The NCAA issued a helpful statement, indicating that it’s
concerned about the impact of the law on its employees and that it wants to
ensure that those attending next week’s Final Four are not negatively impacted. It also left dangling the implication that there
could be more direct action taken as it further considers its options. But I’m disappointed anyway.<o:p></o:p></div>
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The Indiana legislature has been considering this law for
the last few months. The governor has
repeatedly expressed his support for it.
What the NCAA should have done was threaten to move this year’s Final
Four, even with all the logistical challenges that would create, unless either
the legislature voted the bill down or the governor refused to sign it. By not speaking up it, the law got passed and
by virtue of its existence, its employees and everyone attending the Final Four
are negatively impacted. It’s simply
unrealistic at this late moment to expect every employee of the NCAA, every
participant in the tournament and every fan to boycott the state at this late
date. </div>
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Instead they have to do business
in what is certainly now one of this nation’s most odious states.<o:p></o:p></div>
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The NFL had threatened Arizona with the withdrawal of a
Super Bowl when it was considering a similar law. It worked.
But here the NFL has remained silent, at least so far. That’s puzzling but perhaps not. The NFL has a very troubled history of moving
too slowly on issues of social significance and it usually takes a few missteps
and a public outcry before it gets it right.</div>
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<o:p></o:p></div>
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This isn’t that hard for the NFL. Just come out now and tell the state that the
combine won’t take place in Indianapolis again and until the law is
changed. Maybe they have contracts that
would have to get broken. So be it. The NFL has twice as much money as the God
these legislators claim to worship. It can
take the short term loss for the long term gain. So could have the NCAA.<o:p></o:p></div>
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Undoubtedly demanding action by the NCAA and the NFL will
surely inflame the religious fruitcakes who think these kind of Jim Crow 2.0
laws are just dandy. The argument Spence
articulated on behalf of them is that the law is not about discrimination, it’s
about religious freedom. What Spence can’t
rightly answer, and the most salient question he avoided, is exactly how
religious freedom is supposedly under attack in this country. It’s not, that’s a fallacy perpetrated by far
right religious lobbying groups in order to further its far right Christian
agenda. When Spence references religion,
it’s code for Christianity. And it’s not
all of Christianity, just the far right branch that believes cats will start
playing with dogs and cows will rain from the heavens if gays are allowed to
marry.<o:p></o:p></div>
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The real nub of the issue is that a few far right religious
lobbying groups worked the state like TV evangelists work their flocks. They convinced them that a few mom and pop
shops who ran afoul of public accommodation laws by refusing to serve gays was
a wrong that needed to be righted in the name of a God whom, a character in the
movie Hannah and Her Sisters once said, if he returned and saw all that was
being done in his name would be so appalled he’d never stop throwing up.<o:p></o:p></div>
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There’s no inherent wrong that needed to be righted unless
it’s telling those loudmouth bigots that they are wrong, morally, religiously
and economically. If Spence and the
Indiana legislature wants to stand up for religious freedom then they ought to
be the first to stand in front of the line and protect the next group of
Muslims who get threatened for wanting to build a mosque next to a
synagogue. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Gay marriage is legal in 36 states at the moment. The country hasn’t collapsed onto
itself. Indeed things pretty much seem
the same. The Cleveland Browns still
suck. The Republicans still hate the
President. Girls still remains one of
the most over-rated shows in television history. </div>
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The U.S. Supreme Court is poised to legalize gay
marriage across the country. But that
won’t dissuade the bigots any more than the decision in Brown v. The Board of
Education when bigoted businesses were told that they had to integrate or risk
breaking the law. When George Wallace
refused to abide by the decision and tried to stop the University of Alabama
from integrating, when he tried to stop elementary schools from integrating, he
was shut down by the federal courts and federal marshals. He had plenty of supporters, certainly, but
time and history haven’t been kind to either of them.<o:p></o:p></div>
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That will ultimately be the same result for Pence and every
legislator in Indiana who passed this law, just as it will be for every
legislator across the country considering similar laws, just as it will be for
every governor in every state and every other attorney general in every other
state (including John Kasich and Mike DeWine in Ohio) still fighting the wrong
fight on taxpayer money.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
There’s no reason though to wait for history to render its
judgment. That judgment can and should be
rendered contemporaneously by those with the economic power to do it. And if the NCAA and the NFL don’t get this
right, then it’s time to reconsider our support for anything they sponsor. <o:p></o:p></div>
</div>
<div class="blogger-post-footer">google_ad_client = "pub-0329689737263823";
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google_ad_channel ="";</div>Gary Benzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10578834252235902676noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30300136.post-51279913907408472092015-03-04T19:05:00.000-05:002015-03-04T19:05:00.876-05:00Shrugging It All Off<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-YO-XHDcvQ_Q/VPdzr6D89hI/AAAAAAAAB4Y/tYlEsWbhLSo/s1600/shrug.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-YO-XHDcvQ_Q/VPdzr6D89hI/AAAAAAAAB4Y/tYlEsWbhLSo/s1600/shrug.jpg" height="266" width="400" /></a>Joe Paterno hated end zone celebrations.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He told his players to hand the ball to the
official and to act like they’ve been there before.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Cleveland Browns fans don’t need to act like
they’ve been there before.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They have.<o:p></o:p></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
How else can one otherwise act when considering the various
moves of the Cleveland Browns as it goes about its latest offseason marked as
it is by the usual overpromising and under delivering. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Maybe the better reaction is the Joey Bosa
shrug.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
To focus on but two recent examples:<o:p></o:p></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
The Browns unveiled their new branding initiatives that
amounted to nothing more than keeping the same logo but with a more vibrant
shade of orange on the helmet and a more foreboding shade of black on the
faceguard.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
There was a bunch of accompanying talk about how these new
designs somehow are more reflective of Cleveland today than in the past.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Mostly though this great unveil was a
microcosm of the team itself: more hype than substance.<o:p></o:p></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Then the Browns signed Josh McCown, 35-year old Josh McCown,
as their next quarterback.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That makes
McCown number 23 on a list with no end, no real beginning, and no real goal.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Such is the ignominious roster of Browns
quarterbacks the last 15 years.<o:p></o:p></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
It probably means something that of the previous 22
quarterbacks to wear a Browns uniform the only one with a winning record, Brian
Hoyer, is the latest one being replaced.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>But it probably says even more that the Browns are still signing quarterbacks
like McCown with the abiding belief that what this team needs, indeed what gets
it from point A to point B, is a bridge to its true savior, also known as the
quarterback that doesn’t exist.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Josh
McCown, meet Luke McCown or Jack Delhomme or Brian Hoyer or, or, do I really
need to go through the other 20?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Seriously, how long are the Browns going to try and recreate the Gary
Danielson/Bernie Kosar experience?<o:p></o:p></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
No one could possibly much care that the Browns see McCown
as a better option than Hoyer.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s like
choosing Budget Car Rental over Alamo at the airport.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Neither is Hertz or Avis and what you get by
being cheap is a pretty decent chance that the car you reserved won’t be
available for another hour, please wait.<o:p></o:p></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
In the same way, no one much cares that the Browns grand
strategists see the latest shade of orange as somehow more reflective (unless
it’s actually, you know, reflective) of the city than the previous color.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s like choosing ecru over khaki when
picking a shade of brown to paint the guest room.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>To the person visiting the colors are as
indistinguishable as they are uninteresting.<o:p></o:p></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
It really is hard to figure out what this team is doing or
working on that ultimately will make it perform better on the field.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We know, for example, that if the team had
better players it wouldn’t matter if they wore uniforms that were ultraviolet
with grey accents just as we know if these same players wore the red, white and
blue of the New England Patriots they’d still finish under .500 every season.<o:p></o:p></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
I’m not against branding or even updating the branding.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But let’s call it what it is: the last tool
in the box of a diversionist.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
What this bit of news about re-branding really demonstrates
above almost all else is that this is a franchise more consumed with fluff than
substance.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I suppose that the only thing
that would make this effort more clear if the team had decided to rename
itself.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Isn’t that the last bastion of
all failing brands?<o:p></o:p></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
The Browns have become the Value Jet of NFL franchises so it
wouldn’t be a total surprise if they came up with a new name, like Value Jet
did when it renamed itself JetBlue after a particularly horrific crash in a
Florida swamp revealed that Value Jet was not a brand that anyone trusted.<o:p></o:p></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
For Value Jet, it mostly worked.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>JetBlue was reborn and has been modestly
successful as a budget airline flying limited routes while charging
frugal-minded customers for bags and probably everything else, including arm
rests and seat cushions.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Browns’
rebranding efforts, I suspect, will meet with less success.<o:p></o:p></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
As long as owner Jimmy Haslam retains the team’s current
name how much can really change?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Decades
ago most fans understood that the team name honored its most famous coach, Paul
Brown.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But Art Modell changed that
calculus when he fired Brown (has there ever been a better example of
foreshadowing?) but weirdly kept the name.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Now, however, the history has been long forgotten by most fans and now
the name just sits there, wallowing as the logo does in its own bath of
blandness.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Brown might be the least
vibrant color on the spectrum matching the least vibrant team in the NFL.<o:p></o:p></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
And while this franchise has given its fans every reason to
be cynical about anything it does, the question is still relevant: exactly what
is the team trying to distract the fans from?<o:p></o:p></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Oh yea, it’s the stuff going on inside of Berea.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
I’m not against signing McCown though again it’s worth
pointing out that his signing comes at the expense of dropping the only
quarterback the team has had since 1999 who has played more than ten games and
had a winning record.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s just that his
signing doesn’t move anyone’s needle.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>McCown
was terrible last season, played well in spots in previous seasons, and overall
brings absolutely nothing to the mix assuming the goal was to stabilize the
quarterback position. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He’s what Brandon
Weeden would have been in a few years, when he turns 35, had the Browns kept
him.<o:p></o:p></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
So why did the Browns sign McCown?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Good question and one the team hasn’t really
ventured to answer.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But you can read
into some of McCown’s comments, the most telling of which is that he both understands
that he is not nor does he have any interest in being the team’s near, mid or
long-term answer at quarterback.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He just
wants to contribute, you know, do what’s asked.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>That apparently conflicts with Hoyer’s perfectly understandable view
that given his success with a team that otherwise lacks any, he both wants to
start and be paid like one.<o:p></o:p></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
In other words, in signing McCown the Browns weren’t
interested in a fierce competitor with his eye on the prize.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They wanted a caretaker, a guy willing to
shut his pie hole and sit in the corner happy with a <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>contract that guarantees him a little over $6
million by the time he exits Cleveland, probably at the end of next season.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That narrative also fits well into the larger
issue of branding, doesn’t it?<o:p></o:p></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
There is much else in Berea from which the Browns would want
its fans distracted, like the disastrous general manager with the happy texting
fingers.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Then there’s the news that the
Browns nixed solid trade offers for Josh Gordon last season only to now find
themselves clinging to a player with no market value on a team in desperate
need of someone who can catch the ball.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The
overhang, of course, is just the general specter of another draft, a passel
full of draft picks, and a track record that says they’re more likely to blow
every one of them than get any one of them right.<o:p></o:p></div>
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 11pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">Yea,
sure, now is exactly the right time to re-brand, just as it is the right time
to sign McCown, and the right time shrug your shoulders at it all and move on,
secure in the knowledge that no matter which way the Browns arrange the deck
chairs the ship is still sinking.</span><div class="blogger-post-footer">google_ad_client = "pub-0329689737263823";
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<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-u2jE_7jQ4OQ/VN0iJf80amI/AAAAAAAAB3c/WNOo-xSyKes/s1600/Haslam.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-u2jE_7jQ4OQ/VN0iJf80amI/AAAAAAAAB3c/WNOo-xSyKes/s1600/Haslam.jpg" height="400" width="380" /></a></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
After about a week or so of letting the latest fire inside
the Berea headquarters of the Cleveland Browns burn indiscriminately, owner
Jimmy Haslam has spoken with the kind of earnestness that suggested a belief
that his words would douse the flames while calming the masses.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
To lead with the positive, at least Haslam answered the
questions posed. To point out the obvious, though, it didn’t help his case, the
situation or the overarching narrative that the team remains where it’s been,
in the gutter.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
The biggest revelation, and taking a page from Atlanta
Falcons owner Arthur Blank’s book, <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>was Haslam
trying to get ahead of the NFL’s imminent announcement that Ray Farmer, the
team’s general manager, indeed brake league rules by texting coaches during
games by announcing it himself.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Yes,
apparently, Farmer did as alleged.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Perhaps the bigger news though is that Haslam couldn’t care
less.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Rather than offering up even an
ounce of criticism that his chosen pick as general manager may be out of his element
or, at the very least, not setting the right leadership example for others to
follow, Haslam instead supported Farmer as if he had just pulled off the
biggest coup since Kevin Costner procured Vontae Mack, Ray Jennings and Seattle’s
top punt returner while still getting back the three first round picks he
foolishly gave up to get the Johnny Manziel-like Bo Callahan.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
In a story from Thursday’s Akron Beacon Journal, Haslam
called Farmer “smart,” a description that’s hard to square with the stupidity
of his misconduct.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He lavished praise
about Farmer’s work ethic and his all around awesomeness.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Haslam even went to great pains to say that
while he hates that his organization now looks like it’s run by dumbbells, he “hate[s]
it more for Ray Farmer.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I can tell you
it eats him up every day.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Well, there
is that.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
It’s nice and good for team unity I suppose for Haslam to
publicly support Farmer, even in such an over the top manner, but in many ways
it’s done at the expense of slapping the fans across the face, hard. The NFL
hasn’t yet announced the punishment the team will get but irrespective of
whether it’s just a suspension of Farmer or something more serious, such as
lost draft picks, is irrelevant.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The
fans are left trying to justify for another whole off season exactly why they
root for a team, let alone spend money to support it, that seems not just off
message but off mission.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Then when you couple it with Haslam’s real intent, to rally
the fans behind a guy who in just his first year of running the draft botched two
first round picks and failed to secure any credible receivers despite knowing
at the outset that Josh Gordon wasn’t going to be available to them, it makes
you wonder whether Haslam even understands that he didn’t buy the team as a
means to give goofs like Farmer a job, he bought it to supply entertainment to
fans who just want the team to win once in a while.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s all well and
good that Haslam has such trust in Farmer.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The real question is why?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
It’s as if that that question never occurred to Haslam.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Haslam responded to the question as to why
Farmer shouldn’t be fired with the kind of praise one might reserve, say, for
the general manager of the New England Patriots, not the beleaguered general
manager who swung wildly and missed on two number one picks in the same
draft.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Haslam said “I think you’ve got
to look at [the] individual’s body of work, and we’re comfortable with Ray’s
body of work.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We’re very comfortable.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’d love to know who the “we” is in that
sentence.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Stated differently, that “we”
certainly doesn’t include the fans.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
In any event, it’s really quite fascinating stuff.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In the first place, Farmer’s body of work is
pretty small, so even in that context “comfortable” wouldn’t seem to be an
appropriate word. At best it would be “cautious.” For most it would be “scared.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In the second place, what there is <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>of his body of work isn’t pretty.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He bungled the draft.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He knowingly broke NFL rules subjecting
himself and his team to sanctions.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>By
all accounts he was at the center, if not the cause, of all the other
dysfunction that resulted in the team virtually imploding once again by year’s
end.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Maybe Haslam is satisfied because
he’s comparing Farmer’s sins to those he’s presiding over at his own personal
ATM, Pilot Flying J, and thinks, “at least Farmer wasn’t cooking the books.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
While his defense of Farmer is just downright puzzling, his
defense of the way things are run generally in Berea call into question Haslam’s
own judgment, if not his competence.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Responding to Jason Canfora’s widely reported story about the
dysfunction in Berea Haslam <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>said “I don’t
at all want people to think we think everything is great.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>OK? We don’t.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>What I want you to understand is we do work together.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s not dysfunctional….All I want to convey
is we do get along, we do work well together and we’ve got a common goal.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Concede that they do have a common goal and put that
aside.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But even the most casual of fans
can readily tell that this is a franchise that doesn’t work well together and
hasn’t since Haslam and before Haslam.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>In fact if there’s anything that’s been remarkably consistent it’s the
inability of the front office to work well together irrespective of the people
involved.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
When a front office is working well together an offensive
coordinator still under contract doesn’t put together a 32-point presentation
on why he should be let out of his contract after one troubling year so he can
go anywhere else.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A front office that’s
working well together doesn’t dump still another quarterbacks coach in favor of
someone even less accomplished than the guy they just let go.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A front office that works well together doesn’t
pressure its rookie head coach into starting a quarterback who was no more
ready for real NFL play than the fictional and aforementioned Bo Callahan.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A front office that’s working well together
doesn’t ignore the red flags of the mercurial and controversial quarterback it
drafted and then act surprised that said quarterback is now in rehab.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And for God’s sake, a front office that’s
working well together doesn’t see the need to take a 3-day retreat immediately
after the season in order to, as Haslam said, clarify roles, strategy, where it
wants to go and how it’s going to get there.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>If it really had been working well together, a retreat would have been
the last thing it needed.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
For all his cluelessness though, you can’t say that Haslam
isn’t without humor, even if it was unintentional.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Talking about that recent retreat that Haslam
and the front office took, he said “I actually felt that since our family
bought the Browns, it’s the best week we’ve had.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What about the fans?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When are they going to get their best week,
which most as define as one that culminates in a Super Bowl title and a parade
through Public Square.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Haslam is a passionate owner, no doubt.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He is in the midst of a steep learning curve,
as he admitted. What the interview revealed though is that Haslam is still
pretty far down on that curve and that it’s getting steeper.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>His faith in Farmer is misplaced if only
because, although not certainly because, Farmer so embarrassed the organization
at exactly the moment Haslam has been trying to project calmness and
competence. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What ultimately will be
Haslam’s undoing though as an owner is not this kind of misplaced faith
disguised as loyalty, but his abiding miscalculation of the fan base he
inherited.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The fans are fed up with the
circus and don’t want to pay 30% more for the privilege of looking like fools
and their money.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">It’s both hard to imagine but yet easy to reconcile that the
Cleveland Browns, already at the bottom of the NFL’s pecking order of desirable
franchises, has actually found a way to get even lower.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If this isn’t rock bottom then it better get
here soon because that sucking sound being heard all over Northeast Ohio are
Browns fans in a collective gasp over<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>the
disaster that is their team of choice.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">You know that show “Hoarders” where a borderline mentally
ill individual can’t seem to navigate a clear path from kitchen to bathroom
because of the accumulated clutter of years of neglect?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Browns’ house is far worse.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Short of a league intervention, in the way a
professional helps the hoarder, the Browns franchise is in real danger of
suffocating to death among the piles of mess it’s created and can’t clean.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">It’s enough to make you wonder what Jimmy Haslam really sees
when he takes a look at the asset he’s devalued as he makes fans actually long
for the relative salad days of Randy Lerner’s reign of ineptness.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">In just the last week we’ve learned that it’s probably time
to remove the word “functional” in front of the word “alcoholic” when it comes
to describing quarterback Johnny Manziel.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>We’ve learned that Josh Gordon indeed will be suspended for at least a
year from the NFL.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And we’ve just
learned that general manager Ray Farmer is likely about to get the team
sanctioned and himself punished by the NFL for texting his grandiose thoughts
on play calling to the coaching staff during games.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This latest just confirms that when it comes
to personnel decisions Haslam has about the worst instincts possible.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">Seriously, can it get any worse?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The sad truth is that indeed it can get
worse.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Just because things are both bad
and ridiculous now doesn’t mean that Haslam and his front office staff can’t
find a way to make it even worse.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In his
short time as the owner Haslam has made each offseason more disruptive than the
previous.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>With the mess the team is now
in how exactly can it even hope to better its 7 win total of last season with a
quarterback situation as big a mess as it’s ever been, and that just for
starters?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">You can say that the flameout of Manziel was expected, at
least by anyone actually paying attention, so the only surprising thing when it
comes to him is how quickly he devolved into a player needing inpatient rehab
treatment.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And before we bestow bouquets
upon his breast for the supposedly brave decision to volunteer to seek
treatment, let’s remember all the problems he caused, all the red flags he
ignored, all the enabling done by the front office and the coaching staff to
dress this pig up as a rose.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Manziel was
out of control long before he came to Cleveland.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>His personal revelation, with his career
certainly hanging in the balance, isn’t a stroke of bravery to be admired.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is what it is, the last rope being grabbed
by a desperate man finally realizing he’s drowning in a cesspool of his own
creation.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">You can say similar things about a nearly unrepentant
jackass like Gordon, too.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>His open
letter to his critics was a passive-aggressive attempt in which he appeared to
take responsibility for problems while offloading them to his own immaturity
and rough upbringing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It was what it
was, a last ditch attempt to win back the fans who rightfully have turned their
backs on him as he set fire to his career because of a raging ego unchecked by
the prior punishments he endured.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">But when it comes to Farmer, it is a little surprising I
guess to find out that he’s mostly an intervening and insufferable prick
afflicted by the seemingly contradictory maladies of delusions of grandeur and fears
of inadequacy and incompetence.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You don’t
have to be a big Kyle Shanahan fan to at least empathize with his need to exit
Cleveland the moment the clock read 00:00 in the season’s final, miserable
game.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Shanahan knew, unlike most of the
coaching staff, that he had other more viable alternatives than wallowing in
Cleveland’s mess any longer.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Why should
he, why would he, endure that kind of behavior from the general manager during
games, let alone between them?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">Don’t forget, the hierarchy that Haslam created had the
coaching staff, via head coach Mike Pettine, reporting directly to the owner,
not the general manager.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Having created
the structure it was up to Haslam to enforce it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Instead he let problems develop and metastasize
to the point where the franchise is once again on the precipice of completing
falling apart.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">If CBSSports’ <a href="http://www.cbssports.com/nfl/writer/jason-la-canfora/25038103/browns-mess-with-gordon-manziel-starts-with-owner-haslams-meddling" target="_blank">Jason Canfora’s report</a> is to be believed, and
there’s no reason it shouldn’t, Farmer is far from the only problem child.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Alec Scheiner, the team president, is proving
to be just as difficult to the point that despite operating solely on the
business side he’s forced Pettine to sit with him and watch game film at 6 a.m.
each Monday morning of the season.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">Scheiner, like Farmer, is supposed to be at the same level
as Pettine yet in practice Pettine is the red-headed step child of a previous
marriage.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s what comes with taking
a job that no one else wanted or would otherwise touch without more millions
that even Haslam could afford.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Pettine
was desperate to become a head coach and it’s as if Scheiner and Farmer are
relishing every opportunity to rub his nose in it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">Given this context, it’s actually hard now to muster much
respect for Pettine.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He either lacks the
wherewithal or the desire to compete with the sharp elbows of his counterparts
on the business or player acquisition sides.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The result?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It lowers his stature
in everyone’s eyes, including the players.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Put it this way, the players knew Manziel was both unprepared and too
overmatched to actually start a game this season, let alone a game where the
playoffs were theoretically on the line.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The players knew that Pettine knew it as well.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But when Pettine didn’t stand up to Farmer
and/or Haslam and refuse to start Manziel, whatever respect there was for him
in the locker room had to drop by half, or more.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s not just that<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>you can’t imagine Bill Belichick ever getting
himself in that situation, it’s that you can’t imagine even Pat Shurmur getting
in that kind of bind.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">Indeed, I’d have more respect now for Pettine if he had just
quit after one dysfunctional season, like Shanahan.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And I’d have more respect for Haslam if
instead of keeping the circus intact and letting Shanahan go would have instead
say goodbye to Pettine and installed Shanahan as the head coach.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That would have shown real vision on Haslam’s
part not to mention a willingness to actually listen to the people running the
games on a weekly basis.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">What this team needs right now is exactly what they lost in
Shanahan, someone willing to set ablaze his relationship with the owner in the
name of doing what’s right instead of what’s expedient.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Instead fans are left with a team led by an
owner all too willing to let his direct reports push each other around like
kids on a playground as if the path to success is to be paved by whoever
survives as the biggest bully.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">Short of an indictment, which would have come by now if it
was coming at all, Haslam isn’t selling this team.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That doesn’t bode well for as far as the eye
of the Browns fan can see or his mind can dream.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Haslam wasted several days a few weeks ago by
taking a retreat with his front office to figure out what went wrong.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He doesn’t need a retreat.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He needs some of that faux courage that his
favorite son Manziel exercised, recognize that rock bottom has been reach and
raise his hand and ask for some real help from the league.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s very clear at this point that Haslam can’t
fix this mess by himself. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="blogger-post-footer">google_ad_client = "pub-0329689737263823";
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google_ad_channel ="";</div>Gary Benzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10578834252235902676noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30300136.post-51197892294978659542015-01-29T18:45:00.000-05:002015-01-29T18:45:00.485-05:00The Price Of Failure
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-7mx7GcLNE14/VMqqE7GlmbI/AAAAAAAAB3M/BTZJ1hpP-WQ/s1600/sad-browns-fanjpg-8a499ea9d188635d.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-7mx7GcLNE14/VMqqE7GlmbI/AAAAAAAAB3M/BTZJ1hpP-WQ/s1600/sad-browns-fanjpg-8a499ea9d188635d.jpg" height="233" width="400" /></a>Apparently the Cleveland Browns got tired of waiting until
they had a successful season.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
While not publicly announcing it, the Browns informed season
ticket holders this past week that prices will be going up, somewhere between
$6 and $15 depending on their seat location.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>And rather than tout the usual reasons for raising prices, such as “it cost
money to be this successful,” club president Alec Scheiner said that the market
was telling the team it was time.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Just how was the market being so chatty with Scheiner? Well,
he looked at the secondary market saw that people were selling tickets on
occasion for more than twice the face value.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>From there he extrapolated that fans, particularly the most loyal and
not, say, the ones that frequent the secondary market for high demand games,
were just itching to pay more.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And if
this wasn’t enough of a message, Scheiner just figured it’s been 7 years since
prices were increased, so what the heck?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
As this was being “announced” in the usual way that bad news
gets announced, I happened to be contemplating exactly why anyone continues to be
a season ticket holder.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’m not
advocating against renewing season tickets or criticizing those who do.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>To paraphrase Don Corleone, it doesn’t matter
to me how a person wants to spend his money.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I’m just wondering exactly what possesses one to continually invest in a
franchise that repeatedly squanders the money it has been given in ways that
shake the head and puzzle the conscience.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
It’s not just that the Browns haven’t been successful.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s more that they’ve relegated to high art
all the ways large and small it takes to sustain failure for so many years.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
The Browns didn’t fire their head coach this offseason,
which qualifies as a high water mark for owner Jimmy Haslam.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But that doesn’t mean it hasn’t been nearly
as disruptive as if they would have.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The
Browns have just hired another offensive coordinator and are finalizing their
plans, at least I think they are, with respect to both a quarterbacks and
receivers coaches.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So another year,
another philosophy and another shakedown period.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Meanwhile the personnel on this team, particularly the ones
these new coaches will have to instruct in the mystical ways of their magical
offense, are just as much a mess.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Much
of it started when general manager Ray Farmer curiously did not opt to draft
any viable receivers in the offseason despite knowing that Josh Gordon wasn’t
going to be available to them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Instead
he brought this franchise the biggest, bestest, hot mess the NFL has seen in
years, one Johnny Manziel.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Now with Gordon likely gone for a year and probably forever,
quarterback Brian Hoyer likely off to test free agency, Manziel off to find the
next party, a coaching staff in flux and untested, Haslam and Scheiner have to convince
season ticketholders of two things in order to keep that pool from shrinking
further.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>First is that they know what
the heck they’re doing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Tall order.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Second, that there will be a payoff to this
investment in something other than an offseason meet-and-greet with Hanford
Dixon. Even taller order.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Perhaps the best way to judge the Browns’ current ability to
move into a status of something other than also-ran is to place them in context
with Sunday’s Super Bowl participants.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Top to bottom, side to side, the Browns are not competitive at nearly
every position on the roster, including coaching, with either the Seattle
Seahawks or the New England Patriots.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Stated differently, once I spot you Joe Thomas, name me another player
on the Browns who would start for either team on Sunday.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
It takes time, God does it take time, for a franchise to
improve.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Yet, oddly, the one sport where
teams can turn more quickly than any other, is the NFL.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There are examples every year where doormat
teams the previous year are now playoff contenders, and vice versa.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The NFL’s system, from its draft structure to
its salary cap, keep most teams relatively close to each other, meaning that success
or failure can turn on one or two acquisitions.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Yet for the Browns things never seem that close.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They are the anti-Patriots, an outlier, a
team that consistently foils the odds, except where the Patriots succeed year
in and year out, the Browns fail.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They
can’t get better, they won’t get better and believe me, this franchise has
tried everything to get better.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
So again I ask, I wonder, why does anyone continue to invest
in this team as a season ticket holder?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Maybe the answer is that the question is rhetorical and as such isn’t
subject to being answered, at least in the physical world.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
**</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Meanwhile, speaking of the aforementioned Gordon, he wrote
an open letter, published on sports site The Cauldron that serves as both a mea
culpa and a backhanded slap at folks like Charles Barkley, Cris Carter and
Stephen A. Smith, all of whom opined on the state of Gordon’s affairs.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Gordon has a point, limited, but a point.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Barkley, Carter and Smith, as paid talking
heads with time to fill, were full of empathy and tough love for Gordon when he
tested positive again, this time for alcohol.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>As Gordon notes, they don’t know him, never have spoken to him, and
should thus refrain from making statements about him.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
I guess, but then again don’t they, don’t we, know enough
about Gordon to offer an opinion?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Isn’t
that the job of the media?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We cover
Gordon and lately that coverage is more about how he’s screwed up a promising
career than that promising career.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So
offering an opinion on the screwing up part is valid, having observed the
circus for the last few years.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Gordon takes responsibility, mostly, for his screw ups, and
claims he’s not a victim while also detailing exactly why he’s a victim: tough
upbringing, lack of guidance, hanging out with the wrong people, being immature,
etc.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But after reading the letter, I’m
more convinced than ever of two overarching points: Gordon is complex in his
immaturity and he’s still in very deep denial.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Let’s start with the latter and work our way to the former.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Gordon claims he hasn’t smoked marijuana
since before he was drafted by the Browns in 2012.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Frankly, that’s hard to believe.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He tested positive for the substance last
year but clings to the widely discredited defense of second hand smoke.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Here’s where the personal experiences come in to inform that
opinion, in case Gordon wants to pen his next letter to me instead of Carter<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In my other life, I’ve tried several drug
cases dealing with the consequences that have flowed to individuals who have
tested positive, often for marijuana.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The defense is almost always the same: “I was at a party where others
were using and I must have inhaled the second hand smoke.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
That defense has never worked in any case I’ve tried, or in
any case that I know of, and it didn’t work for Gordon, either.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The reason is simple.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>According to virtually all toxicology
experts, short of standing in a phone booth-sized room (for the younger among
us, a room approximately the size of a typical basement broom closet) for 8
hours while 8 people in that same room smoked continuously, a person would not
test positive at the thresholds typically used, including those used by the
NFL.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Maybe Gordon’s party took place in just those circumstances,
but that’s unlikely.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The truth he doesn’t
seem to want to admit, at least publicly, is that he did use.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Maybe he’s so completely bought into the
narrative advanced by his lawyer during his arbitration that he now doesn’t
even know what is true.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But it remains
that Gordon did test positive and of all the possibilities out there as to why,
the absolute least likely is that he was a victim of second-hand smoke.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Moreover, let’s just assume he was.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What the heck was he doing putting himself in
that situation given the precarious nature in which his career hung in the
balance?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Is that immaturity or is it
stupidity?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s probably both.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Which gets to the first point.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Gordon is complex in his immaturity.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He shows remarkable insight into his
shortcomings but is both unable and unwilling to completely change his
tendencies.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He details his latest
positive test coming as the result of drinking on a private plane after the
final game, a game in which he was suspended for not showing up to work the day
before the game. It was an essentially an “oh shit” moment when he landed and saw
the message instructing him to report for testing within 4 hours.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He knew he wouldn’t pass and didn’t.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
But in describing even this situation, he can’t bring
himself to take full responsibility.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He
knows he shouldn’t have been drinking but more or less shrugs it off by hinting
at the defense he’ll offer in arbitration, claiming that the agreement to not
drink wasn’t particularly fair anyway and besides he it was an agreement that
applied only during the season and the Browns’ season had actually ended.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Of course the football season hadn’t ended as
the good teams were on their way to the playoffs, which was the point of the
agreement he made not to drink.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Gordon
is used to offering up a bad defense.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>This one won’t work either and I suspect he knows this.<o:p></o:p></div>
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">I
will give Gordon this.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He is incredibly
immature.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>His letter was a nice but
incomplete start on the journey to manhood.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Unfortunately he lives in a bubble that retards growth, suppresses
maturity and he’s just too damn comfortable in it to make the real changes in
his life that could actually help him get his career back on track.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Maybe another year off will do the trick, but
I doubt it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Hopefully he’s just on leave
from the car dealership and they are more tolerant of employees with his kind
of immaturity.</span><div class="blogger-post-footer">google_ad_client = "pub-0329689737263823";
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google_ad_channel ="";</div>Gary Benzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10578834252235902676noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30300136.post-68450181541216311552015-01-08T19:05:00.000-05:002015-01-08T19:05:00.399-05:00Dysfunction Thy Name Is Cleveland
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-jpofDKPMReM/VK7sbr6N_iI/AAAAAAAAB28/_kfHU6IHPJY/s1600/shanahan_576_090414.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-jpofDKPMReM/VK7sbr6N_iI/AAAAAAAAB28/_kfHU6IHPJY/s1600/shanahan_576_090414.jpg" height="221" width="400" /></a>It’s a week with a day that ends in a “y” so of course there’s
more dysfunction when it comes to the Cleveland Browns.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
On Thursday the Browns and offensive coordinator Kyle
Shanahan parted ways while quarterbacks coach Dowell Loggains was shown the
door, involuntarily.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For those keeping
score at home, that makes six coordinators in six years.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You have to admire that level of consistency.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
There are many ways to view these changes but like most
things about the Browns these days using the prism of Johnny Manziel is the
best place to start.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Fans will never
officially learn who exactly was responsible for drafting Manziel and then
putting him behind center with the playoffs still technically in the mix.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But we can pretty well surmise by now that it
wasn’t Shanahan’s idea and that’s likely part of the overarching issue here.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Manziel was a non entity as a quarterback but
as a coach killer, he’s proven to be pretty effective.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Starting Manziel was such a colossally stupid decision that
it’s a little unfair to put head coach Mike Pettine in the crosshairs and force
him and him alone to take all the bullets.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>That decision emanated officially or otherwise from the owner’s box to
the general manager’s chair to the head coach’s office as sure as Manziel is
probably drinking champagne out of a Dixie cup at 10 a.m. on a random Thursday
in January.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
In fact, the level of stupid that was that decision makes me
wonder why Pettine as well hasn’t taken the same train out of Cleveland that
Shanahan’s now on. This job can’t be worth that level of embarrassment for if
there’s one abiding truth in this franchise is that it’s so engulfed in
dysfunction that it literally permeates the walls of Berea and seeps into the
skin and other organs of the inhabitants within that it saps them of both pride
and common sense.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Sure, why not?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Let’s
run still another offense next season.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>It wouldn’t be a Browns off season unless there was a major coaching
change so Shanahan leaving continues the pattern where continuity becomes the
enemy and change becomes the constant.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The Browns are led by a still green owner with more passion than sense
and a general manager with more ambition than accomplishment.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The head coach is just grateful to have a
job.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Meanwhile the fans are once again scratching their heads
trying to figure out how a season of legitimate promise has instead degenerated
into another offseason of confusion, disappointment and question.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Wasn’t this supposed to be an offseason where
finally there would be some continuity?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>It didn’t even last past the first week of the playoffs that the Browns
once again missed. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Instead of using this
down time to actually improve the Browns instead find themselves once again
starting over on offense with hope as the abiding strategy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Here’s a suggestion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Quit running coaches out of the building and
instead dump some of the players that are the ones undermining their authority.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Start with Manziel, who may or may not be a functional
alcoholic but clearly has trouble when he mixes with alcohol. He’s back in the
news, of course, because he had a celebratory New Year’s Eve and then
some.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There were the usual drinks, the
usual clubs and the usual trouble.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’ve
lost count.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Is this the second or third
incident since his vow to the team and its fans that he would turn things
around and stop looking like the public jackass he’s become?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Whoever steps in for Shanahan isn’t suddenly going to see in
Manziel, particularly, or the quarterback situation in general, some sort of
diamond in the rough.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Manziel is not a
legitimate NFL quarterback and never will be.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>He doesn’t just lack the size and body to be successful.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He lacks the intellect, discipline and work
ethic as well.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There’s almost nothing
there to work with except feint memories of broken plays that turned out well
while he was in college.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Manziel isn’t
likely to last even as long as Brady Quinn did in the league.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
The suggestion out there is to trade him and if anyone is
willing to part with a draft pick of any level the Farmer should jump at
it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Right now, though, general manager
Ray Farmer seems rather unwilling to admit to the mistake that everyone else in
the free world sees in Manziel, so it fell to Shanahan to step away from the
fray if only to highlight the epic miss.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
If all Shanahan was doing was seeking out a head coaching
gig, then there would be no issue. That’s the dream of every coordinator.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What is more troubling is that Shanahan
appears willing to take even a lateral move just to extricate the stink of the
Browns from his system.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s a red
flag the size of Egypt but the one thing we know about Haslam is that he isn’t
particularly good at seeing trouble even when it’s punching him in the face.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
And why would Shanahan want out?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Because there’s no fun in the Browns’
dysfunction.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Being told that Manziel is
still a viable NFL quarterback with whom you have to work while casting aside a
true, but flawed professional in Brian Hoyer is enough to make any sane man
batty.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In other words, if you’re
Shanahan you’re staring straight into the business end of an offense whose only
viable quarterback right now is Connor Shaw and whoever Farmer decides to try
and resurrect from some other team’s scrap heap.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s not a particularly difficult situation
from which to walk away.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
But perhaps the real seeds of this departure lie in story of
someone in the Browns’ front office literally texting Shanahan during games with
their opinion about plays that should or should not be called.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The story sounds preposterous anywhere but
Cleveland and hasn’t actually been officially confirmed but neither has it been
denied.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In no case is it hard to
believe.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
This is the second straight off season of turmoil that
Haslam has on his hands and once again he’s responsible for it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s easy to look at each little tree and
justify its existence or rationalize why it should be cut down.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But at some point you also have to realize
that these aren’t just trees but a forest and your overriding mission is not
just its maintenance but its long term viability.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
Haslam created the management structure in place in Berea
and it’s one that inherently breeds tension.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Having both the general manager and the head coach report to him was
always going to spark a competitive tension between the two sides as they vie
for the attention and approval of the man to whom they report.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That doesn’t make Haslam’s set up wrong by
any means but it does demand that the structure and the boundaries be respected
for what they are and tended to with some amount of care.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
When someone on the general manager’s side (or perhaps
Farmer himself) starts interfering with the coaching side by texting ideas or
complaints during the game, that’s a clear and irresponsible overreach.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Maybe Haslam shut it down or let it go.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We don’t know.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But the fact that it happened at all strongly
suggests that Haslam doesn’t have firm control over the structure he created so
that it never happened in the first place.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
One of the reasons Shanahan is supposedly leaving is that
the general manager’s side of the equation gave little or no credence to the
input being offered by the coaching side.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>It’s not hard to imagine what the input was.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Manziel wasn’t taking his job seriously and
was ill prepared to ever play.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There
weren’t credible receivers on the roster once Jordan Cameron got hurt and Josh
Gordon got suspended.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Why wasn’t a
credible back up signed once Alex Mack went down?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Need I go on?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt;">
There are good and legitimate reasons why the coaching side
shouldn’t run the personnel side but the most functional organizations find a
way to make it all work.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There are going
to be disagreements in any work environment but for goodness sakes why is it
that every disagreement inside the Browns simmers then boils then overflows and
ruins the counters? <o:p></o:p></div>
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 11pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">Just
as Haslam was able to eventually find someone, anyone, to take the head
coaching position with his team, Pettine will be able to find someone, anyone
to become the next offensive coordinator.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>If that new coordinator succeeds though it will be dumb luck.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This franchise is simply not constructed to
succeed and won’t be until Haslam takes a hard look in the mirror and a step
back and then pays more than lip service to his desire to bring continuity and
calm to Cleveland.</span><div class="blogger-post-footer">google_ad_client = "pub-0329689737263823";
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google_ad_channel ="";</div>Gary Benzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10578834252235902676noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30300136.post-19651719435330590062014-12-28T20:40:00.000-05:002014-12-28T20:40:02.332-05:00Another December To Not Remember
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-b42NTnb94gw/VKCweyiB95I/AAAAAAAAB2o/sAiTsXLbgnc/s1600/browns-ravens.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-b42NTnb94gw/VKCweyiB95I/AAAAAAAAB2o/sAiTsXLbgnc/s1600/browns-ravens.jpg" height="266" width="400" /></a></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">The last time a Cleveland Browns head coach went 0 for
December, he was fired.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The December
before that was essentially the same thing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Given owner Jimmy Haslam’s brief but clear history, both head coach Mike
Pettine and general manager Ray Farmer had to be wondering their fates as the Browns
closed the season in that most familiar way.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">Haslam quickly removed any uncertainty about two of his
three direct reports by stating after the loss to the Baltimore Ravens that
Pettine and Farmer would be back.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Now if
Haslam could find a way to remove all of the other uncertainty surrounding this
franchise then maybe he’d really be on to something.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">Keeping Pettine and Farmer is a way to build continuity,
which is something this franchise hasn’t tried in years so why not give it a
try?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">On the one hand, arguably the hand that matters most, the
Browns ended the season with 7 wins, not great, but the most this team has had
in the last 8 years.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s a bottom line
business so in that sense the Browns have taken a pretty big step forward from
where they ended last season.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">But yet someone has to be accountable for some pretty big
issues pressing against the windows of Berea, to wit:</span></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt 0.5in; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -0.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">1.</span><span style="font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; font: 7pt/normal "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]--><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The team completely unraveled offensively once
Alex Mack went out for the season.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt 0.5in; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -0.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">2.</span><span style="font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; font: 7pt/normal "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]--><span style="font-family: Calibri;">First round draft pick Justin Gilbert was a
complete bust who demonstrated little work ethic and virtually no feel for
playing the position for which he was so highly touted.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt 0.5in; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -0.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">3.</span><span style="font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; font: 7pt/normal "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]--><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Ditto for first round draft pick Johnny Manziel whose
lack of work ethic and discipline fully exposed Pettine to ridicule when he
marched him out to start in place of struggling Brian Hoyer with the playoffs
still technically in the picture.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt 0.5in; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -0.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">4.</span><span style="font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; font: 7pt/normal "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]--><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Josh Gordon still not entirely getting with the
program despite spending most of the year away from it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">This is some pretty high level dysfunction, even for a
franchise that has been so lost and confused it makes the New York Jets look
like the New England Patriots.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">Figuring out how to solve these and a myriad of other minor
matters is further complicated by the way the organization is structured, with
Haslam not just as its titular head but the one with the knife wielding power
and little experience in how to use it except recklessly.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">When Haslam took out Joe Banner and his Sicilian messenger
boy, Mike Lombardi, last season, he didn’t quite elevate Ray Farmer to Banner’s
former role.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He gave Farmer the title of
general manager and control over the personnel but not of the coach.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Instead Pettine likewise reports to Haslam,
putting Haslam in the unenviable position of arbitrating the question over whether
Farmer’s lack of research on Gilbert and increasingly larger reach on Manziel
and the inability to find an even faintly credible replacement for Mack is what
doomed the team or it was Pettine’s abject inexperience at running a team on a
day to day basis?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">I know this, for all his square-jawed clear-eyed talk to the
media, Pettine obviously wasn’t able to reach either Manziel or Gilbert in a
way that resonated. Same with Gordon, though Pettine hardly had the
chance.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I also know that offensive
coordinator Kyle Shanahan, who reports to Pettine, couldn’t figure out how to
overcome the loss of a decent center but certainly not Jim Otto in his
prime.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Once Mack went down, the running
game fell apart and opposing defenses exploited all the reasons Hoyer was a
backup in the first place. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">What’s difficult to figure in that truth though is where
exactly does all the responsibility lie.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Pettine and Shanahan can make a rather forceful claim that they didn’t
populate the team with two rookie running backs, including another work-ethic
challenged player in Terrence West, and a free agent, Ben Tate, who wasn’t
worth even a third of what they paid him.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Of course, Farmer could argue that in the context of hindsight perhaps
Tate was just another player, like Manziel, like Gilbert, like Gordon, that
Pettine couldn’t reach.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">That all could be true and a big part of the problem, but
then Farmer can’t so easily explain away the rest of the receiving corps.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This wasn’t a failure of schemes, but of
talent.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Outside of Jordan Cameron, who
was injured most of the season anyway, there wasn’t a credible receiver on the
field until Gordon returned from his suspension.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Farmer claimed early on that the receivers he
did sign (when he could have drafted some but stubbornly didn’t) were good,
just unknown.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>At season’s end, they’re
still just unknowns.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Farmer also signed
Miles Austin, as he did Tate, and it ended up being just more wasted
money.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">The case for Farmer doesn’t get any better when you look on
the defensive side of the ball.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Gilbert
showed no work ethic from day one and carried it with him until season’s end,
which ended not on Sunday but Saturday when he failed for the eleventymillionth
time to make a meeting on time.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s a
failure of research.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Somewhere in the 6
or 7 notebooks the team compiled on potential first round picks had to be a
mention that Gilbert was a lazy, entitled n’er do well with no work ethic.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But maybe Farmer missed all that as he
maneuvered around the draft, securing picks for 2015 while doing every other
general manager in the league a favor by taking on Manziel.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">Speaking of Manziel, his failures from an organizational
standpoint are shared.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>From a personal
standpoint they’re his own.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Farmer knew
Manziel was a high risk.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So did Pettine
and yet all Pettine did from the first day of the offseason when Manziel
eschewed any work in favor of every party was coddle Manziel in a way that even
the casual fan knew wouldn’t end up well.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>He constantly made excuses for why Manziel wasn’t working when he should
have been and more or less gave him a public pass for being a public douche,
with Manziel’s only fine known publicly is the one just issued for being late
to treatment Saturday morning because of his hard partying Friday night, a
party that kept many of his co-workers from being on time on Saturday as well.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This must be the new Johnny that Manziel spoke
about earlier in the week. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">Unless Haslam publicly admits that he ordered Pettine to
start Manziel late in the season, the decision to do that is all Pettine’s and,
again in the context of hindsight, was perhaps the single dumbest decision any
head coach at any level has made.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">It looked at the time, and I wrote at the time, that the
decision made itself given Hoyer’s play.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>That remains true.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But the wild
card in all that is that only Pettine truly knew if Manziel was ready, or at
least ready enough, to get behind center in an actual game.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We can only assume Pettine believed Manziel
was ready and in the end that was such a colossal misjudgment that most coaches
never get a second chance to make it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">It’s not just that Manziel was overwhelmed by the task.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That can come from a simple lack of
appreciation of the gravity of the moment.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Manziel wasn’t even just overmatched.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>That can be a talent gap.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Manziel
couldn’t have looked any more lost than if Pettine had simply plucked a fan
from the crowd and positioned him in the shotgun.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For an earlier generation, starting Manziel looked
to be the equivalent of the literary joke that writer George Plimpton tried to
play on the rest of the world when he suited up as a quarterback for the
Detroit Lions in a preseason game for the book Paper Lion.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">When Manziel scanned the defensive coverage he had the same
looks of abject confusion and fear as does a father when he takes his teenage
daughters to buy undergarments at Victoria’s Secret.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When the ball was snapped, Manziel acted as
if he didn’t know where to look first or next.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>And when he ran it was in the same way a scared Alfalfa ran in that
Little Rascals episode where Alfalfa claimed to be a football hero he was not.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">Whether Pettine couldn’t or didn’t see any of that coming is
irrelevant.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He’s accountable either
way.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Maybe because Pettine understands
defense more he could see all of Gilbert’s shortcomings more clearly and
benched him earlier.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Pettine should have
seen the same thing with Manziel but didn’t and that is pretty damning when it
comes to defending his cause.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">So as another miserable season at the Factory of Sadness
closes, the Browns look to be in pretty much the same place they started and
not really any closer to being a credible playoff threat.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The owner remains impetuous and inexperienced,
the head coach overmatched, the general manager isn’t as good as he thinks he
is and there is almost no skill at any of the skill positions. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But rather than dwell on just those pesky
negatives let’s just pause and take pity at least on the one true professional
in the entire organization, Joe Thomas.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>As good a player at his position as there’s ever been and yet destined to
never play a meaningful game in December.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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