For anyone still clamoring to understand the root of the dysfunction related to the Cleveland Browns, just reference back the George Kokinis soap opera of this past week as your handy reference guide.
What exactly happened inside the walls of Berea and the minds of the participants is being guarded as if it’s a state secret on the level of troop deployment plans in Afghanistan. Check that, far more is known about troop deployment plans in Afghanistan.
Owner Randy Lerner is now saying Kokinis wasn’t fired as the Browns stick-figure general manager and no one is saying Kokinis voluntarily resigned. And while the notion that these two facts can only co-exist if Kokinis is, in fact, still employed by the Browns as its general manager, we now know that isn’t the case either. Yet Eric Mangini has nothing substantive to say on this topic, Lerner has been his usual ambiguous self and Kokinis, apparently, as entered some sort of witness protection program.
This is the essence of what makes Lerner a bad owner, despite his apparent passion for the team. He will talk in generalities about plans and leaders and credibility and then will exhibit none of those qualities himself as he’ll have underlings escort Kokinis out of the building as if this miserable season rested entirely on his shoulders without bothering to explain it to anyone in a way that makes sense.
It’s all well and good that Lerner met with a couple of self-promoting fans in a quasi-public relations gesture to let them know how much he cares, but it’s not all well and good that the house is burning to the ground and Lerner won’t explain not only how it happened but how he let it happened.
My guess is that the various legal entanglements of the parties is at the root of why the Browns are, once again, coming across as incompetent rubes practically anyone with a lick of senses believes they are.
This is speculation, of course, but it’s not as if the puzzle pieces are that hard to fit together. Lerner hired Kokinis as general manager at the behest of Mangini, ostensibly giving him final authority over football issues. Mangini, knowing that he really controlled everything in Berea from the paintings on the walls to the texture of the toilet paper, has been very visible in exercising that control. Whatever initial friction that may have created, and it likely created a bunch, it certainly had to boil over when Mangini traded Braylon Edwards, ostensibly without any help our input from Kokinis.
Now take a look at this from the various perspectives. Lerner thinks that maybe Kokinis isn’t doing what he was being paid to do, being that credible, front office leader of the team he thought he gave a 5-year, $1 million per year contract. Kokinis, on the other hand, is thinking that somewhere along the line he was misled about his true role. Then there is Mangini, the Machiavellian manipulator, asserting authority he felt was implied if not overtly stated.
As things have come to a head, what’s really revealed is that this is just the usual food fight that breaks out when an owner like Lerner doesn’t put together a clearly defined plan with clearly defined roles and then spends something more than a token amount of time overseeing it. Frankly, it’s not really any different than the fight that pushed John Collins out as president and vested complete power in former general manager Phil Savage.
Now, of course, not having learned from history, the same mistakes are being repeated, although this wasn’t so much an unwarranted power grab like Collins was making so much as it is about Kokinis trying to get Lerner and Mangini to live up to what was promised.
Lerner would love to paint Kokinis’ departing as a discharge for cause because it would save him money. But his legal folks are surely telling him that the charge won’t stick. Thus the reluctance to suggest publicly that Kokinis was fired for any sort of misconduct. Kokinis, on the other hand, is trying to ensure that Lerner honors the contract and pays him what is due, probably the most reasonable request being made. Mangini, meanwhile, just wants to be left alone with his “process” that “will take time” unencumbered by such petty concepts as “fans” or “competence” or “accountability” or “credibility” or, you get the picture.
If this strikes anyone at all that this whole thing has been handled by a bunch of rank amateurs, that’s because it should. The truth in all this isn’t really hard to discern as it was evident from the outset. There was abject role confusion the minute Lerner allowed himself to be manipulated by Mangini into hiring Kokinis in the first place. Maybe Lerner really felt this would all work because that’s what Mangini told him and Lerner, at a very basic level, is a wide-eyed optimist. Maybe Kokinis felt the same way. But all of this depended on Mangini allowing it to work just as it was written. That was never going to happen and if Lerner had really ever bothered to ask someone at the time, like Mangini’s former boss in New York, he would have known it before he ever had the contract drawn up.
**
It was interesting to read that Mangini expects to, once again, be involved in hiring the next general manager. It’s unclear whether that’s Lerner’s expectation as well because he isn’t talking, just typing. But if it comes to pass in just that fashion, then Lerner would be well advised not to give this new figurehead anything more than a one-year contract because that next hire is likewise doomed to fail. Given that inevitability, the last thing Lerner needs at the moment is to be paying off still another multi-million, multi-year contract for someone who didn’t deserve it in the first place.
One of the most puzzling aspects of this whole institutional goofiness is that Lerner seems hell-bent on making the same mistakes time and again as if he’s conducting his own personal game of chicken with his psyche.
Mangini in his first year of what looks like it will be a multi-year effort to bury this franchise once and for all has done nothing to earn him the courtesy of offering up dinner recommendations, let alone recommendations on who his next boss should be. As I wrote previously, Mangini should be the last person consulted about this issue. Mangini picking his own boss is what put Lerner in this pickle in the fist place.
If Lerner can’t see that it was Mangini all along who was responsible for the implosion of this past week, then court action should ensue and the franchise placed in receivership. More importantly, he also should have his “guy’s guy” permit revoked as it would be obvious that he’s never watched “The Godfather Saga” let alone learned anything from it.
Mangini is Hyman Roth trying to orchestrate everything behind the scenes in order to feather his own nest. It was Roth who tried to kill Michael. It was Roth who tried to kill Frankie Pantangelo and make it look like it was Michael. It was Roth who was behind the congressional investigation into Michael. Michael almost realized it too late.
In the same way, the Browns’ problems right now stem from Mangini trying to orchestrate some sort of grand plan that puts himself front and center of everything brown and orange in this town. When Mangini quickly figured that Lerner wasn’t keen to a Butch Davis-like front office, it was Mangini who got Kokinis hired to be his boss. It was Mangini who kept Kokinis from taking a public role with the franchise in favor of the dis-and mis- approach to doling out information. It was Mangini who kept Kokinis out of the loop on the personnel decisions. And for his final masterstroke, it was Mangini who made it all look like it was Kokinis’ fault. Well played.
It’s hard to know exactly Mangini’s end game, mainly because he’s never going to capture the hearts and minds of these fans. But if he ends up getting some equity in the franchise then you’ll know “the process” is nearly complete.
Lerner can choose to find his inner Michael and wake up now or continue the blissful bizarro slumber that has caused him to see green when the light is screaming red.
Unfortunately, Lerner seems to have chosen to remain asleep. For now he’s telling people, albeit through curt written responses to emailed questions, that he expects Mangini to be around in 2010 as well. Maybe that’s just to present a picture of relative stability for the moment and maybe it’s because there really isn’t a better answer to give at the moment.
Here’s one piece of advice that Lerner ignores at his own peril: if Mangini shows up at your door telling you that he’s subbing for your regular driver you walk out to get your newspaper, wear a flak jacket.
**
One of the growing myths about this whole debacle is that those who clamor for immediate regime change are just too impatient to be taken seriously. Far from it.
Although the history of the league is full of one-season turnarounds, by now pretty much anyone whose ever seen a NFL game recognizes that the Browns are years away from being competitive. Immediate results aren’t expected, immediate improvement is.
Look at last season for a moment to grasp the concept. At the halfway point, the Browns were 3-5. But only two of those losses, to Baltimore and Dallas, were by more than two scores. This season, five of their seven losses have been by more than two scores. It was not until the season fell apart amid quarterback and other injuries that the Browns became the total patsies they were in that final season 31-0 loss against Pittsburgh.
No one expected this year to be a playoff year, but surely Mangini could come in and turn some of those near losses into wins and keep most of the rest of the games competitive. Instead, his team put together his way with his players is the football equivalent of baseball’s Washington Nationals or maybe football’s equivalent of basketball’s Washington Generals. And with injuries stacking up likes planes above LaGuardia, there is no reason to think that the rest of the season will suddenly be a burst of sunshine.
This is the high crime and misdemeanor that Mangini has committed. He can talk all he wants about processes and doing things right but I’ve yet to hear a cogent reason why the Browns had to first become the league laughingstock in order to make that happen. Lerner may be getting laughed at these last few days from the national media because of all the dysfunction is light touch has brought. But it won’t be nothing compared to what happens if he allows this same train to leave the station next year.
**
One of the bigger non-stories floating around Browns’ camp this week has to do with Jamal Lewis’ retirement plans. It seemed like a story when Lewis let the cat out of that bag following last week’s perfunctory beat down. Now, of course, we’ve been subjected to an interminable number of are you really serious questions.
For the record, Lewis says he is definitely retiring no matter what. He appears to be frustrated by the season, but who wouldn’t be? Still, his retirement plans don’t appear to be related to the circus atmosphere in Berea so much as they relate to his truly diminishing skills.
One of the biggest problems with the Browns has been their lack of a viable running attack. Lewis had a nice first season in Cleveland and showed he had plenty left in the tank then. But the last few seasons have definitely shown the rigors of a decade long career.
Lewis always struck me as a final piece kind of guy and not someone to build a running game around for the next several years. In large part, that’s why he was signed by Savage. Unfortunately, when 2007 didn’t yield the playoffs, the Browns essentially switched course with Lewis and made him more of a long-term pick up. Now, of course, the Browns are woefully short at running back, even with Lewis on the roster.
As hard as it is to believe, there are only 3 tailbacks on the active roster, Lewis, Jerome Harrison and Chris Jennings. Lewis was finished before the season started, Harrison can’t seem to convince the coaches that he’s anything more than a change of pace runner and Jennings hasn’t seen any action. Maybe James Davis is the answer in waiting, as long as he can keep clear of post-practice skills sessions, whatever the hell that means.
We can talk about the quarterback situation until the last word has been written but has anyone checked into exactly how the Browns are going to build a viable running attack with this mess of a roster, especially with all of the other holes that also need to be plugged? No doubt there is a “plan” and a “process” for addressing this but just like everything else, fans are left to shoot in the dark as to what it is.
**
It’s the bye week. Get outside this weekend and enjoy the time away. You deserve it. But as you do so, here’s this week’s question to ponder: Who will be favored when the Browns face Detroit?
Friday, November 06, 2009
Tuesday, November 03, 2009
A Shakespearean Mess
It’s highly unlikely that anyone looks at Cleveland Browns owner Randy Lerner’s firing of general manager George Kokinis as anything more than a bone thrown to a salivating dawg pound. They may not spit it back out but it won’t solve their hunger problems either unless this is just a start and not an end.
Kokinis was the quintessential figurehead, hired to perform a job that lacked any coherent description. In his role as general manager, he performed roughly the same job that an exterior set on the Universal Studios lot performs. With the camera angle straight on, he looked like a general manager. Move that angle in either direction and it was apparent he was just a façade, someone constructed from plywood and paneling nails to look like a general manager. Three dimensional? He barely was two dimensional.
Kokinis probably never really had much of a chance to succeed in Cleveland. The circumstances of his hire never made any sense to anyone other than, perhaps, Eric Mangini, Kokinis and Lerner, in that order. Mangini got the weak hand of oversight a paranoid control freak craves. Kokinis got a nice title and a bigger paycheck. Lerner got peace of mind knowing that he did his job and brought in “football people.”
It’s funny how everyone not named Mangini, Kokinis or Lerner saw that this was a disaster in the making before any of the protagonists. Sure, there have been the occasional apologists and wishful thinkers. But as the season slides down an ever deepening and slicker cliff, even the most ardent are beginning to finally fathom that wreckage awaits the end of this ride.
The reason Mangini couldn’t recognize the problem he constructed is because he’s convinced he invented the sport and there’s nothing left for him to learn from anyone. Lerner didn’t know better because his thought processes are so malleable that he was easily manipulated in a way that he came to not just share but embrace Mangini’s self-created aura.
There’s a book or two to be written about this Browns season and if any of the parties are really ready to speak about it on the record and for attribution, they can give me a call. I’d be more than happy to write it and might even if they won’t cooperate. In all my years following every Cleveland professional sports team (ok, not every team, I wasn’t a fan of the Force or either of the two Arena Football teams) there’s never been a season this fascinating, even if it has been for all the wrong reasons.
It’s a Shakespearean tragedy being played out in real time. Lerner is King Lear, moneyed and aching to retire somewhere calmer. Mangini is at least Edmund, scheming to overcome his bastard status as the guy that never played professional football and got his start as a ball boy. King Lear, the play, didn’t end well for either of those characters and if the Berea adaptation continues to play out unencumbered by subsequent events it likely will end up much the same way—with Lerner going insane and Mangini being betrayed.
This is the time to begin encumbering those subsequent events. Lerner can save his sanity even if Mangini’s fate is sealed. Lerner, as I’ve already suggested, can actually construct a viable plan around which he can get out of this mess and then retire gracefully to England, faculties in tact.
Mangini, with the Kokinis firing on the heals of the Erin O’Brien firing, is just burning more bridges in a bit of a Sherman-through-Georgia career. He already burnished two allies here in Cleveland to save his shaky status. He alienated himself from anyone associated with the New York Jets before he got here and, for good measure, turned on his mentor and benefactor, Bill Belichick and his regime in New England, too. If there’s anyone left in the NFL to piss off, rest assured Mangini will get that done. It is, after all, part of his process.
Where this all is going to is that Mangini is quickly become a leper among institutional NFL types and has been banished to his own private Idaho. Lerner, who hasn’t shown himself to be a quick or savvy student of internal NFL politics, hasn’t yet figured that part out. When Lerner finally has that palm-of-the-hand-slap-to-the-head moment, Mangini will be gone, too. It’s the path Mangini has laid for himself and as he walks it, wreaking havoc and damage on the way, no one will shed a tear when he disappears from view.
The one thing that should worry Browns’ fans most right now is how Lerner will go about repairing this mess. He’s not shown any affinity to fixing anything, only an affinity for being easily manipulated. It’s more than fair to suggest that Lerner shouldn’t even try. Instead, he should delegate this task to someone beyond question, an Ernie Accorsi-type (although Accorsi denies he’s coming out of retirement). But even having Lerner find that type brings far more risk than most should be comfortable with.
There is a lot of speculation at the moment that Bernie Kosar may be the person Lerner ultimately turns to as the franchise fixer. As much as Kosar remains a fan favorite, there’s nothing in his background that suggests he’s the right guy for that job. In fact, there’s more in his background that suggests he’s not.
That’s not to besmirch Kosar and the troubles he’s had in his post-football professional and personal life so much as it is to point out that if Lerner thinks he can curry favor with the fan base by leveraging Kosar’s fading status in Cleveland as the new face of the team in some sort of quick fix move, the fans won’t be so easily fooled.
Anyone listening to Kosar on pre-season broadcasts can’t help but be impressed by his deep knowledge of offensive Xs and Os. They also heard Kosar be brutally honest at times about the sorry state of affairs, even in preseason. It was refreshing. But that doesn’t mean Kosar has an eye for talent, just an eye for schemes. Right now this franchise is so talent-deprived in every aspect of its operations, a person like Kosar will be easily overwhelmed.
The dire straights of this team need a far more experienced eye. If Ozzie Newsome really can’t be bought (and I’m betting someone like Dan Gilbert could find a way to make that purchase), then Lerner needs to turn to someone like Bill Cowher, not as the head coach but as the club president. Cowher doesn’t strike me as someone eager to get back on the field anyway. But given a chance to run a franchise, and perhaps get a piece of the ownership in the process, Cowher could very well be lured out of retirement. I don’t buy into the notion that the Browns are beyond hope. To the right person, the chance to run this franchise right remains an alluring opportunity.
But whichever way this needs to go, Lerner would be well advised not to rush the decision this time. Lerner needs to really go through a credible, thoughtful and deliberate process (that damn word again) to get that person. Whether it’s Newsome, Cowher or someone else, it has to be someone above reproach. This franchise can be turned around and if the fans have demonstrated anything to this point, it’s that they will buy into a realistic, credible plan. Not something cobbled together by a discredited coach who probably doesn’t even trust his mother.
Kokinis was the quintessential figurehead, hired to perform a job that lacked any coherent description. In his role as general manager, he performed roughly the same job that an exterior set on the Universal Studios lot performs. With the camera angle straight on, he looked like a general manager. Move that angle in either direction and it was apparent he was just a façade, someone constructed from plywood and paneling nails to look like a general manager. Three dimensional? He barely was two dimensional.
Kokinis probably never really had much of a chance to succeed in Cleveland. The circumstances of his hire never made any sense to anyone other than, perhaps, Eric Mangini, Kokinis and Lerner, in that order. Mangini got the weak hand of oversight a paranoid control freak craves. Kokinis got a nice title and a bigger paycheck. Lerner got peace of mind knowing that he did his job and brought in “football people.”
It’s funny how everyone not named Mangini, Kokinis or Lerner saw that this was a disaster in the making before any of the protagonists. Sure, there have been the occasional apologists and wishful thinkers. But as the season slides down an ever deepening and slicker cliff, even the most ardent are beginning to finally fathom that wreckage awaits the end of this ride.
The reason Mangini couldn’t recognize the problem he constructed is because he’s convinced he invented the sport and there’s nothing left for him to learn from anyone. Lerner didn’t know better because his thought processes are so malleable that he was easily manipulated in a way that he came to not just share but embrace Mangini’s self-created aura.
There’s a book or two to be written about this Browns season and if any of the parties are really ready to speak about it on the record and for attribution, they can give me a call. I’d be more than happy to write it and might even if they won’t cooperate. In all my years following every Cleveland professional sports team (ok, not every team, I wasn’t a fan of the Force or either of the two Arena Football teams) there’s never been a season this fascinating, even if it has been for all the wrong reasons.
It’s a Shakespearean tragedy being played out in real time. Lerner is King Lear, moneyed and aching to retire somewhere calmer. Mangini is at least Edmund, scheming to overcome his bastard status as the guy that never played professional football and got his start as a ball boy. King Lear, the play, didn’t end well for either of those characters and if the Berea adaptation continues to play out unencumbered by subsequent events it likely will end up much the same way—with Lerner going insane and Mangini being betrayed.
This is the time to begin encumbering those subsequent events. Lerner can save his sanity even if Mangini’s fate is sealed. Lerner, as I’ve already suggested, can actually construct a viable plan around which he can get out of this mess and then retire gracefully to England, faculties in tact.
Mangini, with the Kokinis firing on the heals of the Erin O’Brien firing, is just burning more bridges in a bit of a Sherman-through-Georgia career. He already burnished two allies here in Cleveland to save his shaky status. He alienated himself from anyone associated with the New York Jets before he got here and, for good measure, turned on his mentor and benefactor, Bill Belichick and his regime in New England, too. If there’s anyone left in the NFL to piss off, rest assured Mangini will get that done. It is, after all, part of his process.
Where this all is going to is that Mangini is quickly become a leper among institutional NFL types and has been banished to his own private Idaho. Lerner, who hasn’t shown himself to be a quick or savvy student of internal NFL politics, hasn’t yet figured that part out. When Lerner finally has that palm-of-the-hand-slap-to-the-head moment, Mangini will be gone, too. It’s the path Mangini has laid for himself and as he walks it, wreaking havoc and damage on the way, no one will shed a tear when he disappears from view.
The one thing that should worry Browns’ fans most right now is how Lerner will go about repairing this mess. He’s not shown any affinity to fixing anything, only an affinity for being easily manipulated. It’s more than fair to suggest that Lerner shouldn’t even try. Instead, he should delegate this task to someone beyond question, an Ernie Accorsi-type (although Accorsi denies he’s coming out of retirement). But even having Lerner find that type brings far more risk than most should be comfortable with.
There is a lot of speculation at the moment that Bernie Kosar may be the person Lerner ultimately turns to as the franchise fixer. As much as Kosar remains a fan favorite, there’s nothing in his background that suggests he’s the right guy for that job. In fact, there’s more in his background that suggests he’s not.
That’s not to besmirch Kosar and the troubles he’s had in his post-football professional and personal life so much as it is to point out that if Lerner thinks he can curry favor with the fan base by leveraging Kosar’s fading status in Cleveland as the new face of the team in some sort of quick fix move, the fans won’t be so easily fooled.
Anyone listening to Kosar on pre-season broadcasts can’t help but be impressed by his deep knowledge of offensive Xs and Os. They also heard Kosar be brutally honest at times about the sorry state of affairs, even in preseason. It was refreshing. But that doesn’t mean Kosar has an eye for talent, just an eye for schemes. Right now this franchise is so talent-deprived in every aspect of its operations, a person like Kosar will be easily overwhelmed.
The dire straights of this team need a far more experienced eye. If Ozzie Newsome really can’t be bought (and I’m betting someone like Dan Gilbert could find a way to make that purchase), then Lerner needs to turn to someone like Bill Cowher, not as the head coach but as the club president. Cowher doesn’t strike me as someone eager to get back on the field anyway. But given a chance to run a franchise, and perhaps get a piece of the ownership in the process, Cowher could very well be lured out of retirement. I don’t buy into the notion that the Browns are beyond hope. To the right person, the chance to run this franchise right remains an alluring opportunity.
But whichever way this needs to go, Lerner would be well advised not to rush the decision this time. Lerner needs to really go through a credible, thoughtful and deliberate process (that damn word again) to get that person. Whether it’s Newsome, Cowher or someone else, it has to be someone above reproach. This franchise can be turned around and if the fans have demonstrated anything to this point, it’s that they will buy into a realistic, credible plan. Not something cobbled together by a discredited coach who probably doesn’t even trust his mother.
Monday, November 02, 2009
Coming Out of the Closet
Writer’s Note: Although the following column was written before Randy Lerner fired general manager George Kokinis, nothing much else has changed. How do you fire someone who was never really there in the first place? All Lerner did was save some money, maybe, although that never seems to be much of a concern as the money he’s currently paying all the former coaches and front office types still his payroll could probably push the Cleveland Indians into the top third of baseball payrolls. Although the Browns haven’t commented on the Kokinis firing other than to confirm it, speculation is that Kokinis was offended by Lerner’s public comments about the team seeking a credible front office leader. Why Kokinis would be offended by that statement is anyone’s guess. He had to know from the outset that the circumstances of his hiring made him neither credible nor a leader. Lerner was just speaking the truth. With him gone a void still exists, no less or no more than when the day began on Monday. As for where this leaves Mangini, just picture Michael Corleone in the Godfather as the world around him begins to close in.
Apparently both Eric Mangini and Randy Lerner have a gag reflex. And, as should be expected when dysfunction is the chief characteristic of their operating manual, they are on the wrong page again.
Mangini finally saw enough of Derek Anderson on Sunday to realize that simply saying an improvement is happening, even if you’re saying it over and over, doesn’t mean it’s actually happening. After seemingly hitting rock bottom two weeks ago against the Green Bay Packers, Anderson proved that there are still more depths to plumb against Chicago. With 3 minutes remaining, even Mangini couldn’t stand to see anymore and put in Brady Quinn.
Sure, the Browns had already been embarrassed again and sure the move, in context, didn’t make any sense. But in a season where nothing else has made sense, this was just another twig on the pile. In actuality it was probably Mangini making a point to offensive coordinator Brian Daboll about disastrous weekly game. It was the wrong point.
The right one came from Lerner, the most elusive of owners, finally coming out of the closet to witness the massacre for himself from a field-level tunnel inside of Chicago’s Soldier Field.
After the game, Lerner finally dropped word that he has seen enough. Not enough, perhaps, to fire Mangini, but enough to say that at 1-7 heading into the bye week, this team has regressed to the point that the season thus far has been a near total waste for everyone involved, coaches, fans, and players. Now Lerner wants to install a credible voice at the top of the organization. Apparently that means Mangini is neither credible nor omnipotent.
Whoa, Randy, not so fast.
It’s not news anymore that Lerner more than anyone else is to blame for the sorry state of affairs. I was suspicious of the hiring of Eric Mangini from the outset and said so because of the half-assed process Lerner used to make that decision. Feeling burned by the hiring of Romeo Crennel, a lifelong assistant repeatedly passed over for head coaching jobs, Lerner felt he needed an experienced head coach and needed him NOW. When Mangini was suddenly available after being fired by the New York Jets, Lerner pounced like an alcoholic at a beer truck and negotiated against himself to hire someone no one else wanted anyway.
To further compound the problem, he hired Mangini before he could even put in place a general manager. Then Lerner let Mangini hire his own general manager, which put the Claude Rains of general managers, George Kokinis, in the unenviable position of being beholden to Mangini instead of it being the other way around.
It’s fascinating that 8 games into the season when another year has been lost and perhaps more, Lerner is just now starting to see the errors of his ways and articulating answers before he truly understands that the problem lies deep within. It’s just as fascinating that Lerner will be meeting with the two fans trying to organize a protest for the Monday night game against Baltimore. If Lerner is doing it to stave off an insurrection, then he’s miscalculated again. Whether or not this little protest would ever have gained much traction, Lerner has long since lost a generation of fans over the sheer incompetence that has exemplified the operations in Berea since his father bought the team.
As fascinating and troubling as this all is, just know that one of the few positives of this miserable season is that Lerner has arrived at the party, finally. He may be late. He may not even realize that he’s late. But he’s now at the party and continuing to beat him up for being standoffish about the whole thing initially is mostly beside the point.
Taking Lerner just at his few words, he seems to get it. He seems to really, finally, understand that hiring Mangini was a mistake, at least without pairing Mangini with an even stronger voice to whom he has to report.
If you accept as fact, as I do, that Lerner has no plans on selling the team, then this time is really best used to help Lerner help himself. The two so-called fan representatives with whom he plans on meeting is a nice public relations play but it won’t help the cause. There’s been enough of the “I’ve been a fan for X years and this is just sad” kind of comments. What Lerner needs is advice and not just on who to hire next. The advice he needs is far more fundamental. Here’s some:
First, before concluding that he’s going to keep Mangini or his sock-puppet boss George Kokinis, and before landing on whomever he wants to run this franchise, Lerner needs to do more than a little soul-searching. He needs to grab himself a yellow pad, a ball point pen, and lock himself inside his home office or whatever man cave he retreats to when he wants to contemplate the cosmos.
Alone, he must use the time wisely. He’s 47 years of age, now is the time to find out what he stands for as a person. What are his core values? What does he expect from himself not just as a business person but as a member of this planet? He may think this is unnecessary. He may think it’s mindless. But he ignores it at his own peril because it fundamentally sets up what is to come next.
Second, Lerner has to translate those deep thoughts to this business. He needs to ask himself what the Cleveland Browns should stand for? What should its core values be? Are he and his team on the same page? If they aren’t how can he expect anyone associated with the team to work in concert? It’s time for Lerner, alone, to set the tone for this franchise based on what he’s all about.
Part of the problem with Lerner all along is that he’s let everyone from Butch Davis to Phil Savage to Romeo Crennel to Eric Mangini and God knows how many others tell him what his team should stand for. But everyone of these fine ideas spun out of control because the person at the controls, Lerner, never was given a map. As a wise men once told me, if you don’t know where you’re going anywhere will get you there. For too long, Lerner has been about trying to accomplish what someone else wants done. It’s why progress never gets made. There is no measuring stick.
It’s easy for those looking for a job to mouth words like “excellence,” “discipline,” “pride.” But everyone has their own definitions of what that means. Lerner’s task is first and foremost to define those values for himself and his franchise and then interview anyone seeking employment with his team, from the top job to the next ball boy-head-coach-in-training, against those principles. Don’t test them to see if they say the right things. Make them show you in word and deed that they are completely in sync with what you want to accomplish. If they aren’t move on to the next candidate.
Second, once having decided what he and his franchise truly are about, he should fire Mangini. This may seem somewhat inconsistent with the first point until you realize that no matter what Lerner stands for Mangini doesn’t.
Mangini lost his job in New York because the owner felt he lost the locker room. In Cleveland he never got it. True, every new coach has to earn it, but Mangini thus far has shown no capacity of cracking that barrier. The players, as is their wont, were skeptical of him coming in and all he’s done since is give them reasons to be more skeptical. He treats the media, who, after all, serve only as a proxy for the fans, with derision. His thought processes are just random enough to keep everyone ill-informed. His system of discipline is sophomoric. In short, Mangini treats no one with the dignity and respect he demands for himself.
You don’t need to take my word for all of this, just listen to the words of players like Jamal Lewis. He’s been around enough coaches and enough situations to know that when something’s not right, it’s wrong.
Lewis, emotional after the Chicago game to the point of announcing his retirement, summed up well what the rest of us have been trying to tell Lerner for some time now. As Lewis said, “I don’t know what’s going on. In the past, where I’ve been, that has never happened.” Lewis then said that the players supposedly bought into the Mangini system in training camp, but then it all just mostly fell apart in the blur of loss after loss after loss after loss.
Taking some pains not to completely blame Mangini, Lewis nevertheless essentially did, explaining that he doesn’t understand what Mangini is trying to accomplish on either side of the ball. Amen. No one does.
Third, if Lerner can’t find it in his heart or his wallet to dump Mangini now, then at least have him dump Brian Daboll, as overmatched of an offensive coordinator as there ever has been in the league.
Mangini gave Daboll the job because Daboll used to coach the quarterbacks in New York. That in and of itself is stunning but probably explains why Brett Favre is in Minnesota. All Daboll has done here is take two quarterbacks, one very average and the other completely untested, and made them worse. Derek Anderson looks as if he’s never played the pro game and Brady Quinn is so robotic and mechanical in his approach that it’s difficult to remember that he used to be able to make athletic plays when he was in college.
Daboll appears to be trying to establish a rushing attack but his play calling during each game is so scattershot that not even his own players can figure it out. Rather than view the Wildcat formation, for example, as a component piece to a broader attack, Daboll treats it like a gimmick and it shows. As a corollary, Daboll treats Josh Cribbs like he’s a gimmicky player, as if he’s the reincarnation of Kordell Stewart.
It’s unlikely that Daboll has ever had a player quite like Cribbs and that shows, too. By not figuring out any cohesive way to use him on offense, the only time Cribbs plays like he’s not confused is when he’s returning punts or kicks.
Finally, Lerner needs to go with his instinct and hire an experienced football executive and plant him on top of the pyramid, but only after first defining the franchise for himself. There is one proviso to all of this, assuming he does end up keeping Mangini: don’t seek any input from Mangini on who this person should be or the role he should have. Indeed, the person Lerner chooses should make Mangini uncomfortable and sweat profusely. Mangini carries himself with an odd sense of entitlement and job security when he’s earned neither. It’s time that Mangini understand that he isn’t the smartest person in the room, not even close.
As advice goes, it’s really pretty simple stuff yet so elusive for Lerner. The overarching problem with Lerner all along is that he fundamentally hasn’t put his imprint on this franchise. Instead he’s delegated to others these fundamentally non-delegable duties. He uses his fear of public speaking as a crutch when all it’s really doing is masking who he is and what he stands for. It’s a mistake and always has been.
This is his chance to finally get it right. But it all starts with him. It always has.
Apparently both Eric Mangini and Randy Lerner have a gag reflex. And, as should be expected when dysfunction is the chief characteristic of their operating manual, they are on the wrong page again.
Mangini finally saw enough of Derek Anderson on Sunday to realize that simply saying an improvement is happening, even if you’re saying it over and over, doesn’t mean it’s actually happening. After seemingly hitting rock bottom two weeks ago against the Green Bay Packers, Anderson proved that there are still more depths to plumb against Chicago. With 3 minutes remaining, even Mangini couldn’t stand to see anymore and put in Brady Quinn.
Sure, the Browns had already been embarrassed again and sure the move, in context, didn’t make any sense. But in a season where nothing else has made sense, this was just another twig on the pile. In actuality it was probably Mangini making a point to offensive coordinator Brian Daboll about disastrous weekly game. It was the wrong point.
The right one came from Lerner, the most elusive of owners, finally coming out of the closet to witness the massacre for himself from a field-level tunnel inside of Chicago’s Soldier Field.
After the game, Lerner finally dropped word that he has seen enough. Not enough, perhaps, to fire Mangini, but enough to say that at 1-7 heading into the bye week, this team has regressed to the point that the season thus far has been a near total waste for everyone involved, coaches, fans, and players. Now Lerner wants to install a credible voice at the top of the organization. Apparently that means Mangini is neither credible nor omnipotent.
Whoa, Randy, not so fast.
It’s not news anymore that Lerner more than anyone else is to blame for the sorry state of affairs. I was suspicious of the hiring of Eric Mangini from the outset and said so because of the half-assed process Lerner used to make that decision. Feeling burned by the hiring of Romeo Crennel, a lifelong assistant repeatedly passed over for head coaching jobs, Lerner felt he needed an experienced head coach and needed him NOW. When Mangini was suddenly available after being fired by the New York Jets, Lerner pounced like an alcoholic at a beer truck and negotiated against himself to hire someone no one else wanted anyway.
To further compound the problem, he hired Mangini before he could even put in place a general manager. Then Lerner let Mangini hire his own general manager, which put the Claude Rains of general managers, George Kokinis, in the unenviable position of being beholden to Mangini instead of it being the other way around.
It’s fascinating that 8 games into the season when another year has been lost and perhaps more, Lerner is just now starting to see the errors of his ways and articulating answers before he truly understands that the problem lies deep within. It’s just as fascinating that Lerner will be meeting with the two fans trying to organize a protest for the Monday night game against Baltimore. If Lerner is doing it to stave off an insurrection, then he’s miscalculated again. Whether or not this little protest would ever have gained much traction, Lerner has long since lost a generation of fans over the sheer incompetence that has exemplified the operations in Berea since his father bought the team.
As fascinating and troubling as this all is, just know that one of the few positives of this miserable season is that Lerner has arrived at the party, finally. He may be late. He may not even realize that he’s late. But he’s now at the party and continuing to beat him up for being standoffish about the whole thing initially is mostly beside the point.
Taking Lerner just at his few words, he seems to get it. He seems to really, finally, understand that hiring Mangini was a mistake, at least without pairing Mangini with an even stronger voice to whom he has to report.
If you accept as fact, as I do, that Lerner has no plans on selling the team, then this time is really best used to help Lerner help himself. The two so-called fan representatives with whom he plans on meeting is a nice public relations play but it won’t help the cause. There’s been enough of the “I’ve been a fan for X years and this is just sad” kind of comments. What Lerner needs is advice and not just on who to hire next. The advice he needs is far more fundamental. Here’s some:
First, before concluding that he’s going to keep Mangini or his sock-puppet boss George Kokinis, and before landing on whomever he wants to run this franchise, Lerner needs to do more than a little soul-searching. He needs to grab himself a yellow pad, a ball point pen, and lock himself inside his home office or whatever man cave he retreats to when he wants to contemplate the cosmos.
Alone, he must use the time wisely. He’s 47 years of age, now is the time to find out what he stands for as a person. What are his core values? What does he expect from himself not just as a business person but as a member of this planet? He may think this is unnecessary. He may think it’s mindless. But he ignores it at his own peril because it fundamentally sets up what is to come next.
Second, Lerner has to translate those deep thoughts to this business. He needs to ask himself what the Cleveland Browns should stand for? What should its core values be? Are he and his team on the same page? If they aren’t how can he expect anyone associated with the team to work in concert? It’s time for Lerner, alone, to set the tone for this franchise based on what he’s all about.
Part of the problem with Lerner all along is that he’s let everyone from Butch Davis to Phil Savage to Romeo Crennel to Eric Mangini and God knows how many others tell him what his team should stand for. But everyone of these fine ideas spun out of control because the person at the controls, Lerner, never was given a map. As a wise men once told me, if you don’t know where you’re going anywhere will get you there. For too long, Lerner has been about trying to accomplish what someone else wants done. It’s why progress never gets made. There is no measuring stick.
It’s easy for those looking for a job to mouth words like “excellence,” “discipline,” “pride.” But everyone has their own definitions of what that means. Lerner’s task is first and foremost to define those values for himself and his franchise and then interview anyone seeking employment with his team, from the top job to the next ball boy-head-coach-in-training, against those principles. Don’t test them to see if they say the right things. Make them show you in word and deed that they are completely in sync with what you want to accomplish. If they aren’t move on to the next candidate.
Second, once having decided what he and his franchise truly are about, he should fire Mangini. This may seem somewhat inconsistent with the first point until you realize that no matter what Lerner stands for Mangini doesn’t.
Mangini lost his job in New York because the owner felt he lost the locker room. In Cleveland he never got it. True, every new coach has to earn it, but Mangini thus far has shown no capacity of cracking that barrier. The players, as is their wont, were skeptical of him coming in and all he’s done since is give them reasons to be more skeptical. He treats the media, who, after all, serve only as a proxy for the fans, with derision. His thought processes are just random enough to keep everyone ill-informed. His system of discipline is sophomoric. In short, Mangini treats no one with the dignity and respect he demands for himself.
You don’t need to take my word for all of this, just listen to the words of players like Jamal Lewis. He’s been around enough coaches and enough situations to know that when something’s not right, it’s wrong.
Lewis, emotional after the Chicago game to the point of announcing his retirement, summed up well what the rest of us have been trying to tell Lerner for some time now. As Lewis said, “I don’t know what’s going on. In the past, where I’ve been, that has never happened.” Lewis then said that the players supposedly bought into the Mangini system in training camp, but then it all just mostly fell apart in the blur of loss after loss after loss after loss.
Taking some pains not to completely blame Mangini, Lewis nevertheless essentially did, explaining that he doesn’t understand what Mangini is trying to accomplish on either side of the ball. Amen. No one does.
Third, if Lerner can’t find it in his heart or his wallet to dump Mangini now, then at least have him dump Brian Daboll, as overmatched of an offensive coordinator as there ever has been in the league.
Mangini gave Daboll the job because Daboll used to coach the quarterbacks in New York. That in and of itself is stunning but probably explains why Brett Favre is in Minnesota. All Daboll has done here is take two quarterbacks, one very average and the other completely untested, and made them worse. Derek Anderson looks as if he’s never played the pro game and Brady Quinn is so robotic and mechanical in his approach that it’s difficult to remember that he used to be able to make athletic plays when he was in college.
Daboll appears to be trying to establish a rushing attack but his play calling during each game is so scattershot that not even his own players can figure it out. Rather than view the Wildcat formation, for example, as a component piece to a broader attack, Daboll treats it like a gimmick and it shows. As a corollary, Daboll treats Josh Cribbs like he’s a gimmicky player, as if he’s the reincarnation of Kordell Stewart.
It’s unlikely that Daboll has ever had a player quite like Cribbs and that shows, too. By not figuring out any cohesive way to use him on offense, the only time Cribbs plays like he’s not confused is when he’s returning punts or kicks.
Finally, Lerner needs to go with his instinct and hire an experienced football executive and plant him on top of the pyramid, but only after first defining the franchise for himself. There is one proviso to all of this, assuming he does end up keeping Mangini: don’t seek any input from Mangini on who this person should be or the role he should have. Indeed, the person Lerner chooses should make Mangini uncomfortable and sweat profusely. Mangini carries himself with an odd sense of entitlement and job security when he’s earned neither. It’s time that Mangini understand that he isn’t the smartest person in the room, not even close.
As advice goes, it’s really pretty simple stuff yet so elusive for Lerner. The overarching problem with Lerner all along is that he fundamentally hasn’t put his imprint on this franchise. Instead he’s delegated to others these fundamentally non-delegable duties. He uses his fear of public speaking as a crutch when all it’s really doing is masking who he is and what he stands for. It’s a mistake and always has been.
This is his chance to finally get it right. But it all starts with him. It always has.
Sunday, November 01, 2009
Bring on the Bye Week
For as much controversy that has swirls around the Cleveland Browns, and this past week was no different with owner Randy Lerner letting it be known that this team could desperately use a legitimate football man as its franchise leader, there were some reasons for the naïve among us to at least be optimistic about the matchup with the Chicago Bears on Sunday.
After all, the Browns had won 3 of their last 4 against the Bears. Then there was the fact that the Browns were 9-4 lifetime against the Bears. There also was the fact that the Bears were coming off a humiliating loss to the Cincinnati Bengals and were perhaps taking the woeful Browns a little too lightly. And if none of that was good enough, then there was always the hope and a wish that things couldn’t possibly get worse.
Depending on your perspective, things didn’t get worse, if only because that would be impossible. They didn’t get much better either, unless you consider progress as measured by a semi-inspired effort by the league’s worst defense coupled with the fact that Derek Anderson may have taken his last snap in Cleveland. Even then, the Browns still were manhandled by another NFC North team, losing 30-6 in a game that was closer than it should have been, considering the Browns turned it over 5, count ‘em 5, times.
Credit for the relatively close score goes mostly to defensive coordinator Rob Ryan. Ryan, one of the best quotes and more fascinating coaches in the league, had his defense constantly pressuring Bears quarterback Jay Cutler, sacking him 4 times. It didn’t keep the Bears from scoring more than enough points but it did give Bears fans something further to consider, like maybe they really did get the wrong end of the Kyle Orton/Jay Culer trade. Ryan’s edge-of-the-cliff game plan kept the Browns in it, technically, until the roof fell in for good during the fourth quarter.
And fall in it did. After trailing the bears 16-0 at the half, the Browns had an opportunity to get back into the game quickly in the second half.
After the defense held the Bears to a quick 3-and-out to start the half, the Bears’ first punt by Brad Maynard was nullified by a penalty. His second punt was shanked like an 22-handicapper’s 4 iron and traveled 12 yards, giving the Browns the ball at the Bears’ 30-yard line.
And for one of the few times this season, the Browns stared at good fortune and didn’t blink. Jamal Lewis, taking advantage of gaping holes along the Bears’ defensive line, ran for 13 yards on first down, added 6 more on his next run and another 10 yards after that. Anderson then snuck it in from inside the 1-yard line. The Phil Dawson extra point was blocked and the Browns trailed 16-6.
The defense then held serve on the Bears’ next possession. Maynard this time hit a nice punt which the Bears downed at the Cleveland 1-yard line. The Browns were able to move it out of the shadow of the end zone on a nice Jerome Harrison run but the drive died three plays later.
There was still nearly 7 minutes left in the game but it was at this spot where most other games have died. The offense, having done something positive for one of the few times this season, had just seen its momentum come to a screeching halt. The defense, though, was doing its best to make sure it didn’t happen, containing Cutler and a Bears offense that was more stagnant than stunning. If only the Browns’ offense could respond.
And just when it seemed it might, a pass from Anderson to Heiden that looked to extend a key drive was fumbled by Heiden and picked up by Manning. For as hard as it had been playing, the defense looked spent and dispirited after the fumble. It gave up a 31-yard pass from Cutler to Johnny Knox that took the ball to the Cleveland 10-yard drive and then Forte drove home that fact with a 10-yard touchdown run that helped give the Bears a 23-6 lead with just under two minutes left in the third quarter.
Not quite dead but clearly dying, the Browns looked to have something going on their next drive but it wasn’t much. The drive and the team died its natural death at the Bears’ 27-yard line when a 4th and 1 pass by Anderson to Heiden fell incomplete, giving the Bears the opportunity to put the game away for good.
The Bears couldn’t do it, at least not initially. Cutler, after seeing one pass almost intercepted, saw his luck run out two plays later when Brodney Pool intercepted a pass off a Kaluka Maiava tip, giving the Browns the ball at the Bears 35-yard line.
Anderson then completed his best pass of the day, a 19-yarder to Mohamed Massaquoi, but Massaquoi fumbled it and the Bears recovered. It was the Browns’ 4th turnover of the game.
This time the Bears put the game away for good, perhaps not the way their fans would have initially liked, but for good nonetheless. After recovering the Heiden fumble at the their own 15-yard line, Cutler drove the Bears down to the Cleveland 1-yard line. But on 4th and 1, Cutler couldn’t connect in the end zone, giving the Browns the ball with just under 5 minutes remaining, 1st and 99 yards and 17 points to go.
As he exited the field, Cutler and Ryan could be seen barking at each other, with Ryan dropping a few f-bombs in Cutler’s direction. Perhaps Ryan should have waited before beating his chest. After all, Anderson was still behind center at that point, clinging to his career. The pressure proved to be too much. After two handoffs to Lewis almost resulted in safeties, Anderson, eschewing taking the safety when he could find no one downfield, threw it up for grabs. Bears defensive back Charles Tillman apparently called for it and then promptly returned it for a touchdown giving the Bears the 30-6 lead.
Even that was too much for head coach Eric Mangini, who must be feeling the pressure himself. Apparently after getting word from the press box that it would now be impossible for Brady Quinn to earn any sort of bonus for snaps taken, he turned to Quinn with just 3 minutes remaining.
Quinn hit his first pass but saw Heiden drop a potential first round pass on third down. Mangini will likely blame Quinn and start Brett Ratliff following the bye week.
If this is indeed Anderson’s last start, barring an injury, then he went out with a blaze of glory. Already the worst rated quarterback in the league, and by a healthy margin, Anderson completed 6 of 17 passes for 76 yards and 2 interceptions. It gave Anderson a rating of 10.539. It dropped his league low rating from 40.6 to 36.1.
But really, the story of Anderson is the story of the Browns this season. Although Anderson was the lowest rated passer last season, he’s worse this season for the simple reason that there is even less talent surrounding him, both on the field and on the sidelines. All its done is highlight every single shortcoming in his very limited game.
Quinn, too, has his share of shortcomings, but they aren’t nearly as fully developed. Where he is better than Anderson is on short to mid-range passes and right now that’s the area where the Browns suffer the most. If Quinn does indeed get the starting job back, it probably won’t make a huge difference. Same players, same coaches.
The running game, not particularly strong, was at least finding enough holes to keep the offense moving on occasion, particularly in that second half. Lewis had 69 yards on 16 carries, Josh Cribbs had 28 yards on 6 carries out of the Wildcat formation and Jerome Harrison added another 19 yards on 5 carries. Those aren’t great stats, certainly, but enough to suggest that the onus wasn’t just on Anderson.
Although Ryan’s defense gave up 23 points, it could have been far worse. With 5 turnovers to go along with their general ineffectiveness, the offense was constantly putting pressure on the defense.
After holding the Bears to 3-and-out on their opening two possessions, the defense gave up four straight scores, 3 of which were Robbie Gould field goals. On the drive that led to their first field goal, for example, the Bears had the ball at the Cleveland 15-yard line but couldn’t advance it any further.
After Anderson was picked off on a great effort by Danieal Manning, who returned it to the Browns’ 13-yard line, the defense again held Cutler. On another drive started by a Cleveland turnover—an Anderson/Lewis botched handoff, the Bears took it to the Cleveland 9-yard line but had to settle for another field goal after Kamerion Wimbley sacked Cutler for an 11-yard loss. The problem, though, is that this third field goal put the Bears up by two scores and given how little the Browns were doing offensively, it looked like a huge hill to climb.
The hill got even higher when the Bears finally found the end zone on their next drive thanks to 1-yard Matt Forte run that helped give the Bears a 16-0 lead. That drive would have ended much sooner and without a score but on 3rd-and-8 from Chicago’s 31-yard line, Wimbley went helmet-to-helmet with Cutler and was flagged for the roughing penalty. It will probably cost Wimbley about $10,000. It also cost Cutler a few moments of clarity, but only a few. Cutler completed his next 4 passes to put the team in position for the Forte touchdown run.
As this most miserable of half seasons comes to an end, the Browns and their fans get a much needed week off. That’s probably bad news for those in the league that look at playing the Browns the same way that someone with allergies looks at a bottle of Zyrtec. Relief will just have to wait.
As for what the second half of the season holds there’s no way of knowing. Everything the Browns have done to this point has been a crashing disappointment. But at least there’s one bit of good news. The only NFC North team remaining on the schedule is the Detroit Lions.
After all, the Browns had won 3 of their last 4 against the Bears. Then there was the fact that the Browns were 9-4 lifetime against the Bears. There also was the fact that the Bears were coming off a humiliating loss to the Cincinnati Bengals and were perhaps taking the woeful Browns a little too lightly. And if none of that was good enough, then there was always the hope and a wish that things couldn’t possibly get worse.
Depending on your perspective, things didn’t get worse, if only because that would be impossible. They didn’t get much better either, unless you consider progress as measured by a semi-inspired effort by the league’s worst defense coupled with the fact that Derek Anderson may have taken his last snap in Cleveland. Even then, the Browns still were manhandled by another NFC North team, losing 30-6 in a game that was closer than it should have been, considering the Browns turned it over 5, count ‘em 5, times.
Credit for the relatively close score goes mostly to defensive coordinator Rob Ryan. Ryan, one of the best quotes and more fascinating coaches in the league, had his defense constantly pressuring Bears quarterback Jay Cutler, sacking him 4 times. It didn’t keep the Bears from scoring more than enough points but it did give Bears fans something further to consider, like maybe they really did get the wrong end of the Kyle Orton/Jay Culer trade. Ryan’s edge-of-the-cliff game plan kept the Browns in it, technically, until the roof fell in for good during the fourth quarter.
And fall in it did. After trailing the bears 16-0 at the half, the Browns had an opportunity to get back into the game quickly in the second half.
After the defense held the Bears to a quick 3-and-out to start the half, the Bears’ first punt by Brad Maynard was nullified by a penalty. His second punt was shanked like an 22-handicapper’s 4 iron and traveled 12 yards, giving the Browns the ball at the Bears’ 30-yard line.
And for one of the few times this season, the Browns stared at good fortune and didn’t blink. Jamal Lewis, taking advantage of gaping holes along the Bears’ defensive line, ran for 13 yards on first down, added 6 more on his next run and another 10 yards after that. Anderson then snuck it in from inside the 1-yard line. The Phil Dawson extra point was blocked and the Browns trailed 16-6.
The defense then held serve on the Bears’ next possession. Maynard this time hit a nice punt which the Bears downed at the Cleveland 1-yard line. The Browns were able to move it out of the shadow of the end zone on a nice Jerome Harrison run but the drive died three plays later.
There was still nearly 7 minutes left in the game but it was at this spot where most other games have died. The offense, having done something positive for one of the few times this season, had just seen its momentum come to a screeching halt. The defense, though, was doing its best to make sure it didn’t happen, containing Cutler and a Bears offense that was more stagnant than stunning. If only the Browns’ offense could respond.
And just when it seemed it might, a pass from Anderson to Heiden that looked to extend a key drive was fumbled by Heiden and picked up by Manning. For as hard as it had been playing, the defense looked spent and dispirited after the fumble. It gave up a 31-yard pass from Cutler to Johnny Knox that took the ball to the Cleveland 10-yard drive and then Forte drove home that fact with a 10-yard touchdown run that helped give the Bears a 23-6 lead with just under two minutes left in the third quarter.
Not quite dead but clearly dying, the Browns looked to have something going on their next drive but it wasn’t much. The drive and the team died its natural death at the Bears’ 27-yard line when a 4th and 1 pass by Anderson to Heiden fell incomplete, giving the Bears the opportunity to put the game away for good.
The Bears couldn’t do it, at least not initially. Cutler, after seeing one pass almost intercepted, saw his luck run out two plays later when Brodney Pool intercepted a pass off a Kaluka Maiava tip, giving the Browns the ball at the Bears 35-yard line.
Anderson then completed his best pass of the day, a 19-yarder to Mohamed Massaquoi, but Massaquoi fumbled it and the Bears recovered. It was the Browns’ 4th turnover of the game.
This time the Bears put the game away for good, perhaps not the way their fans would have initially liked, but for good nonetheless. After recovering the Heiden fumble at the their own 15-yard line, Cutler drove the Bears down to the Cleveland 1-yard line. But on 4th and 1, Cutler couldn’t connect in the end zone, giving the Browns the ball with just under 5 minutes remaining, 1st and 99 yards and 17 points to go.
As he exited the field, Cutler and Ryan could be seen barking at each other, with Ryan dropping a few f-bombs in Cutler’s direction. Perhaps Ryan should have waited before beating his chest. After all, Anderson was still behind center at that point, clinging to his career. The pressure proved to be too much. After two handoffs to Lewis almost resulted in safeties, Anderson, eschewing taking the safety when he could find no one downfield, threw it up for grabs. Bears defensive back Charles Tillman apparently called for it and then promptly returned it for a touchdown giving the Bears the 30-6 lead.
Even that was too much for head coach Eric Mangini, who must be feeling the pressure himself. Apparently after getting word from the press box that it would now be impossible for Brady Quinn to earn any sort of bonus for snaps taken, he turned to Quinn with just 3 minutes remaining.
Quinn hit his first pass but saw Heiden drop a potential first round pass on third down. Mangini will likely blame Quinn and start Brett Ratliff following the bye week.
If this is indeed Anderson’s last start, barring an injury, then he went out with a blaze of glory. Already the worst rated quarterback in the league, and by a healthy margin, Anderson completed 6 of 17 passes for 76 yards and 2 interceptions. It gave Anderson a rating of 10.539. It dropped his league low rating from 40.6 to 36.1.
But really, the story of Anderson is the story of the Browns this season. Although Anderson was the lowest rated passer last season, he’s worse this season for the simple reason that there is even less talent surrounding him, both on the field and on the sidelines. All its done is highlight every single shortcoming in his very limited game.
Quinn, too, has his share of shortcomings, but they aren’t nearly as fully developed. Where he is better than Anderson is on short to mid-range passes and right now that’s the area where the Browns suffer the most. If Quinn does indeed get the starting job back, it probably won’t make a huge difference. Same players, same coaches.
The running game, not particularly strong, was at least finding enough holes to keep the offense moving on occasion, particularly in that second half. Lewis had 69 yards on 16 carries, Josh Cribbs had 28 yards on 6 carries out of the Wildcat formation and Jerome Harrison added another 19 yards on 5 carries. Those aren’t great stats, certainly, but enough to suggest that the onus wasn’t just on Anderson.
Although Ryan’s defense gave up 23 points, it could have been far worse. With 5 turnovers to go along with their general ineffectiveness, the offense was constantly putting pressure on the defense.
After holding the Bears to 3-and-out on their opening two possessions, the defense gave up four straight scores, 3 of which were Robbie Gould field goals. On the drive that led to their first field goal, for example, the Bears had the ball at the Cleveland 15-yard line but couldn’t advance it any further.
After Anderson was picked off on a great effort by Danieal Manning, who returned it to the Browns’ 13-yard line, the defense again held Cutler. On another drive started by a Cleveland turnover—an Anderson/Lewis botched handoff, the Bears took it to the Cleveland 9-yard line but had to settle for another field goal after Kamerion Wimbley sacked Cutler for an 11-yard loss. The problem, though, is that this third field goal put the Bears up by two scores and given how little the Browns were doing offensively, it looked like a huge hill to climb.
The hill got even higher when the Bears finally found the end zone on their next drive thanks to 1-yard Matt Forte run that helped give the Bears a 16-0 lead. That drive would have ended much sooner and without a score but on 3rd-and-8 from Chicago’s 31-yard line, Wimbley went helmet-to-helmet with Cutler and was flagged for the roughing penalty. It will probably cost Wimbley about $10,000. It also cost Cutler a few moments of clarity, but only a few. Cutler completed his next 4 passes to put the team in position for the Forte touchdown run.
As this most miserable of half seasons comes to an end, the Browns and their fans get a much needed week off. That’s probably bad news for those in the league that look at playing the Browns the same way that someone with allergies looks at a bottle of Zyrtec. Relief will just have to wait.
As for what the second half of the season holds there’s no way of knowing. Everything the Browns have done to this point has been a crashing disappointment. But at least there’s one bit of good news. The only NFC North team remaining on the schedule is the Detroit Lions.
Wednesday, October 28, 2009
Shutting Up the Statistics
There’s a Peanuts cartoon by Charles Schulz in which Charlie Brown’s beleaguered baseball team is getting hammered once again. Linus, I believe, is rattling off the statistics on just how bad it all is and Charlie Brown yells “tell your statistics to shut up.”
It’s easy to appreciate Charlie Browns’ angst. It’s sometimes hard facing the absolute truth of what the black and white numbers reveal. Ignoring them may have been a plot point for Peanuts, but ignoring them when it comes to the Cleveland Browns is no more a strategy than hoping that they’ll change. Reality may bite and it may bite hard, but you ignore the venom at your own risk.
A statistic caught my eye today. It’s a statistic that more than any other I’ve seen chronicling the mess in Berea, places the awfulness of it all in just the right light. The Plain Dealer reported that in the Browns’ last two games, the differential in yards between what the defense has given up and what the offense has gained is a staggering 667 yards (1003 yards given up, 336 gained). Even more alarming, it is the worst two-game differential in the entire history of the franchise, which covers over 900 games dating back to 1946. For further perspective, consider that the second worst occurred during the first two games of the 1999 expansion year.
This is a statistic you can’t easily shut up. It serves as about the only counter-argument to the nonsense of those counseling patience with the new regime.
The popular theory making the rounds of the Mangini Apologist Movement is that things will inevitably get worse before they get better. By using this as the backdrop, the Apologists dismiss the mounting evidence on how bad things really are with this franchise as saying, “well, it’s to be expected.”
Let me take a novel approach: why? Where is it written that things must get worse in order to get better? Why can’t things simply improve from where they stood initially?
It’s fascinating how the narrative on this Browns’ season has changed from one of steady progress to one where it’s all about tearing it down in order to build it back up. Yet that’s become not just the official narrative of the fledgling Apologist movement but also the official narrative of an increasingly disingenuous head coach.
What is being lost in this rush to change the storyline to one that better fits what more reasoned observers see as an abject disaster is the fact that the Browns weren’t an aging team on the tail end of a good run that had reached an inevitable rebuilding point in their cycle. When Eric Mangini and his hand picked sock puppet George Kokinis took over, it was a young team with a smattering of talent. It had only upside, or so most people thought.
What’s turned out instead is that it had a much further downside, a historically, unprecedented, hide the women and children, put on the Haz Met suit, lock the doors, move out of town, shut your eyes, turn off the TV, liquidate the assets, run don’t walk, gut wrenching, vomit inducing, downside.
I’ll concede that the franchise wasn’t in the greatest shape when Mangini and Kokinis buffaloed owner Randy Lerner, but it wasn’t as bad as it is now. In fact, the franchise probably wasn’t even in as bad of shape for Mangini and Kokinis as it was for former general manager Phil Savage and former head coach Romeo Crennel.
The Browns’ receiving corps this year may be awful, but remember that when Mangini and Kokinis took over it also included Kellen Winslow and Braylon Edwards. Whatever you think about either of those two players, each was statistically better than anyone on the roster at the end of 2004. There was no Joe Thomas or Eric Steinbach on that 2004 squad, only Ryan Tucker and Ross Verba. There was no Shaun Rogers on that 2004 team. They were making due with the likes of Gerard Warren, Mike Myers and Ebenezer Ekuban. The defensive backfield in 2004 was better than what Mangini and Kokinis inherited, but Phil Dawson is still the place kicker and the 2004 didn’t have anyone close to Josh Cribbs on special teams.
Whatever problems that 2004 team had, it never once sunk to the depths of what’s now being experienced under Mangini. Savage and Crennel didn’t improve the talent level enough to make the Browns a materially better team but it would be hard to make the case that they made the franchise worse. All they really did was stunt its progress, an unpardonable sin given the promises they sold.
But Mangini and Kokinis have made things far worse. It’s not opinion, it’s fact. By every statistical measure one wants to use, this franchise is worse now than when those two took over and there is absolutely nothing to suggest that it will get any better, certainly not this year and probably not next except perhaps just through the law of averages.
But the Mangini Apologist Movement nonetheless keeps counseling patience in the midst of an absolute shit-storm of ineptitude as if things will magically get better if we just accept the awfulness and wait it all out without question or concern. I appreciate someone taking the alternate view as much as anyone and I don’t think less of them for doing so. But the whole basis for their view is that Mangini has somehow inherited remarkable circumstances and thus more slack must be cut.
Well, let’s go back to the statistics, shall we? The roster Mangini inherited was bad, but it wasn’t historically bad. He then turned over nearly half of it between his trades, his draft picks and his refugees from New York. If these are remarkable circumstances, despite how abundantly unremarkable they actually are, just know then that they are self-inflicted. A killer doesn’t get sympathy for murdering his parents just because he’s now an orphan and Mangini doesn’t get sympathy because he blew up the team and now is left with nothing but shrapnel and spare parts.
If Lerner can ever get engaged with his $1 billion investment long enough to realize that his franchise is on the precipice of sinking into complete irrelevance with a formally proud and loyal following, he might come to realize that this has nothing to do with having a hair trigger reaction to a little bad news.
This is all about correcting a major mistake that almost everyone saw coming except him. In 2007, the Miami Dolphins hired Cam Cameron, the offensive coordinator with San Diego, to lead their team. Under Cameron, the Dolphins eschewed picking Brady Quinn in the first round when they truly needed a quarterback and instead picked Ted Ginn, Jr. It was a surprise pick that turned out to be a major mistake not just because of the personnel involved because of the thought process. It ultimately revealed Cameron as someone in over his head.
Under Cameron, the Dolphins were a confused and ill-run franchise and finished the season at 1-15. As that most bitter of seasons was winding down, owner Wayne Huzienga had seen enough to know that he needed a real football professional to run the operation. He hired Bill Parcells.
Parcells didn’t move on Cameron right away, he didn’t need to. The year was almost over. But he did move on him quickly enough and Cameron’s head coaching career ended, mercifully, after one year.
I point all this out as evidence that things don’t have to get worse before they can better. Things can actually get better pretty quickly. The Dolphins aren’t a great team two years later but on the other hand they did go 11-5 one year after going 1-15. All it takes is competent football minds, not head coaches with insecurity issues and wannabe executives so anxious to advance that they’ll take a job on whatever bizarre conditions are imposed.
There’s probably no final straw in any of this only a million little straws breaking the will of the fans being charged to support this dying franchise. And while debating the quarterback situation is tiresome for everyone involved, just consider that irrespective of your feelings on either Brady Quinn or Derek Anderson, you have to concede that both are measurably worse as players under this regime. It may be the offensive philosophy. It may be the lousy coaching. It may be a hundred other things. But again, statistically this is just a fact.
The Mangini Apologist Movement deserves the right to defend its patron saint just as much as the rest of us deserve our right to dream of a day when this franchise actually gets on the right track; a day when no one tries to advance the faulty paradigm that you must get worse to get better; a day when a truly competent football professional is running this franchise; a day when the right moves are actually made so that showing some patience actually makes sense. Let them defend Mangini all they want, but in doing so the statistics don’t just have to shut up, they have to wither up and die.
It’s easy to appreciate Charlie Browns’ angst. It’s sometimes hard facing the absolute truth of what the black and white numbers reveal. Ignoring them may have been a plot point for Peanuts, but ignoring them when it comes to the Cleveland Browns is no more a strategy than hoping that they’ll change. Reality may bite and it may bite hard, but you ignore the venom at your own risk.
A statistic caught my eye today. It’s a statistic that more than any other I’ve seen chronicling the mess in Berea, places the awfulness of it all in just the right light. The Plain Dealer reported that in the Browns’ last two games, the differential in yards between what the defense has given up and what the offense has gained is a staggering 667 yards (1003 yards given up, 336 gained). Even more alarming, it is the worst two-game differential in the entire history of the franchise, which covers over 900 games dating back to 1946. For further perspective, consider that the second worst occurred during the first two games of the 1999 expansion year.
This is a statistic you can’t easily shut up. It serves as about the only counter-argument to the nonsense of those counseling patience with the new regime.
The popular theory making the rounds of the Mangini Apologist Movement is that things will inevitably get worse before they get better. By using this as the backdrop, the Apologists dismiss the mounting evidence on how bad things really are with this franchise as saying, “well, it’s to be expected.”
Let me take a novel approach: why? Where is it written that things must get worse in order to get better? Why can’t things simply improve from where they stood initially?
It’s fascinating how the narrative on this Browns’ season has changed from one of steady progress to one where it’s all about tearing it down in order to build it back up. Yet that’s become not just the official narrative of the fledgling Apologist movement but also the official narrative of an increasingly disingenuous head coach.
What is being lost in this rush to change the storyline to one that better fits what more reasoned observers see as an abject disaster is the fact that the Browns weren’t an aging team on the tail end of a good run that had reached an inevitable rebuilding point in their cycle. When Eric Mangini and his hand picked sock puppet George Kokinis took over, it was a young team with a smattering of talent. It had only upside, or so most people thought.
What’s turned out instead is that it had a much further downside, a historically, unprecedented, hide the women and children, put on the Haz Met suit, lock the doors, move out of town, shut your eyes, turn off the TV, liquidate the assets, run don’t walk, gut wrenching, vomit inducing, downside.
I’ll concede that the franchise wasn’t in the greatest shape when Mangini and Kokinis buffaloed owner Randy Lerner, but it wasn’t as bad as it is now. In fact, the franchise probably wasn’t even in as bad of shape for Mangini and Kokinis as it was for former general manager Phil Savage and former head coach Romeo Crennel.
The Browns’ receiving corps this year may be awful, but remember that when Mangini and Kokinis took over it also included Kellen Winslow and Braylon Edwards. Whatever you think about either of those two players, each was statistically better than anyone on the roster at the end of 2004. There was no Joe Thomas or Eric Steinbach on that 2004 squad, only Ryan Tucker and Ross Verba. There was no Shaun Rogers on that 2004 team. They were making due with the likes of Gerard Warren, Mike Myers and Ebenezer Ekuban. The defensive backfield in 2004 was better than what Mangini and Kokinis inherited, but Phil Dawson is still the place kicker and the 2004 didn’t have anyone close to Josh Cribbs on special teams.
Whatever problems that 2004 team had, it never once sunk to the depths of what’s now being experienced under Mangini. Savage and Crennel didn’t improve the talent level enough to make the Browns a materially better team but it would be hard to make the case that they made the franchise worse. All they really did was stunt its progress, an unpardonable sin given the promises they sold.
But Mangini and Kokinis have made things far worse. It’s not opinion, it’s fact. By every statistical measure one wants to use, this franchise is worse now than when those two took over and there is absolutely nothing to suggest that it will get any better, certainly not this year and probably not next except perhaps just through the law of averages.
But the Mangini Apologist Movement nonetheless keeps counseling patience in the midst of an absolute shit-storm of ineptitude as if things will magically get better if we just accept the awfulness and wait it all out without question or concern. I appreciate someone taking the alternate view as much as anyone and I don’t think less of them for doing so. But the whole basis for their view is that Mangini has somehow inherited remarkable circumstances and thus more slack must be cut.
Well, let’s go back to the statistics, shall we? The roster Mangini inherited was bad, but it wasn’t historically bad. He then turned over nearly half of it between his trades, his draft picks and his refugees from New York. If these are remarkable circumstances, despite how abundantly unremarkable they actually are, just know then that they are self-inflicted. A killer doesn’t get sympathy for murdering his parents just because he’s now an orphan and Mangini doesn’t get sympathy because he blew up the team and now is left with nothing but shrapnel and spare parts.
If Lerner can ever get engaged with his $1 billion investment long enough to realize that his franchise is on the precipice of sinking into complete irrelevance with a formally proud and loyal following, he might come to realize that this has nothing to do with having a hair trigger reaction to a little bad news.
This is all about correcting a major mistake that almost everyone saw coming except him. In 2007, the Miami Dolphins hired Cam Cameron, the offensive coordinator with San Diego, to lead their team. Under Cameron, the Dolphins eschewed picking Brady Quinn in the first round when they truly needed a quarterback and instead picked Ted Ginn, Jr. It was a surprise pick that turned out to be a major mistake not just because of the personnel involved because of the thought process. It ultimately revealed Cameron as someone in over his head.
Under Cameron, the Dolphins were a confused and ill-run franchise and finished the season at 1-15. As that most bitter of seasons was winding down, owner Wayne Huzienga had seen enough to know that he needed a real football professional to run the operation. He hired Bill Parcells.
Parcells didn’t move on Cameron right away, he didn’t need to. The year was almost over. But he did move on him quickly enough and Cameron’s head coaching career ended, mercifully, after one year.
I point all this out as evidence that things don’t have to get worse before they can better. Things can actually get better pretty quickly. The Dolphins aren’t a great team two years later but on the other hand they did go 11-5 one year after going 1-15. All it takes is competent football minds, not head coaches with insecurity issues and wannabe executives so anxious to advance that they’ll take a job on whatever bizarre conditions are imposed.
There’s probably no final straw in any of this only a million little straws breaking the will of the fans being charged to support this dying franchise. And while debating the quarterback situation is tiresome for everyone involved, just consider that irrespective of your feelings on either Brady Quinn or Derek Anderson, you have to concede that both are measurably worse as players under this regime. It may be the offensive philosophy. It may be the lousy coaching. It may be a hundred other things. But again, statistically this is just a fact.
The Mangini Apologist Movement deserves the right to defend its patron saint just as much as the rest of us deserve our right to dream of a day when this franchise actually gets on the right track; a day when no one tries to advance the faulty paradigm that you must get worse to get better; a day when a truly competent football professional is running this franchise; a day when the right moves are actually made so that showing some patience actually makes sense. Let them defend Mangini all they want, but in doing so the statistics don’t just have to shut up, they have to wither up and die.
Monday, October 26, 2009
What About the Fans?
It’s nice to have some company.
A few weeks ago I suggested on these very same pages that Cleveland Browns head coach Eric Mangini and staff were in over their collective heads and that the product was as bad as it’s ever been. I also suggested that Mangini would be in line for one of the quickest exits in NFL history if not for owner Randy Lerner’s serial indifference to the wants and needs of his fans.
Now Patrick McMannamon of the Akron Beacon Journal has written likewise. It would be nice if just a few more in the media, as proxies for the disgruntled fan base, would join the chorus. Maybe, just maybe, Lerner would hear the drum beats banging furiously for the head of his latest mistake.
I’m not suggesting that Lerner run the team based on a vote of the fans. I am suggesting that he stop the abuse. The Browns performance on Sunday was absolutely the most dispiriting performance I’ve ever witnessed and believe me, I’ve witnessed a whole bunch of bad over the years. Mangini himself said that the team lacked intensity and, for once, I won’t bother to argue with him.
I know Josh Cribbs took a little bit of an issue with Mangini’s assessment and, in truth, any assessments regarding the lack of intensity or professionalism always exclude Cribbs. He’s the one shining light on this miserable wretch of a franchise. If Lerner really wanted to do something positive for Cribbs, he’d fire Mangini now and give Cribbs that money.
Instead, in this topsy-turvy world where incompetence is rewarded and faith and persistence is overlooked, Cribbs is made to sweat out a bad contract he stupidly signed while Mangini and his band of merry idiots thrives as if everyday is Christmas. Well, Christmas can’t come soon enough for most Browns fans. It means the season will be nearly over.
Sunday was a perfect fall day. From all the various choices that laid in front of most people, inexplicably too many of us wasted 3+ hours watching this franchise find new ways to embarrass itself. Leaves could have been raked and golf could have been played. Cars could have been washed and kids could have been taken to the park. Instead on what is likely to be the last decent Sunday until the spring, too many Browns fans had toxic waste dripped on their eyeballs for the 7th straight week.
You could start with the quarterback situation but really you could start anywhere. When it comes to picking apart the carcass of this pathetic team it’s a never-ending supply of rancid meat. Mangini has yet to offer a cogent explanation as to why Derek Anderson is still on the team, let alone its starting quarterback. Anderson is making JaMarcus Russell look like a keeper.
Anderson is the worst-rated passer, statistically, and even that doesn’t do him justice. He has a quick release, yes, but he uses it to get rid of the ball well before the play has developed. Sunday’s game was a virtual greatest hits of reasons why Anderson isn’t a viable starting quarterback in this league. He has no touch on mid-range passes, he doesn’t throw particularly well on the run (and if you’re a quarterback in Cleveland, you better be able to throw on the run), and he’s not particularly accurate on anything other than a really deep pass down the middle of the field and even then that’s only occasionally. If he were trying to play this bad on purpose it couldn’t get much worse.
The fact that Anderson only completed three passes to wide receivers on Sunday may, to some, be a tribute to the defensive prowess of the Packers’ Charles Woodson and Al Harris. But they aren’t gods, except when they have the good fortune of playing against a team with quarterback who can’t throw.
Anderson isn’t a particularly effective leader, either, at least at this point. I have no doubt that he’s working hard or at least he thinks he’s working hard. But that’s irrelevant. Anderson can’t work himself into competency. He’s only effective when the talent around him is at a much higher level. Well, guess what? The league is full of back-ups with the same story.
As for why Mangini is giving Anderson such a long leash when he virtually yanked Quinn by his after just 10 quarters remains unexplained except in the most generic and meaningless way. The longer Mangini continues to try and rationalize the decision, the less it looks like one he made.
It’s well known that Quinn has an incentive in his contract that will pay him $11 million if he plays 70% of the team’s snaps this season. It also boosts his salary for next season. With the Browns falling off the radar screen of even the most ardent fans and late season sell outs looking less and less likely, Quinn’s banishment is looking like it has less to do with ability and more to do with money. And each day that goes by and Mangini continues to play word games while his owner sits mute, the more likely this scenario becomes.
But maybe the real answer in all of this is that there isn’t a quarterback out there that could do much better than either Anderson or Quinn under this regime The offensive line, once thought to be a strength, has played down to the level of the rest of the team. Jamal Lewis is finished as an effective running back in this league. The fact that he has an occasional good run is meaningless. It’s like Barry Bonds coming back into baseball and hitting a few home runs. The receivers weren’t very good when training camp started and aren’t very good now. Layered on all of this is an offensive coordinator, Brian Daboll, just learning his craft. It’s an offense that can’t even offer hope as a strategy.
If that’s the case, then it would be hard to play Quinn given the financial ramifications that decision entails. Businesses and people make those kinds of decisions all the time. Look at it this way: if season ticketholders knew that the price of next year’s tickets increased with the number of games they attended this year, do you think they’d continue to go to the games?
On defense, the Browns have been every bit as horrible as they have been on offense and, in some sense, it makes matters worse. Fans are certainly for high-powered offenses, but fans in towns like Cleveland take far more pride in a good defense. Scoring is nice but it’s infinitely more satisfying to punish another team’s players. Watching this defense, with a supposedly Pro Bowl nose tackle, give up huge chunks of yards to the Ryan Grants of the world makes your knees buckle. Watching Spencer Harvan, a rookie tight end/linebacker (according to the Packers’ official roster) run through the defense on a routine outlet pass makes the heart sink. This defense is actually worse than last year’s model which is as hard of sentence to write as it is to believe.
Is all of this on Mangini? Yes and no. No in the sense that only about half the players on this miserable roster are attributable to him. Yes in the sense that about half the players on this miserable roster are attributable to him. Throw in the entire coaching staff belonging to Mangini and all of the sudden the scales trip decidedly against his short tenure.
It’s not that the Browns aren’t trying to work on things. I’ve tried to be both positive and fair on this front. You can see them trying to establish a running game, even without the talent. You can see Mangini trying to establish discipline and rigor in approach. Those are the right things to establish.
The problem is that week after week the same excuses keep getting made and most of them start and end with the phrase “we just need to execute.” Well, it’s nearly halfway through the season and the team still can’t execute even the most basic of tasks, like blocking and tackling? What that really says is that this regime can’t teach and this team isn’t listening, if they ever were.
With Mangini at the helm and the product that his weird little machinations creates, there is absolutely no reason to even bother with this team any longer. It has lost all its capacity to either surprise or entertain. People will watch a car wreck on YouTube a few times because of the perverse pleasure it brings. But they won’t keep watching it repeatedly and that’s where the Browns now find themselves. They are a perverse pleasure no longer.
After 7 games, nearly half a season, the weekly wreck that awaits holds no appeal to anyone. Sure, some fans that already bought tickets will show up early in the Muny Lot and party. But they do so for the same reasons friends gather at a wake. They have absolutely no delusion that this corpse of a team will come back to life, at least not with this Dr. Frankenstein at the controls.
Sure, you can argue for the long-term theory which suggests that patience will eventually be rewarded. But for that to work, the right group needs to be in charge. What is there in this group that would lead anyone to believe that it can eventually bring long-term success.
You can also look at it from the perspective of other cities like St. Louis and Oakland. The fans there must be just as miserable. But there’s no comfort in that. The problems here still remain and have to be addressed.
Mangini was fired from his last job because the owner became convinced that he had lost the locker room. Here in Cleveland, Lerner doesn’t even need to worry about the locker room. Mangini never had it. What Lerner should be asking himself is the same thing the rest of us are asking: What about the fans?
A few weeks ago I suggested on these very same pages that Cleveland Browns head coach Eric Mangini and staff were in over their collective heads and that the product was as bad as it’s ever been. I also suggested that Mangini would be in line for one of the quickest exits in NFL history if not for owner Randy Lerner’s serial indifference to the wants and needs of his fans.
Now Patrick McMannamon of the Akron Beacon Journal has written likewise. It would be nice if just a few more in the media, as proxies for the disgruntled fan base, would join the chorus. Maybe, just maybe, Lerner would hear the drum beats banging furiously for the head of his latest mistake.
I’m not suggesting that Lerner run the team based on a vote of the fans. I am suggesting that he stop the abuse. The Browns performance on Sunday was absolutely the most dispiriting performance I’ve ever witnessed and believe me, I’ve witnessed a whole bunch of bad over the years. Mangini himself said that the team lacked intensity and, for once, I won’t bother to argue with him.
I know Josh Cribbs took a little bit of an issue with Mangini’s assessment and, in truth, any assessments regarding the lack of intensity or professionalism always exclude Cribbs. He’s the one shining light on this miserable wretch of a franchise. If Lerner really wanted to do something positive for Cribbs, he’d fire Mangini now and give Cribbs that money.
Instead, in this topsy-turvy world where incompetence is rewarded and faith and persistence is overlooked, Cribbs is made to sweat out a bad contract he stupidly signed while Mangini and his band of merry idiots thrives as if everyday is Christmas. Well, Christmas can’t come soon enough for most Browns fans. It means the season will be nearly over.
Sunday was a perfect fall day. From all the various choices that laid in front of most people, inexplicably too many of us wasted 3+ hours watching this franchise find new ways to embarrass itself. Leaves could have been raked and golf could have been played. Cars could have been washed and kids could have been taken to the park. Instead on what is likely to be the last decent Sunday until the spring, too many Browns fans had toxic waste dripped on their eyeballs for the 7th straight week.
You could start with the quarterback situation but really you could start anywhere. When it comes to picking apart the carcass of this pathetic team it’s a never-ending supply of rancid meat. Mangini has yet to offer a cogent explanation as to why Derek Anderson is still on the team, let alone its starting quarterback. Anderson is making JaMarcus Russell look like a keeper.
Anderson is the worst-rated passer, statistically, and even that doesn’t do him justice. He has a quick release, yes, but he uses it to get rid of the ball well before the play has developed. Sunday’s game was a virtual greatest hits of reasons why Anderson isn’t a viable starting quarterback in this league. He has no touch on mid-range passes, he doesn’t throw particularly well on the run (and if you’re a quarterback in Cleveland, you better be able to throw on the run), and he’s not particularly accurate on anything other than a really deep pass down the middle of the field and even then that’s only occasionally. If he were trying to play this bad on purpose it couldn’t get much worse.
The fact that Anderson only completed three passes to wide receivers on Sunday may, to some, be a tribute to the defensive prowess of the Packers’ Charles Woodson and Al Harris. But they aren’t gods, except when they have the good fortune of playing against a team with quarterback who can’t throw.
Anderson isn’t a particularly effective leader, either, at least at this point. I have no doubt that he’s working hard or at least he thinks he’s working hard. But that’s irrelevant. Anderson can’t work himself into competency. He’s only effective when the talent around him is at a much higher level. Well, guess what? The league is full of back-ups with the same story.
As for why Mangini is giving Anderson such a long leash when he virtually yanked Quinn by his after just 10 quarters remains unexplained except in the most generic and meaningless way. The longer Mangini continues to try and rationalize the decision, the less it looks like one he made.
It’s well known that Quinn has an incentive in his contract that will pay him $11 million if he plays 70% of the team’s snaps this season. It also boosts his salary for next season. With the Browns falling off the radar screen of even the most ardent fans and late season sell outs looking less and less likely, Quinn’s banishment is looking like it has less to do with ability and more to do with money. And each day that goes by and Mangini continues to play word games while his owner sits mute, the more likely this scenario becomes.
But maybe the real answer in all of this is that there isn’t a quarterback out there that could do much better than either Anderson or Quinn under this regime The offensive line, once thought to be a strength, has played down to the level of the rest of the team. Jamal Lewis is finished as an effective running back in this league. The fact that he has an occasional good run is meaningless. It’s like Barry Bonds coming back into baseball and hitting a few home runs. The receivers weren’t very good when training camp started and aren’t very good now. Layered on all of this is an offensive coordinator, Brian Daboll, just learning his craft. It’s an offense that can’t even offer hope as a strategy.
If that’s the case, then it would be hard to play Quinn given the financial ramifications that decision entails. Businesses and people make those kinds of decisions all the time. Look at it this way: if season ticketholders knew that the price of next year’s tickets increased with the number of games they attended this year, do you think they’d continue to go to the games?
On defense, the Browns have been every bit as horrible as they have been on offense and, in some sense, it makes matters worse. Fans are certainly for high-powered offenses, but fans in towns like Cleveland take far more pride in a good defense. Scoring is nice but it’s infinitely more satisfying to punish another team’s players. Watching this defense, with a supposedly Pro Bowl nose tackle, give up huge chunks of yards to the Ryan Grants of the world makes your knees buckle. Watching Spencer Harvan, a rookie tight end/linebacker (according to the Packers’ official roster) run through the defense on a routine outlet pass makes the heart sink. This defense is actually worse than last year’s model which is as hard of sentence to write as it is to believe.
Is all of this on Mangini? Yes and no. No in the sense that only about half the players on this miserable roster are attributable to him. Yes in the sense that about half the players on this miserable roster are attributable to him. Throw in the entire coaching staff belonging to Mangini and all of the sudden the scales trip decidedly against his short tenure.
It’s not that the Browns aren’t trying to work on things. I’ve tried to be both positive and fair on this front. You can see them trying to establish a running game, even without the talent. You can see Mangini trying to establish discipline and rigor in approach. Those are the right things to establish.
The problem is that week after week the same excuses keep getting made and most of them start and end with the phrase “we just need to execute.” Well, it’s nearly halfway through the season and the team still can’t execute even the most basic of tasks, like blocking and tackling? What that really says is that this regime can’t teach and this team isn’t listening, if they ever were.
With Mangini at the helm and the product that his weird little machinations creates, there is absolutely no reason to even bother with this team any longer. It has lost all its capacity to either surprise or entertain. People will watch a car wreck on YouTube a few times because of the perverse pleasure it brings. But they won’t keep watching it repeatedly and that’s where the Browns now find themselves. They are a perverse pleasure no longer.
After 7 games, nearly half a season, the weekly wreck that awaits holds no appeal to anyone. Sure, some fans that already bought tickets will show up early in the Muny Lot and party. But they do so for the same reasons friends gather at a wake. They have absolutely no delusion that this corpse of a team will come back to life, at least not with this Dr. Frankenstein at the controls.
Sure, you can argue for the long-term theory which suggests that patience will eventually be rewarded. But for that to work, the right group needs to be in charge. What is there in this group that would lead anyone to believe that it can eventually bring long-term success.
You can also look at it from the perspective of other cities like St. Louis and Oakland. The fans there must be just as miserable. But there’s no comfort in that. The problems here still remain and have to be addressed.
Mangini was fired from his last job because the owner became convinced that he had lost the locker room. Here in Cleveland, Lerner doesn’t even need to worry about the locker room. Mangini never had it. What Lerner should be asking himself is the same thing the rest of us are asking: What about the fans?
Sunday, October 25, 2009
Utterly Predictable
It would be nice to believe that the drama-queen of a football team that calls itself the Cleveland Browns would have the attendant unpredictability accorded that status. It doesn’t. In its utterly predictable fashion, they were drilled Sunday by the Green Bay Packers, 31-3.
In one sense, this loss could be attributed to any number of issues that plagued the team this week; swine flu, car wrecks, no tight ends, bad clams perhaps. In another sense, it’s always something.
The outcome was basically known before kickoff but confirmed on the Browns’ first drive. It featured everything that plagues them as a franchise.
Green Bay, fearing the only player in a Browns uniform they needed to fear, kicked away from Josh Cribbs and had the ball hit the pylon. It was ruled out of bounds and the Browns started their drive at their own 40-yard line. They ended it at their own 42 after having taken a step backward first due to an offensive pass interference call on Mohammad Massaquoi on a ball that he couldn’t have caught no matter how hard he pushed off Green Bay defensive back Al Harris.
Despite setting that tone, there was a moment, however brief, where the team actually showed a whiff of life and actually got on the scoreboard first. After squandering good field position on their first drive, the Browns’ offense found some rhythm on its second drive or for most of the drive anyway. Taking over on downs after the defense stopped Aaron Rodgers and the Packers on 4th and 1 from the Cleveland 34-yard line, the Browns methodically marched down the field as if they’d done it a hundred times this season.
But what they’ve really done a hundred times this season is squander opportunities and this one was no different.
The rhythm established was summarily broken and for the rest of the game after Jamal Lewis got the ball down to the 2-yard line on second down. Anderson was forced to call time out for some such reason and on consecutive plays thereafter fumbled and nearly threw an interception. Billy Cundiff, subbing once again for Phil Dawson, converted the chip shot field goal, after hitting the left upright, and the Browns had a 3-0 lead just seconds into the second quarter. The doink sound the ball made after hitting the upright aptly captured the collective thoughts of thousands.
The Browns’ minor uprising apparently was enough to shake the sleep out of the eyes of the Packers. On the ensuring drive, Rodgers put together a 6-play, 71-yard touchdown drive that featured a 45-yard touchdown pass to tight end Spencer Havner, helping the Packers grab a 7-3 lead. It was shades of the Steelers’ game. Havner was an outlet for Rodgers on 3rd and 1 who then rumbled nearly untouched the entire way to the end zone.
Predictably, the Browns responded with a 3-and-out. But the Packers had 12 men on the field and with that penalty the Browns got another chance. Unbowed, they went 3-and-out again.
The Packers then made it 14-3 when Rodgers hit Donald Driver on what was supposed to be a quick strike but turned even more quickly into a 71-yard touchdown. Defensive back Brodney Pool had a chance at Driver but couldn’t make the tackle. It probably wouldn’t have mattered anyway.
Then it got ugly. On the Browns’ next drive, Anderson spent most of it alternately scrambling for his life and throwing wildly off the mark. The Browns got a gift first down, however, on an illegal contact penalty and Anderson used the extra downs to get his weekly interception out of the way early, this one to Charles Woodson, who took it to the Cleveland 13-yard line.
The Browns’ defense looked to have held the Packers to a field goal but on 3rd and goal from the 2-yard line, Brandon McDonald interfered in the end zone with Driver, giving the Packers 4 more chances to score. They needed 3 but got what they needed when Ryan Grant pushed it in from the 1-yard line. It helped push the score to 21-3 with just under two minutes in the half.
The Browns then made a predictably half-hearted effort at a two-minute drive, half-hearted because they threw short and in the middle of the field mostly. After Anderson was sacked with two seconds remaining and the ball sitting their own 48-yard line, the Browns inexplicably called time out. It was explained 30 seconds later when offensive coordinator Brian Daboll gave Anderson a final opportunity to throw another interception. Anderson’s heave to the end zone was knocked away harmlessly instead.
The rest of the game had the look and intensity of a mid-summer scrimmage, with the Packers testing various aspects of their offense and the Browns willingly complying.
The Packers worked on the run in their first drive but it ended with a missed 55-yard field goal by Mason Crosby. The Browns took over at their own 45-yard line but on 3rd and 2, Anderson hit Cribbs on a short pass, Cribbs fumbled and it was picked up by linebacker Brandon Chillar at the Green Bay 49 yard line. Head coach Eric Mangini challenged the call and, predictably, he was wrong.
When the Packers took over again, they worked some more on their running game. It should bode well for the rest of the season. Grant ran four of the next 5 plays and ran well. That drive, too, though ended just short of the end zone and Crosby hit the short field goal that gave the Packers a 24-3 lead.
The Browns, meanwhile, looked to be working on, well, it was hard to say what they were working on. There were a few perfunctory runs by Lewis into a stacked line of scrimmage, an occasional fumbled snap and a variety of passes that didn’t appear to have intended targets. And the drive would have ended predictably and quickly but the Packers did their level best to keep the drive alive by continually committing penalties, including holding and a late hit after Jerome Harrison had stepped out of bounds after a swing pass and then was inadvertently hit by safety Atari Bigby.
All that nonsense allowed the Browns to get the ball deep into Green Bay territory. Then Anderson hit recently-signed tight end Michael Gaines inside the 5-yard line and he took it to the 1. Lewis then lost 2 yards, Anderson overthrew Massaquoi in the corner of the end zone, Lewis got his two yards back and then Anderson missed badly to Massaquoi in the end zone on 4th down, leaving the ball at the Packers 1-yard line. On the plus side, Mangini didn’t attempt the field goal.
The Packers got out of that jail as if they were in Mayberry. Anderson hit Driver on first down for 18 yards. He then hit Havner for another 14 yards. Two plays later, Rodgers scrambled 19 yards on 3rd and 6. Grant then went off tackle right for 37 yards, getting the ball to the Cleveland 5-yard line. Rodgers finished off the drive with a 5-yard touchdown pass to James Jones and the Packers had a 31-3 lead.
With the Browns deeply entrenched once again in garbage time, it’s hard to know exactly what Mangini was thinking, except that he wasn’t thinking Brady Quinn. Anderson was awful in every way a quarterback can be awful and offered absolutely no resume for why he should see another snap. In fairness, he did have the one good drive late in the first quarter, but as long as we’re being fair let’s not that he helped that drive come unhinged.
Meanwhile, Quinn sat idly on the bench wondering why someone who was 12-26 for 99 yards and 1 interception to that point and a quarterback rating around 40 was playing ahead of him. Maybe this really is a money thing.
But there was Anderson anyway, throwing his next pass at the feet of Lawrence Vickers and another out of the reach of Massaquoi. When it was all over, Anderson didn’t complete another pass and finished the day 12-29.
Rodgers, on the other hand, was brilliant. He threw only 20 times but completed 15 and had 3 touchdowns and 246 yards. He finished with a quarterback rating over 150. The Packers also rolled up 202 yards on the ground. In all, they had 460 net yards while the Browns had a meager 139.
The Browns are now 1-6 and probably petitioning the league office as to why they have to wait still another week until they get a bye. So are their fans.
As for Sunday’s outcome, it’s not so much that it was a set back because this team, despite its win in Buffalo, has shown absolutely no progress since the first game when they were similarly blasted by the Packers’ divisional rival, the Minnesota Vikings. But just as this loss and everything about it was predictable, so too will be the inevitable silver lining that Mangini will find somewhere, especially when it comes to Anderson. There was that one drive. And just as predictably, the fans will mutter, “huh?”
In one sense, this loss could be attributed to any number of issues that plagued the team this week; swine flu, car wrecks, no tight ends, bad clams perhaps. In another sense, it’s always something.
The outcome was basically known before kickoff but confirmed on the Browns’ first drive. It featured everything that plagues them as a franchise.
Green Bay, fearing the only player in a Browns uniform they needed to fear, kicked away from Josh Cribbs and had the ball hit the pylon. It was ruled out of bounds and the Browns started their drive at their own 40-yard line. They ended it at their own 42 after having taken a step backward first due to an offensive pass interference call on Mohammad Massaquoi on a ball that he couldn’t have caught no matter how hard he pushed off Green Bay defensive back Al Harris.
Despite setting that tone, there was a moment, however brief, where the team actually showed a whiff of life and actually got on the scoreboard first. After squandering good field position on their first drive, the Browns’ offense found some rhythm on its second drive or for most of the drive anyway. Taking over on downs after the defense stopped Aaron Rodgers and the Packers on 4th and 1 from the Cleveland 34-yard line, the Browns methodically marched down the field as if they’d done it a hundred times this season.
But what they’ve really done a hundred times this season is squander opportunities and this one was no different.
The rhythm established was summarily broken and for the rest of the game after Jamal Lewis got the ball down to the 2-yard line on second down. Anderson was forced to call time out for some such reason and on consecutive plays thereafter fumbled and nearly threw an interception. Billy Cundiff, subbing once again for Phil Dawson, converted the chip shot field goal, after hitting the left upright, and the Browns had a 3-0 lead just seconds into the second quarter. The doink sound the ball made after hitting the upright aptly captured the collective thoughts of thousands.
The Browns’ minor uprising apparently was enough to shake the sleep out of the eyes of the Packers. On the ensuring drive, Rodgers put together a 6-play, 71-yard touchdown drive that featured a 45-yard touchdown pass to tight end Spencer Havner, helping the Packers grab a 7-3 lead. It was shades of the Steelers’ game. Havner was an outlet for Rodgers on 3rd and 1 who then rumbled nearly untouched the entire way to the end zone.
Predictably, the Browns responded with a 3-and-out. But the Packers had 12 men on the field and with that penalty the Browns got another chance. Unbowed, they went 3-and-out again.
The Packers then made it 14-3 when Rodgers hit Donald Driver on what was supposed to be a quick strike but turned even more quickly into a 71-yard touchdown. Defensive back Brodney Pool had a chance at Driver but couldn’t make the tackle. It probably wouldn’t have mattered anyway.
Then it got ugly. On the Browns’ next drive, Anderson spent most of it alternately scrambling for his life and throwing wildly off the mark. The Browns got a gift first down, however, on an illegal contact penalty and Anderson used the extra downs to get his weekly interception out of the way early, this one to Charles Woodson, who took it to the Cleveland 13-yard line.
The Browns’ defense looked to have held the Packers to a field goal but on 3rd and goal from the 2-yard line, Brandon McDonald interfered in the end zone with Driver, giving the Packers 4 more chances to score. They needed 3 but got what they needed when Ryan Grant pushed it in from the 1-yard line. It helped push the score to 21-3 with just under two minutes in the half.
The Browns then made a predictably half-hearted effort at a two-minute drive, half-hearted because they threw short and in the middle of the field mostly. After Anderson was sacked with two seconds remaining and the ball sitting their own 48-yard line, the Browns inexplicably called time out. It was explained 30 seconds later when offensive coordinator Brian Daboll gave Anderson a final opportunity to throw another interception. Anderson’s heave to the end zone was knocked away harmlessly instead.
The rest of the game had the look and intensity of a mid-summer scrimmage, with the Packers testing various aspects of their offense and the Browns willingly complying.
The Packers worked on the run in their first drive but it ended with a missed 55-yard field goal by Mason Crosby. The Browns took over at their own 45-yard line but on 3rd and 2, Anderson hit Cribbs on a short pass, Cribbs fumbled and it was picked up by linebacker Brandon Chillar at the Green Bay 49 yard line. Head coach Eric Mangini challenged the call and, predictably, he was wrong.
When the Packers took over again, they worked some more on their running game. It should bode well for the rest of the season. Grant ran four of the next 5 plays and ran well. That drive, too, though ended just short of the end zone and Crosby hit the short field goal that gave the Packers a 24-3 lead.
The Browns, meanwhile, looked to be working on, well, it was hard to say what they were working on. There were a few perfunctory runs by Lewis into a stacked line of scrimmage, an occasional fumbled snap and a variety of passes that didn’t appear to have intended targets. And the drive would have ended predictably and quickly but the Packers did their level best to keep the drive alive by continually committing penalties, including holding and a late hit after Jerome Harrison had stepped out of bounds after a swing pass and then was inadvertently hit by safety Atari Bigby.
All that nonsense allowed the Browns to get the ball deep into Green Bay territory. Then Anderson hit recently-signed tight end Michael Gaines inside the 5-yard line and he took it to the 1. Lewis then lost 2 yards, Anderson overthrew Massaquoi in the corner of the end zone, Lewis got his two yards back and then Anderson missed badly to Massaquoi in the end zone on 4th down, leaving the ball at the Packers 1-yard line. On the plus side, Mangini didn’t attempt the field goal.
The Packers got out of that jail as if they were in Mayberry. Anderson hit Driver on first down for 18 yards. He then hit Havner for another 14 yards. Two plays later, Rodgers scrambled 19 yards on 3rd and 6. Grant then went off tackle right for 37 yards, getting the ball to the Cleveland 5-yard line. Rodgers finished off the drive with a 5-yard touchdown pass to James Jones and the Packers had a 31-3 lead.
With the Browns deeply entrenched once again in garbage time, it’s hard to know exactly what Mangini was thinking, except that he wasn’t thinking Brady Quinn. Anderson was awful in every way a quarterback can be awful and offered absolutely no resume for why he should see another snap. In fairness, he did have the one good drive late in the first quarter, but as long as we’re being fair let’s not that he helped that drive come unhinged.
Meanwhile, Quinn sat idly on the bench wondering why someone who was 12-26 for 99 yards and 1 interception to that point and a quarterback rating around 40 was playing ahead of him. Maybe this really is a money thing.
But there was Anderson anyway, throwing his next pass at the feet of Lawrence Vickers and another out of the reach of Massaquoi. When it was all over, Anderson didn’t complete another pass and finished the day 12-29.
Rodgers, on the other hand, was brilliant. He threw only 20 times but completed 15 and had 3 touchdowns and 246 yards. He finished with a quarterback rating over 150. The Packers also rolled up 202 yards on the ground. In all, they had 460 net yards while the Browns had a meager 139.
The Browns are now 1-6 and probably petitioning the league office as to why they have to wait still another week until they get a bye. So are their fans.
As for Sunday’s outcome, it’s not so much that it was a set back because this team, despite its win in Buffalo, has shown absolutely no progress since the first game when they were similarly blasted by the Packers’ divisional rival, the Minnesota Vikings. But just as this loss and everything about it was predictable, so too will be the inevitable silver lining that Mangini will find somewhere, especially when it comes to Anderson. There was that one drive. And just as predictably, the fans will mutter, “huh?”
Friday, October 23, 2009
Lingering Items--Steelers Edition
Disaster, at least when it comes to professional sports teams, often is a matter of scale. The Cleveland Browns are in the 11th year of a never-ending odyssey to somewhere, destination unknown. One thing is certain though, few if any fans are happy about it. Ok, one other thing is certain, most if not all fans have have plenty to say about it.
Meanwhile, over in Washington, D.C., the locals are perhaps even more verklempt and it has nothing to do with health care, cap-and-trade or the wars in the Mideast. Apparently those are transient issues when compared to the relative woes of the Redskins. What’s more fascinating though is the remarkable parallels it has to what’s taking place with the Browns.
Daniel Snyder is in his 10th year of ownership of the Redskins. He came into the league like most young owners with too much money came into the league—loudly. He paid fleeting attention to the team’s salary cap and far more to its Q rating. Deals that no general manager outside of Phil Savage would consider making Snyder made anyway. He’s probably still in debt to Deion Sanders.
But recently, Snyder has become nearly invisible. A victim of his past hubris, Snyder has aged into a far more traditional owner, laying low and supposedly letting his football people run the franchise. In that vein, Snyder brought back Joe Gibbs to run the franchise a few years ago but that didn’t do much to restore former glory. Gibbs now hangs around as an unpaid consultant.
The bottom line is that Snyder’s ownership has looked an awful lot like the Lerner family’s ownership of the Browns, but without the glitz. And, guess what? The fans are screaming for Snyder to sell as the only viable path remaining for returning to respectability. That has a familiar ring to it. It won’t happen there as it won’t happen here.
The mess surrounding current head coach Jim Zorn makes the tenure of Eric Mangini in Cleveland look positively tranquil by comparison. While Mangini’s relationship with Lerner is, by contrast, rock solid, the turmoil enveloping each franchise still has the same impact.
Not even halfway through the season Zorn is on the shortest of leashes, hamstrung by an idiot owner who can’t seem to understand that he’s the far bigger problem. Whatever it was that made Snyder rich enough to buy the Redskins, and it’s hard to remember that far back at this point, Snyder believes it doesn’t apply to his current business interest. I’d say the same thing about Randy Lerner, but really, his riches are inherited not earned and there is no business success to translate over.
But maybe none of that matters. If Forbes magazine is correct, then Snyder’s abject mismanagement hasn’t affected the franchise’s value one iota. The same is true in Cleveland. In fact, according to Forbes, the Redskins have doubled in valued from when Snyder bought the team for a then unheard of $800 million and is second in worth behind the Dallas Cowboys.
Unless Snyder is strapped for cash, why would he sell, performance on the field notwithstanding? And that is true of Lerner as well. The economy runs in cycles but NFL franchises are still about the safest investment vehicle out there for the truly rich. The Browns, despite both the economy and their on-field performance, didn’t lose a single percentage point of value in the last year, according to Forbes. More to the point, they are the 13th most valuable franchise, valued at $1 billion, which means that the Lerner family has almost doubled its initial investment of $530 million. At least the Browns are on the right half of something positive.
I’m not a conspiracy theorist by nature, but even someone with the naïveté of Simple Jack can recognize that there is little connection between what takes place on the field and the value of that franchise, except of course when it comes to the Oakland Raiders. They are the worst franchise in the league and their value bears that out.
Lerner, like Snyder, can run through coaches, mission statements and master plans like others run through paper napkins and it isn’t going to impact their real bottom line.
All that means, of course, is that for all the bitching that fans may do about the product being put out on the field, owners like Snyder and Lerner only give it a fleeting thought, no matter what they say publicly. Put it this way, if you knew that you’d continue to get healthy wage increases at work no matter how bad you screwed up would you really care if your co-workers kept complaining about you and asking you to quit?
**
The final score notwithstanding, the thrashing that the Pittsburgh Steelers put on the Browns last Sunday was every bit as bad as that put on them by the Baltimore Ravens, maybe worse. In the Ravens game it was apparent that the team quit playing somewhere around the 13:15 mark of the third quarter. In Pittsburgh, the team appeared to be trying the whole game. That’s a problem.
The talent deficit between the two teams is huge but it’s not as if you need me to confirm that. What makes it scary to think about, though, is that the dominance by the Steelers of the Browns doesn’t look to end any time soon.
The players claim that a rivalry still exists and it’s nice that Mangini thinks of the Steelers as a rival, but that’s just not the case. They are just another team in a division playing in a game that the Browns have no hope of winning.
That’s really the biggest problem with the Steelers’ abject dominance. It takes any fun out of what used to be a great rivalry. And when you begin to measure what it’s going to take before fans start to believe that this team is on some sort of road to redemption, becoming competitive again with the Steelers would be a good start.
The Browns of the early ‘80s could never seem to get a win at Three Rivers Stadium but the games always seemed to be hotly contested. The 1984 and ’85 games were particularly agonizing as the Browns lost both games in Pittsburgh by a combined 4 points.
But the Browns solved that dilemma in 1986 with a 27-24 win on their way to a 12-4 record. That victory didn’t just put the so-called Three Rivers Jinx to rest, it gave the team a platform and an ability to hold its head high. It also started a 4-year win streak in Pittsburgh, culminating with that magical opening game in 1989 when the Browns, under Bud Carson, blasted Pittsburgh 51-0.
But since then it’s been one pathetic performance after another for a franchise that’s been going in the wrong direction. In the 17 games played in Pittsburgh since that win streak ended, including the playoffs, the Browns have lost 15 of them and rarely has it been even close. The average score has been 28-13. Three of those losses have been shutouts and in 6 others the Browns have scored less than 10 points. It’s also a trend that’s getting worse. The average score in the last 4 losses has been 29-12.
If nothing else, reversing this trend is the real marker for determining whether this franchise is on the right track. No one expects the Browns to suddenly begin dominating Pittsburgh on its own turf, but getting competitive there would be a nice first step.
**
Another week and another controversy bubbles around the Browns. This time it was Eric Wright rolling his car on the wet pavement early Thursday morning, apparently after a night out that may or may not have included attending the Jay-Z concert.
In his Friday press conference, the media drones from Sector G found every conceivable way of asking Mangini about Wright and what he thought about his being out at 2 a.m. but Mangini, ever the rock when it comes to saying anything meaningful, wouldn’t bite.
The best Mangini would offer is that he personally wouldn’t be out that late and that he wishes his players were home studying their playbooks and thinking work thoughts. But he said that the Wright incident appeared to be an accident, nothing more.
It’s hard to know what happened exactly with Wright but cars don’t typically rollover without some sort of help. That means driving at a high rate of speed, falling asleep at the wheel, driving impaired, or some other such thing. That’s not to suggest that Wright is guilty of any of that. All it is to suggest is that there’s more to the story.
But putting that piece of it aside, Mangini is correct in wondering why his players find it necessary to party into the next morning, especially given the challenges it faces. A lot of fans have the same question. Wright plays on the worst defense in the league and he’s every bit as much the reason for that as any other player on that side of the ball.
Even if Wright hadn’t rolled his car, that wouldn’t have erased the fact that he was out pretty darn late on a school night and there’s a pretty good chance he had some company in the form of teammates. It’s a pretty sure bet too that if nothing else the ensuing lack of sleep ensured that they wouldn’t have been 100% at what amounts to the last significant practice before the next game.
All it really does it underscore that Mangini still hasn’t come even close to securing the hearts and minds of the players he needs to convert. Wright’s undoubtedly glad he didn’t get hurt in the accident but given Mangini’s reaction to the last player that had a late night out, he’s probably just as glad that the trade deadline has passed.
**
For those keeping score, the Wright car accident was the second of the season for a Browns’ player. James Davis had the first one, which occurred, oddly enough, about a week before he injured his shoulder for good in what’s being termed a post-practice “controlled environment.”
The rumor, fostered by ESPN, was that Davis was injured in some sort of drill after practice when a player in pads, later identified as linebacker Blake Costanza, hit a padless Davis.
Mangini said at the time that he felt there were no league policies violated and that was confirmed by the league office on Friday. Of course Mangini never volunteered what happened in the first place and spoke of it reluctantly only after the reports surfaced from unnamed sources. Someday he’ll learn that early disclosure keeps him from looking so guilty.
For those keeping score, this also is at least the second investigation the league has undertaken of Mangini and his policies (the other had to do with the infamous bus trip in the offseason) to go along with the 5 or so pending grievances. That’s a pretty hefty load in such a short period of time: two investigations, 5 grievances, two car accidents, one in-season trade. For a team trying to avoid distractions, it has a funny way of finding them anyway.
**
Given how exhausting it is to follow this team on a daily basis, this week’s question to ponder: Who is looking forward to the bye week more, the coaches, the players or the fans?
Meanwhile, over in Washington, D.C., the locals are perhaps even more verklempt and it has nothing to do with health care, cap-and-trade or the wars in the Mideast. Apparently those are transient issues when compared to the relative woes of the Redskins. What’s more fascinating though is the remarkable parallels it has to what’s taking place with the Browns.
Daniel Snyder is in his 10th year of ownership of the Redskins. He came into the league like most young owners with too much money came into the league—loudly. He paid fleeting attention to the team’s salary cap and far more to its Q rating. Deals that no general manager outside of Phil Savage would consider making Snyder made anyway. He’s probably still in debt to Deion Sanders.
But recently, Snyder has become nearly invisible. A victim of his past hubris, Snyder has aged into a far more traditional owner, laying low and supposedly letting his football people run the franchise. In that vein, Snyder brought back Joe Gibbs to run the franchise a few years ago but that didn’t do much to restore former glory. Gibbs now hangs around as an unpaid consultant.
The bottom line is that Snyder’s ownership has looked an awful lot like the Lerner family’s ownership of the Browns, but without the glitz. And, guess what? The fans are screaming for Snyder to sell as the only viable path remaining for returning to respectability. That has a familiar ring to it. It won’t happen there as it won’t happen here.
The mess surrounding current head coach Jim Zorn makes the tenure of Eric Mangini in Cleveland look positively tranquil by comparison. While Mangini’s relationship with Lerner is, by contrast, rock solid, the turmoil enveloping each franchise still has the same impact.
Not even halfway through the season Zorn is on the shortest of leashes, hamstrung by an idiot owner who can’t seem to understand that he’s the far bigger problem. Whatever it was that made Snyder rich enough to buy the Redskins, and it’s hard to remember that far back at this point, Snyder believes it doesn’t apply to his current business interest. I’d say the same thing about Randy Lerner, but really, his riches are inherited not earned and there is no business success to translate over.
But maybe none of that matters. If Forbes magazine is correct, then Snyder’s abject mismanagement hasn’t affected the franchise’s value one iota. The same is true in Cleveland. In fact, according to Forbes, the Redskins have doubled in valued from when Snyder bought the team for a then unheard of $800 million and is second in worth behind the Dallas Cowboys.
Unless Snyder is strapped for cash, why would he sell, performance on the field notwithstanding? And that is true of Lerner as well. The economy runs in cycles but NFL franchises are still about the safest investment vehicle out there for the truly rich. The Browns, despite both the economy and their on-field performance, didn’t lose a single percentage point of value in the last year, according to Forbes. More to the point, they are the 13th most valuable franchise, valued at $1 billion, which means that the Lerner family has almost doubled its initial investment of $530 million. At least the Browns are on the right half of something positive.
I’m not a conspiracy theorist by nature, but even someone with the naïveté of Simple Jack can recognize that there is little connection between what takes place on the field and the value of that franchise, except of course when it comes to the Oakland Raiders. They are the worst franchise in the league and their value bears that out.
Lerner, like Snyder, can run through coaches, mission statements and master plans like others run through paper napkins and it isn’t going to impact their real bottom line.
All that means, of course, is that for all the bitching that fans may do about the product being put out on the field, owners like Snyder and Lerner only give it a fleeting thought, no matter what they say publicly. Put it this way, if you knew that you’d continue to get healthy wage increases at work no matter how bad you screwed up would you really care if your co-workers kept complaining about you and asking you to quit?
**
The final score notwithstanding, the thrashing that the Pittsburgh Steelers put on the Browns last Sunday was every bit as bad as that put on them by the Baltimore Ravens, maybe worse. In the Ravens game it was apparent that the team quit playing somewhere around the 13:15 mark of the third quarter. In Pittsburgh, the team appeared to be trying the whole game. That’s a problem.
The talent deficit between the two teams is huge but it’s not as if you need me to confirm that. What makes it scary to think about, though, is that the dominance by the Steelers of the Browns doesn’t look to end any time soon.
The players claim that a rivalry still exists and it’s nice that Mangini thinks of the Steelers as a rival, but that’s just not the case. They are just another team in a division playing in a game that the Browns have no hope of winning.
That’s really the biggest problem with the Steelers’ abject dominance. It takes any fun out of what used to be a great rivalry. And when you begin to measure what it’s going to take before fans start to believe that this team is on some sort of road to redemption, becoming competitive again with the Steelers would be a good start.
The Browns of the early ‘80s could never seem to get a win at Three Rivers Stadium but the games always seemed to be hotly contested. The 1984 and ’85 games were particularly agonizing as the Browns lost both games in Pittsburgh by a combined 4 points.
But the Browns solved that dilemma in 1986 with a 27-24 win on their way to a 12-4 record. That victory didn’t just put the so-called Three Rivers Jinx to rest, it gave the team a platform and an ability to hold its head high. It also started a 4-year win streak in Pittsburgh, culminating with that magical opening game in 1989 when the Browns, under Bud Carson, blasted Pittsburgh 51-0.
But since then it’s been one pathetic performance after another for a franchise that’s been going in the wrong direction. In the 17 games played in Pittsburgh since that win streak ended, including the playoffs, the Browns have lost 15 of them and rarely has it been even close. The average score has been 28-13. Three of those losses have been shutouts and in 6 others the Browns have scored less than 10 points. It’s also a trend that’s getting worse. The average score in the last 4 losses has been 29-12.
If nothing else, reversing this trend is the real marker for determining whether this franchise is on the right track. No one expects the Browns to suddenly begin dominating Pittsburgh on its own turf, but getting competitive there would be a nice first step.
**
Another week and another controversy bubbles around the Browns. This time it was Eric Wright rolling his car on the wet pavement early Thursday morning, apparently after a night out that may or may not have included attending the Jay-Z concert.
In his Friday press conference, the media drones from Sector G found every conceivable way of asking Mangini about Wright and what he thought about his being out at 2 a.m. but Mangini, ever the rock when it comes to saying anything meaningful, wouldn’t bite.
The best Mangini would offer is that he personally wouldn’t be out that late and that he wishes his players were home studying their playbooks and thinking work thoughts. But he said that the Wright incident appeared to be an accident, nothing more.
It’s hard to know what happened exactly with Wright but cars don’t typically rollover without some sort of help. That means driving at a high rate of speed, falling asleep at the wheel, driving impaired, or some other such thing. That’s not to suggest that Wright is guilty of any of that. All it is to suggest is that there’s more to the story.
But putting that piece of it aside, Mangini is correct in wondering why his players find it necessary to party into the next morning, especially given the challenges it faces. A lot of fans have the same question. Wright plays on the worst defense in the league and he’s every bit as much the reason for that as any other player on that side of the ball.
Even if Wright hadn’t rolled his car, that wouldn’t have erased the fact that he was out pretty darn late on a school night and there’s a pretty good chance he had some company in the form of teammates. It’s a pretty sure bet too that if nothing else the ensuing lack of sleep ensured that they wouldn’t have been 100% at what amounts to the last significant practice before the next game.
All it really does it underscore that Mangini still hasn’t come even close to securing the hearts and minds of the players he needs to convert. Wright’s undoubtedly glad he didn’t get hurt in the accident but given Mangini’s reaction to the last player that had a late night out, he’s probably just as glad that the trade deadline has passed.
**
For those keeping score, the Wright car accident was the second of the season for a Browns’ player. James Davis had the first one, which occurred, oddly enough, about a week before he injured his shoulder for good in what’s being termed a post-practice “controlled environment.”
The rumor, fostered by ESPN, was that Davis was injured in some sort of drill after practice when a player in pads, later identified as linebacker Blake Costanza, hit a padless Davis.
Mangini said at the time that he felt there were no league policies violated and that was confirmed by the league office on Friday. Of course Mangini never volunteered what happened in the first place and spoke of it reluctantly only after the reports surfaced from unnamed sources. Someday he’ll learn that early disclosure keeps him from looking so guilty.
For those keeping score, this also is at least the second investigation the league has undertaken of Mangini and his policies (the other had to do with the infamous bus trip in the offseason) to go along with the 5 or so pending grievances. That’s a pretty hefty load in such a short period of time: two investigations, 5 grievances, two car accidents, one in-season trade. For a team trying to avoid distractions, it has a funny way of finding them anyway.
**
Given how exhausting it is to follow this team on a daily basis, this week’s question to ponder: Who is looking forward to the bye week more, the coaches, the players or the fans?
Wednesday, October 21, 2009
Performance-Based Privileges
It may be darkest before the storm, but for Cleveland Browns fans the clouds hanging over their franchise have been so thick for so long it’s difficult to remember what the sun once looked like.
The news that linebacker D’Qwell Jackson is not out for the year because of a shoulder injury should have had more of an impact than it actually does. Jackson is a decent player, maybe even the best player on the defense. But the unit already is the worst in the league and has looked bad far more often than it’s looked good. How much of an impact can the loss of Jackson or any member of that defense really have?
The other news, of sorts, of the week regarding the Browns relates to what they didn’t do, as in they didn’t trade any more players. No one expected head coach Eric Mangini to trade Josh Cribbs so the fact that the trade deadline passed without any action with him isn’t a surprise. But it is a little surprising that something didn’t happen at some level, or maybe it’s not.
There are a few players on this team that would be immediately useful on other teams; players like Joe Thomas, Josh Cribbs, Shaun Rogers and Dave Zastudil come to mind. You could probably throw Eric Steinbach on that list as well. There also are some players that would be useful down the road to some teams, players like Mohammad Massaquoi, Jerome Harrison, and Alex Mack. There may even be a few others that could find roles on other teams if they were available, players like Brodney Pool, Alex Hall and Eric Wright. But no team is going to give you much or anything for them.
And that’s really the point. Mangini isn’t rebuilding this team, he’s building it from scratch and he has very little to work with and very little to dangle in front of anyone else.
So let’s go back for a moment to a time when the last regime was in its salad days and owner Randy Lerner was feeling particularly sprite about its prospects; a time when he was more prone to giving interviews.
It was March, 2007 to be exact when Lerner made the rounds of the local newspapers and more or less gave his state of the Browns address, personalizing it a little for each reporter. I wrote about it here and it’s instructive to visit with Rappin’ Randy a bit to give some perspective on what hasn’t happened since.
Lerner told the media then that owning the Browns was a performance-base privilege. He posited the question that if he can’t perform as an owner, why should he continue to own the team. Since then, he’s answered his own question, he shouldn’t. Don’t take my word for it, take his.
Using the yardstick that Lerner laid out for himself, he said that when Savage took over, there were maybe “five or six or seven” football players on the team, though he left it to others to debate the names. He also said that a team needs about 35 core players in order to be successful. He named 19 players currently on that 2007 roster who fit that category: “I have (Joe) Jurevicius, (Orpheus) Roye, Kellen Winslow, Braylon Edwards, Kamerion Wimbley, Sean Jones, Brodney Pool, Eric [Steinbach], Jamal Lewis, Andra Davis, Charlie Frye, D'Qwell Jackson, Leigh Bodden, Josh Cribbs for special teams certainly if not other, Steve Heiden, and emerging players like Leon Williams, Lawrence Vickers, Jerome Harrison, Travis Wilson.”
It’s an interesting list for a variety of reasons. It gives insight into what both Lerner and Savage were thinking at the time and in that context explains why Savage really is gone and why Lerner should sell. But more instructive still is the fact that it’s just two short seasons later and the only ones still on the team are Wimbley, Pool, Steinbach, Lewis, Jackson, Cribbs, Heiden, Vickers and Harrison. Assuming for the moment that Lerner’s assessment on the players was correct, that means that over half of the “core” players are no longer with the team. And of those 9 still remaining, two are now on injured reserve and a third, Wimbley, continues to tease as he’s done throughout his career. He’s yet to make a real impact.
That means that only two seasons removed from Lerner’s assessment, the Browns are utilizing the services of 7 core players at the moment.
If Lerner were still in a talking mood, it would be fascinating to learn how many core players he now sees on this roster and who they might be. Let’s speculate.
Starting from Lerner’s original list, you have to assume he’d still put Wimbley on it even though nothing’s happened in the last two years to make anyone else put the words “Wimbley” and “core player” in the same sentence unless the word “not” also is thrown in. You can also assume that a case can still be made for Pool, a consummate and underappreciated professional. Certainly, Steinbach, Jackson, Cribbs and Harrison still qualify. But of those still on the roster and Lerner’s original list, the same case can’t be made for Lewis, because of his age and, frankly, his diminishing skills, Heiden, because of injuries, and Vickers, because he’s easily replaced. (As an aside, I’m not sure how Vickers ever really got on the list, but then just look at Lerner’s original list and ask yourself the same question about Leon Williams, Travis Wilson and Charlie Frye.)
Now, from the current roster, you can add in Thomas, Rogers, Zastudil (though Lerner didn’t have him on that list in 2007, hmm), Massaquoi, Mack, and Hall. If Lerner’s being really generous, he’d add, well, actually, I’m not sure who else he’d add without arousing a howl from the fan base. But assuming that there are a few others, that still puts the team well short of the 19 Lerner targeted in 2007 and well short of the 35 players the team supposedly needs to be competitive.
In other words, in 2007 the Browns supposedly were roughly halfway toward the required complement of core players. Now, they are maybe a third of the way there, depending on whether or not you’re an easy grader. (Another aside: I recognize mightily that Lerner’s original list was ridiculous. The 2008 season bore that out. Still, it’s a useful premise for purposes of illustrating the far larger point.)
The other thing that’s noticeable about the list of current so-called core players is the lack of any quarterback on it. Lerner originally had Frye on his list but he obviously didn’t foresee that Savage would dump him a few months later after a bad opening game. When Derek Anderson emerged in 2007 in place of Frye he certainly would have been on that list but his 2008 season, his inability to secure the starting spot going into 2009 and the fact that he’s currently the worst rated quarterback in the league removes him from any consideration as a core player.
There was a time, probably last season, when Lerner would have put Brady Quinn on that list, but he isn’t there anymore. Mangini has effectively written off Quinn and will dump him in the offseason, apparently with Lerner’s blessing. That leaves Brett Ratliff. Mangini may like him well enough but if a 3rd string quarterback really is considered a core player on this team then just forfeit the rest of the games now and bring the season to a close.
Mangini will be finding out, if he doesn’t know already, that there aren’t enough hours in the day or days on the calendar to fix this mess in any reasonable time frame. You can constantly churn a roster as most NFL teams do, you can listen to the siren song of free agency, you can gather draft picks like they’re acorns on a fall day, and you still can’t go from 12 core players to 35 in just a few short seasons.
The other part of this treadmill is that as the years pass, the core players you once had drop off the list for a variety of reasons, including injury, age and salary demands. They also drop off because as impatience kicks in, the temptation to trade one away for the chance on getting two more can be irresistible.
For example, Savage traded Bodden for Rogers. Rogers is the better player, certainly, but it did nothing toward the goal of increasing the nucleus of the team. All Savage did was trade one core player for another. (Another aside because I feel the need to explain: I don’t think Bodden was a core player, Lerner did, that’s all. Lerner was wrong. He often is.) When Mangini traded Edwards for Chansi Stuckey and Jason Trusnik, the team took a step backward from the standpoint of building its base. Maybe Stuckey and Trusnik eventually become core players, but they aren’t now. Ditto for the draft picks received in exchange for Edwards.
And that’s how this gamble really works. Trading anyone worth trading on this current roster would have done little for building a stronger base. Giving away marginal players for late round picks has no promise of accomplishing anything for the long term and nothing for the short term.
For Mangini to effectively accelerate the long process of building the base he’s going to have to develop some of these marginal players into core players and then he’s going to have to get awfully lucky with the draft in a hurry. That’s the task Lerner really has thrown at the feet of his new head coach. It was the same task Savage had and failed at. And if Lerner is every bit as good as assessing the ability of someone to make this transformation as he was at identifying the team’s core in 2007 or picking the last architect, then something tells me those dark clouds won’t be dissipating anytime soon. And, for good measure, just know that in Cleveland if ownership is indeed a performance-based privilege, it’s apparently a fleeting and ill-defined concept.
The news that linebacker D’Qwell Jackson is not out for the year because of a shoulder injury should have had more of an impact than it actually does. Jackson is a decent player, maybe even the best player on the defense. But the unit already is the worst in the league and has looked bad far more often than it’s looked good. How much of an impact can the loss of Jackson or any member of that defense really have?
The other news, of sorts, of the week regarding the Browns relates to what they didn’t do, as in they didn’t trade any more players. No one expected head coach Eric Mangini to trade Josh Cribbs so the fact that the trade deadline passed without any action with him isn’t a surprise. But it is a little surprising that something didn’t happen at some level, or maybe it’s not.
There are a few players on this team that would be immediately useful on other teams; players like Joe Thomas, Josh Cribbs, Shaun Rogers and Dave Zastudil come to mind. You could probably throw Eric Steinbach on that list as well. There also are some players that would be useful down the road to some teams, players like Mohammad Massaquoi, Jerome Harrison, and Alex Mack. There may even be a few others that could find roles on other teams if they were available, players like Brodney Pool, Alex Hall and Eric Wright. But no team is going to give you much or anything for them.
And that’s really the point. Mangini isn’t rebuilding this team, he’s building it from scratch and he has very little to work with and very little to dangle in front of anyone else.
So let’s go back for a moment to a time when the last regime was in its salad days and owner Randy Lerner was feeling particularly sprite about its prospects; a time when he was more prone to giving interviews.
It was March, 2007 to be exact when Lerner made the rounds of the local newspapers and more or less gave his state of the Browns address, personalizing it a little for each reporter. I wrote about it here and it’s instructive to visit with Rappin’ Randy a bit to give some perspective on what hasn’t happened since.
Lerner told the media then that owning the Browns was a performance-base privilege. He posited the question that if he can’t perform as an owner, why should he continue to own the team. Since then, he’s answered his own question, he shouldn’t. Don’t take my word for it, take his.
Using the yardstick that Lerner laid out for himself, he said that when Savage took over, there were maybe “five or six or seven” football players on the team, though he left it to others to debate the names. He also said that a team needs about 35 core players in order to be successful. He named 19 players currently on that 2007 roster who fit that category: “I have (Joe) Jurevicius, (Orpheus) Roye, Kellen Winslow, Braylon Edwards, Kamerion Wimbley, Sean Jones, Brodney Pool, Eric [Steinbach], Jamal Lewis, Andra Davis, Charlie Frye, D'Qwell Jackson, Leigh Bodden, Josh Cribbs for special teams certainly if not other, Steve Heiden, and emerging players like Leon Williams, Lawrence Vickers, Jerome Harrison, Travis Wilson.”
It’s an interesting list for a variety of reasons. It gives insight into what both Lerner and Savage were thinking at the time and in that context explains why Savage really is gone and why Lerner should sell. But more instructive still is the fact that it’s just two short seasons later and the only ones still on the team are Wimbley, Pool, Steinbach, Lewis, Jackson, Cribbs, Heiden, Vickers and Harrison. Assuming for the moment that Lerner’s assessment on the players was correct, that means that over half of the “core” players are no longer with the team. And of those 9 still remaining, two are now on injured reserve and a third, Wimbley, continues to tease as he’s done throughout his career. He’s yet to make a real impact.
That means that only two seasons removed from Lerner’s assessment, the Browns are utilizing the services of 7 core players at the moment.
If Lerner were still in a talking mood, it would be fascinating to learn how many core players he now sees on this roster and who they might be. Let’s speculate.
Starting from Lerner’s original list, you have to assume he’d still put Wimbley on it even though nothing’s happened in the last two years to make anyone else put the words “Wimbley” and “core player” in the same sentence unless the word “not” also is thrown in. You can also assume that a case can still be made for Pool, a consummate and underappreciated professional. Certainly, Steinbach, Jackson, Cribbs and Harrison still qualify. But of those still on the roster and Lerner’s original list, the same case can’t be made for Lewis, because of his age and, frankly, his diminishing skills, Heiden, because of injuries, and Vickers, because he’s easily replaced. (As an aside, I’m not sure how Vickers ever really got on the list, but then just look at Lerner’s original list and ask yourself the same question about Leon Williams, Travis Wilson and Charlie Frye.)
Now, from the current roster, you can add in Thomas, Rogers, Zastudil (though Lerner didn’t have him on that list in 2007, hmm), Massaquoi, Mack, and Hall. If Lerner’s being really generous, he’d add, well, actually, I’m not sure who else he’d add without arousing a howl from the fan base. But assuming that there are a few others, that still puts the team well short of the 19 Lerner targeted in 2007 and well short of the 35 players the team supposedly needs to be competitive.
In other words, in 2007 the Browns supposedly were roughly halfway toward the required complement of core players. Now, they are maybe a third of the way there, depending on whether or not you’re an easy grader. (Another aside: I recognize mightily that Lerner’s original list was ridiculous. The 2008 season bore that out. Still, it’s a useful premise for purposes of illustrating the far larger point.)
The other thing that’s noticeable about the list of current so-called core players is the lack of any quarterback on it. Lerner originally had Frye on his list but he obviously didn’t foresee that Savage would dump him a few months later after a bad opening game. When Derek Anderson emerged in 2007 in place of Frye he certainly would have been on that list but his 2008 season, his inability to secure the starting spot going into 2009 and the fact that he’s currently the worst rated quarterback in the league removes him from any consideration as a core player.
There was a time, probably last season, when Lerner would have put Brady Quinn on that list, but he isn’t there anymore. Mangini has effectively written off Quinn and will dump him in the offseason, apparently with Lerner’s blessing. That leaves Brett Ratliff. Mangini may like him well enough but if a 3rd string quarterback really is considered a core player on this team then just forfeit the rest of the games now and bring the season to a close.
Mangini will be finding out, if he doesn’t know already, that there aren’t enough hours in the day or days on the calendar to fix this mess in any reasonable time frame. You can constantly churn a roster as most NFL teams do, you can listen to the siren song of free agency, you can gather draft picks like they’re acorns on a fall day, and you still can’t go from 12 core players to 35 in just a few short seasons.
The other part of this treadmill is that as the years pass, the core players you once had drop off the list for a variety of reasons, including injury, age and salary demands. They also drop off because as impatience kicks in, the temptation to trade one away for the chance on getting two more can be irresistible.
For example, Savage traded Bodden for Rogers. Rogers is the better player, certainly, but it did nothing toward the goal of increasing the nucleus of the team. All Savage did was trade one core player for another. (Another aside because I feel the need to explain: I don’t think Bodden was a core player, Lerner did, that’s all. Lerner was wrong. He often is.) When Mangini traded Edwards for Chansi Stuckey and Jason Trusnik, the team took a step backward from the standpoint of building its base. Maybe Stuckey and Trusnik eventually become core players, but they aren’t now. Ditto for the draft picks received in exchange for Edwards.
And that’s how this gamble really works. Trading anyone worth trading on this current roster would have done little for building a stronger base. Giving away marginal players for late round picks has no promise of accomplishing anything for the long term and nothing for the short term.
For Mangini to effectively accelerate the long process of building the base he’s going to have to develop some of these marginal players into core players and then he’s going to have to get awfully lucky with the draft in a hurry. That’s the task Lerner really has thrown at the feet of his new head coach. It was the same task Savage had and failed at. And if Lerner is every bit as good as assessing the ability of someone to make this transformation as he was at identifying the team’s core in 2007 or picking the last architect, then something tells me those dark clouds won’t be dissipating anytime soon. And, for good measure, just know that in Cleveland if ownership is indeed a performance-based privilege, it’s apparently a fleeting and ill-defined concept.
Sunday, October 18, 2009
Bring Back the Bills
Thank you, sir, may I have another? That’s about the only thing to say these days when the Cleveland Browns face the Pittsburgh Steelers and it was the most appropriate thing to say on this day as the Browns were once again spanked by the Steelers, this time 27-14. It was the Steelers’ 12th straight win against the Browns and 18th in their last 19 tries.
It wasn’t the blowout 31-0 that the Browns suffered against the Steelers at the end of last season, but the Steelers’ victory wasn’t ever in doubt, either. At least there won’t be any talk this week of good losses or bad wins. This was a solid, old fashioned loss. So for those Browns fans still making goofy bets with co-workers that are Steelers fans, wear that Steelers jersey with pride at work this week as you hang your head in faked shame. Maybe next time you’ll learn to keep your big mouth shut.
In some ways the final score isn’t indicative of the kind of game it really was. The Steelers dominated everywhere but on the final score board, although they won by plenty. They ran up over 500 yards in offense, the first time they’ve done that since 2006 when the Browns were also the victims. But three straight turnovers by the Steelers, two of which were greeted with turnovers by the Browns, kept the Steelers from inflicting more damage.
What they did inflict was plenty enough and it was done by the usual suspects, Ben Roethlisberger, Hines Ward, Santonio Holmes and Heath Miller. Roethlisberger threw for 417 yards with two touchdowns against his one interception. Hines Ward was the beneficiary of most of that, catching 8 passes for 159 yards and one touchdown. A second touchdown catch was nullified on a replay review near the end of the first half.
Holmes likewise had a big day, catching 5 passes for 104 yards. Miller had 4 catches, most of them at crucial moments, for 80 yards. On the ground the Steelers added another 140 yards, with Rashard Mendenhall leading the way with 62 yards on 17 carries.
On the Browns’ side of the ball, they had a meager 197 net yards on offense. The running game, strong the previous two weeks, was held to 91 yards total, with Josh Cribbs serving as the leading rusher with 45 yards on 6 carries.
Quarterback Derek Anderson was perhaps better than he was against Buffalo, but it’s a matter of degree. He completed more passes, but he had more turnovers. In all he was 9-24 for 122 yards, but fumbled twice and was intercepted once, at the Pittsburgh 1-yard line late in the game. Look for head coach Eric Mangini to note Anderson’s improving quarterback rating. He went from just over 15 last week to 51.04 this week.
Cribbs, demonstrating why he deserves a new contract, in addition to his 45 yards on the ground had a 98-yard touchdown return and was used more liberally on offense than he had been all year in the so-called “wildcat” formation.
After an initial few series by each team that went nowhere, the first break of the game went the Browns’ way when Roethlisberger fumbled the snap and Alex Hall recovered it at the Steelers’ 39-yard line late in the first quarter. Utilizing Cribbs as quarterback with Anderson serving as a decoy receiver, the Browns initially were able to move and perhaps take the early lead. But the drive imploded on the wings of good intentions as head coach Eric Mangini and offensive coordinator Brian Daboll went to wildcat well one too many times with one too many looks. On 1st and 10 from the Pittsburgh 14-yard line, Cribbs passed low to Chansi Stuckey who couldn’t handle it. Then, on 2nd and 10, Cribbs passed again for Stuckey but was easily picked off by safety Troy Polamalu, who appeared to be hurt on the play.
That seemed to be all the spark the Steelers’ needed. With virtually no pressure being applied, Roethlisberger was able to literally look at every receiving option twice as he picked apart the defense on his way to putting his team up 7-0 with an 8-yard pass to Miller. The key play on the 8-play 85 yard drive was a short pass to Holmes that Holmes turned into a 41-yard gain. In all, Roethlisberger was 5-5 on the drive.
The Browns’ couldn’t respond, but then again they haven’t been able to respond to anyone all season.
The Steelers then pushed it to 14-0 after Roethlisberger hit Ward for a 52-yard touchdown. The pass looked to be for Holmes but Ward stepped in front, apparently fooling the Browns’ secondary. Not to worry for Holmes. Again he set the drive in the right direction with a 21-yard catch a few plays earlier.
Cribbs, who seemed to be touching the ball on every play at this point, made it 14-7 with the 98-yard return on the ensuing kickoff. It was the second kick return for a touchdown against Pittsburgh in Cribbs’ career. It made the game look closer than it really was but it also gave Cribbs’ agent more fodder for his drive to land Cribbs a new contract. Good luck finding someone on the other end of the line in Berea who’s sympathetic.
It was nice moment that didn’t last nearly long enough. The Steelers were able to hit their “easy” button or so it seemed and looked to have pushed the lead back to 14 points but a 13-yard pass from Roethlisberger to Ward for a touchdown was overruled on review. Hines couldn’t maintain possession through the catch. Then, on third down, Roethlisberger, finally under some pressure, threw recklessly and had it almost picked off. Jeff Reed stepped in and kicked a 32-yard field goal for the 17-7 halftime lead.
That drive also featured a bit of controversy, still unexplained, regarding a very questionable first down call that went the Steelers way and enabled the drive to stay alive. On television, it looked as if the Steelers had come up inches short on 4th and 1 and the first down markers seemed to confirm as much. Oddly, though, and without any further review or discussion, the Steelers were awarded the first down. Defensive coordinator Rob Ryan could be seen liberally dropping f-bombs at that result and he seem well justified in doing so.
The Browns got on the board to start the second half with an honest-to-gosh offensive touchdown on their most professional drive of the season. After having thrown interceptions on their first possession of the second half in 4 of the first 5 games this season, the Browns marched down the field on the strength of some excellent passes from Anderson to Mohammad Massaquoi, including a 43-yarder that got the ball inside the Pittsburgh 10, and then finished off the drive with an Anderson to Lawrence Vickers 1-yard touchdown pass. The brought the score to 17-14 and at least gave the Steelers something to think about.
But if the Browns were going to be able to make a game of it and really give the Steelers something to think about, the defense had to hold the Steelers on the next drive. It wasn’t close. A 9-yard pass to Miller, a 45-yard pass to Ward and just that quickly the Steelers were back threatening. Then an end around from Rashard Mendenhall to Wallace got the ball to the Browns’ 1-yard line and Mendenhall finished off the drive with a 1-yard carry up the middle. Three minutes, 6 plays, 79 yards and the 10-point lead was restored.
Unlike the Steelers, the Browns’ offense couldn’t respond. A quick 3-and-out clearly delineated the differences between these two franchises, two hours apart by land, two million miles apart in ability.
Then things just got outright sloppy. The Browns tend to bring that out in teams.
Pittsburgh, showing the kind of indifference that can creep in against an inferior opponent, looked to try to level the playing field through a series of interceptions and fumbles. The Browns would here none of it.
First, Roethlisberger was intercepted by Brodney Pool, who returned it to the Cleveland 48-yard line. But on a 3rd and 16 Anderson, under pressure, fumbled and Pittsburgh’s James Harrison recovered. Then Willie Parker returned the favor two plays later by fumbling, with Abe Elam recovering at the Cleveland 16-yard line. Four plays later Anderson fumbled again, this time at the 24-yard line, but again Pittsburgh decided the potato was still too hot as Mendenhall then fumbled on the next play with Bowens recovering at the Cleveland 15 yard line.
After it was all over, Cleveland had the ball, couldn’t move it and was forced to punt. All that really happened was a lot of time was chewed up and the Browns, despite having a superior team almost gift wrapping the opportunities, still found themselves on the wrong end of a 10-point deficit.
The Steelers pushed it further on the strength of a Jeff Reed 39-yard field goal that was the culmination of a drive that started at the beginning of the 4th quarter and consumed over 6 minutes. The Browns and Anderson seemed to be moving it well in what was now garbage time but Anderson threw his obligatory weekly interception that sealed the loss.
It’s hard to know where the Browns will go with this increased use of the wildcat formation. Much of that will likely depend on how Mangini and Daboll view Cribbs’ crucial interception at the Pittsburgh 19-yard line. Still in a game where there weren’t many highlights for the Browns, it was something at least interesting to watch.
With still another loss to the Steelers and another potential one looming later in the season, it’s time to stop calling this series a rivalry. Simply playing a team twice a year doesn’t constitute a rivalry. In this case, it’s more like a semi-annual beatdown. If it’s a rivalry that this team needs, then there’s only one answer: Bring back the Bills.
It wasn’t the blowout 31-0 that the Browns suffered against the Steelers at the end of last season, but the Steelers’ victory wasn’t ever in doubt, either. At least there won’t be any talk this week of good losses or bad wins. This was a solid, old fashioned loss. So for those Browns fans still making goofy bets with co-workers that are Steelers fans, wear that Steelers jersey with pride at work this week as you hang your head in faked shame. Maybe next time you’ll learn to keep your big mouth shut.
In some ways the final score isn’t indicative of the kind of game it really was. The Steelers dominated everywhere but on the final score board, although they won by plenty. They ran up over 500 yards in offense, the first time they’ve done that since 2006 when the Browns were also the victims. But three straight turnovers by the Steelers, two of which were greeted with turnovers by the Browns, kept the Steelers from inflicting more damage.
What they did inflict was plenty enough and it was done by the usual suspects, Ben Roethlisberger, Hines Ward, Santonio Holmes and Heath Miller. Roethlisberger threw for 417 yards with two touchdowns against his one interception. Hines Ward was the beneficiary of most of that, catching 8 passes for 159 yards and one touchdown. A second touchdown catch was nullified on a replay review near the end of the first half.
Holmes likewise had a big day, catching 5 passes for 104 yards. Miller had 4 catches, most of them at crucial moments, for 80 yards. On the ground the Steelers added another 140 yards, with Rashard Mendenhall leading the way with 62 yards on 17 carries.
On the Browns’ side of the ball, they had a meager 197 net yards on offense. The running game, strong the previous two weeks, was held to 91 yards total, with Josh Cribbs serving as the leading rusher with 45 yards on 6 carries.
Quarterback Derek Anderson was perhaps better than he was against Buffalo, but it’s a matter of degree. He completed more passes, but he had more turnovers. In all he was 9-24 for 122 yards, but fumbled twice and was intercepted once, at the Pittsburgh 1-yard line late in the game. Look for head coach Eric Mangini to note Anderson’s improving quarterback rating. He went from just over 15 last week to 51.04 this week.
Cribbs, demonstrating why he deserves a new contract, in addition to his 45 yards on the ground had a 98-yard touchdown return and was used more liberally on offense than he had been all year in the so-called “wildcat” formation.
After an initial few series by each team that went nowhere, the first break of the game went the Browns’ way when Roethlisberger fumbled the snap and Alex Hall recovered it at the Steelers’ 39-yard line late in the first quarter. Utilizing Cribbs as quarterback with Anderson serving as a decoy receiver, the Browns initially were able to move and perhaps take the early lead. But the drive imploded on the wings of good intentions as head coach Eric Mangini and offensive coordinator Brian Daboll went to wildcat well one too many times with one too many looks. On 1st and 10 from the Pittsburgh 14-yard line, Cribbs passed low to Chansi Stuckey who couldn’t handle it. Then, on 2nd and 10, Cribbs passed again for Stuckey but was easily picked off by safety Troy Polamalu, who appeared to be hurt on the play.
That seemed to be all the spark the Steelers’ needed. With virtually no pressure being applied, Roethlisberger was able to literally look at every receiving option twice as he picked apart the defense on his way to putting his team up 7-0 with an 8-yard pass to Miller. The key play on the 8-play 85 yard drive was a short pass to Holmes that Holmes turned into a 41-yard gain. In all, Roethlisberger was 5-5 on the drive.
The Browns’ couldn’t respond, but then again they haven’t been able to respond to anyone all season.
The Steelers then pushed it to 14-0 after Roethlisberger hit Ward for a 52-yard touchdown. The pass looked to be for Holmes but Ward stepped in front, apparently fooling the Browns’ secondary. Not to worry for Holmes. Again he set the drive in the right direction with a 21-yard catch a few plays earlier.
Cribbs, who seemed to be touching the ball on every play at this point, made it 14-7 with the 98-yard return on the ensuing kickoff. It was the second kick return for a touchdown against Pittsburgh in Cribbs’ career. It made the game look closer than it really was but it also gave Cribbs’ agent more fodder for his drive to land Cribbs a new contract. Good luck finding someone on the other end of the line in Berea who’s sympathetic.
It was nice moment that didn’t last nearly long enough. The Steelers were able to hit their “easy” button or so it seemed and looked to have pushed the lead back to 14 points but a 13-yard pass from Roethlisberger to Ward for a touchdown was overruled on review. Hines couldn’t maintain possession through the catch. Then, on third down, Roethlisberger, finally under some pressure, threw recklessly and had it almost picked off. Jeff Reed stepped in and kicked a 32-yard field goal for the 17-7 halftime lead.
That drive also featured a bit of controversy, still unexplained, regarding a very questionable first down call that went the Steelers way and enabled the drive to stay alive. On television, it looked as if the Steelers had come up inches short on 4th and 1 and the first down markers seemed to confirm as much. Oddly, though, and without any further review or discussion, the Steelers were awarded the first down. Defensive coordinator Rob Ryan could be seen liberally dropping f-bombs at that result and he seem well justified in doing so.
The Browns got on the board to start the second half with an honest-to-gosh offensive touchdown on their most professional drive of the season. After having thrown interceptions on their first possession of the second half in 4 of the first 5 games this season, the Browns marched down the field on the strength of some excellent passes from Anderson to Mohammad Massaquoi, including a 43-yarder that got the ball inside the Pittsburgh 10, and then finished off the drive with an Anderson to Lawrence Vickers 1-yard touchdown pass. The brought the score to 17-14 and at least gave the Steelers something to think about.
But if the Browns were going to be able to make a game of it and really give the Steelers something to think about, the defense had to hold the Steelers on the next drive. It wasn’t close. A 9-yard pass to Miller, a 45-yard pass to Ward and just that quickly the Steelers were back threatening. Then an end around from Rashard Mendenhall to Wallace got the ball to the Browns’ 1-yard line and Mendenhall finished off the drive with a 1-yard carry up the middle. Three minutes, 6 plays, 79 yards and the 10-point lead was restored.
Unlike the Steelers, the Browns’ offense couldn’t respond. A quick 3-and-out clearly delineated the differences between these two franchises, two hours apart by land, two million miles apart in ability.
Then things just got outright sloppy. The Browns tend to bring that out in teams.
Pittsburgh, showing the kind of indifference that can creep in against an inferior opponent, looked to try to level the playing field through a series of interceptions and fumbles. The Browns would here none of it.
First, Roethlisberger was intercepted by Brodney Pool, who returned it to the Cleveland 48-yard line. But on a 3rd and 16 Anderson, under pressure, fumbled and Pittsburgh’s James Harrison recovered. Then Willie Parker returned the favor two plays later by fumbling, with Abe Elam recovering at the Cleveland 16-yard line. Four plays later Anderson fumbled again, this time at the 24-yard line, but again Pittsburgh decided the potato was still too hot as Mendenhall then fumbled on the next play with Bowens recovering at the Cleveland 15 yard line.
After it was all over, Cleveland had the ball, couldn’t move it and was forced to punt. All that really happened was a lot of time was chewed up and the Browns, despite having a superior team almost gift wrapping the opportunities, still found themselves on the wrong end of a 10-point deficit.
The Steelers pushed it further on the strength of a Jeff Reed 39-yard field goal that was the culmination of a drive that started at the beginning of the 4th quarter and consumed over 6 minutes. The Browns and Anderson seemed to be moving it well in what was now garbage time but Anderson threw his obligatory weekly interception that sealed the loss.
It’s hard to know where the Browns will go with this increased use of the wildcat formation. Much of that will likely depend on how Mangini and Daboll view Cribbs’ crucial interception at the Pittsburgh 19-yard line. Still in a game where there weren’t many highlights for the Browns, it was something at least interesting to watch.
With still another loss to the Steelers and another potential one looming later in the season, it’s time to stop calling this series a rivalry. Simply playing a team twice a year doesn’t constitute a rivalry. In this case, it’s more like a semi-annual beatdown. If it’s a rivalry that this team needs, then there’s only one answer: Bring back the Bills.
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