How the Cleveland Browns have taken the first steps on the long road to redemption. Maybe.
Ever since I started following the NFL the Cleveland Browns have been a laughing stock, the perennial punchline. In fact, for almost my entire lifetime the Browns have been a laughing stock, don't get me wrong there has been a lot of heart break in the past 22 years but also a lot of almost comically bad luck and decisions. In the early days of the NFL, pre-merger, the Browns dominated the sport. Their early Head Coach and founder Paul Brown pretty much invented much of what we now recognize as Football with his offensive innovation and they won 8 league championships. However, since my birth in 1995 their story has been all tragedy and comedy with no glory to be seen.
To understand what a long road it has been for probably the most tortured and loyal fan base in the league we need to start with the heartbreak. In February of 1996 the then owner of the Browns, Art Modell, fired the Head Coach Bill Belichick and a week later officially announced that the organisation was moving to Baltimore. This move not only ripped the heart out of the city of Cleveland, the nearest geographical team to Canton which is where the NFL's forerunner league was founded, but also in hindsight was a tragic case what could have been.
Whilst the name, uniform and history of the Browns was saved for the NFL expansion team that is current incarnation of the Browns, that's all they were left for their inaugural 1999 season. The whole Browns organisation, front office and all relocated to Baltimore as the Ravens, in this front office was the legendary Tight End of the Browns Ozzie Newsome who would later become the General Manager of the Ravens. Under the stewardship of Newsome the Ravens have won two Super Bowls, the first of which was in 2000, only one year after the 'new' Browns reappeared. The Ravens have been a model of stability in the front office with Newsome consistently demonstrating the ability to build and rebuild winning football teams. The Head Coach of that Browns team that left the city in '96 was one William Stephen Belichick. He had had a long career in the NFL already by the time he was Browns Head Coach but his career afterwards has been legendary, it's included 5 Super Bowl wins, the first of which was in 2001, and he is considered the best Football coach in the history of the sport to many. So in two consecutive years key members of the Browns organisation (including effectively the old team) won Super Bowls, you can't help but wonder what could have been for that team if they'd have kept it in town.
Unlike the successes endured by the Ravens and Belichick post '96 the story of the 'new' Browns is very different. They've almost been a perfect model of dysfunction, only featuring in one playoff bout since being formed. There have been multiple regimes, a change of ownership and an absurdly long list of starting Quarterbacks. And it is that last point that has often made the Browns the butt of NFL fans jokes, the long list of inadequate and occasionally inept men who have stepped out under-center for the Browns is quite impressive. To try, and fail, that many times to find the answer at Quarterback is almost unheard of. The search for Franchise Quarterbacks often can consume General Managers and Head Coaches but the Browns have taken the art of swinging and missing to whole new levels. It's not just at the Quarterback position that regimes have failed, there is a long list of first round draft busts attached to the franchise too.
The lack of success many regimes had in building teams is ultimately what cost many people attached to the Browns their jobs and with each new regime came fresh ridicule. Then last offseason happened, after another clearing out of the front office and coaching staff the Browns, the second worst team in the 2015 season, hired Hue Jackson as Head Coach who had enjoyed success as an Offensive Coordinator for the Cincinnati Bengals and also been a HC before with the Raiders. Along with Jackson they hired Sachi Brown, a Harvard Law Graduate as their Executive Vice President. With him Brown bought Paul DePodesta, a baseball executive who achieved fame with his analytics based 'Moneyball' ideology which inspired the book and the Brad Pitt fronted film. With this appointment came a fresh round of ridicule, people misunderstanding how the Browns new front office would be approaching things. The whole dialogue around the decision would make you think that analytics was this alien concept that Brown and DePodesta had invented just to bring a new level of inadequacy to the Browns. In reality analytics is such a big part of the modern league, ProFootballFocus provide in-depth analytics for every play, FootballOutsiders also have a wide range of statistics, these along with many other websites analytics work are quoted all the time as part of the discussion and breakdown of NFL games. The Seahawks built their Super Bowl team using SPARQ, a formula designed to gauge athleticism, the very foundation of that team building process was analytics. The John Schneider/Pete Carroll Seahawks use these methods and are held up as model organisation, yet the Browns decide to go down this route and are roundly ridiculed.
This cynicism of the Browns approach, though valid when viewed through the prism of their recent history, never sat well with me at the time. I appreciated the Browns trying something different, because - and I know you won't believe this - what they'd done previously hadn't worked, so why the hell not try something new?! In the 2016 draft the Browns owned the 2nd overall pick, this was a draft that quickly became a QB led two horse race for who would be the 1st pick between Cal's Jared Goff and North Dakota State's Carson Wentz. The newly minted LA Rams traded with Tennessee for the first overall pick, they seemed to have their eyes on Goff. This left the Browns with Wentz. Draftnik's seemed torn on the top passer of the class, so depending on your view point and scouting the Browns could well end up with the better passer of the two. Wentz also seemed like the perfect body for the AFC North. Sound like a no-brainer for a franchise that has been searching for a QB since '99 right? Wrong. Sachi Brown traded out of the 2nd overall pick for a mammoth haul from the Philadelphia Eagles.
This move was met with hysteria, the mocking and disbelief continued. What were the Browns doing, Wentz was already being anointed franchise saviour and Brown passed over him for draft picks. Collecting draft picks in this manner has become the foundation of Sachi Brown's team-building philosophy. It's not groundbreaking in Football thinking, GMs have done it for years, including Bill Belichick, John Schneider and the godfather of pick trading Jimmy Johnson. However, yet again as this was Browns move it was questioned at every turn, the Browns still had a pick in the 1st round and selected promising Wideout Corey Coleman, they also made 13 other picks who all made it to their 53 man roster. If nothing else betrays how bad of a state the roster Brown took over was in, that stat should.
Last season, after Brown's first draft in charge of the team the Browns went 1-15. They just about avoided infamy by dodging joining the 0-16 Lions as the worst team in modern league history but were far from impressive. This can be attributed to many factors including an incredibly young and raw roster, and also absolute attrition at the QB position that led to 6 men plying the position for the Browns. But I'm not going to make excuses for last year's Browns, they were terrible and deserved to be picking first in this year's draft. This year's draft had one clear top prospect, Myles Garret the pass rusher our of Texas A&M. As always with the Draft, nobody truly knows what will happen and there was much speculation that the Browns would pass on Garrett for one of the underwhelming crop of QBs that had declared for the draft. This never was something that I bought into, after all why would you pass up the chance to draft Wentz (a QB considered worthy of a top pick) for Mitch Trubisky (maligned by some and with too many questions to take number 1)? Thankfully, as I said in my first round break down, the Browns did the sensible thing and took Garrett. They also added in the first round a versatile defensive play maker in Jabrill Peppers, for new defensive coordinator Greg Williams to have some fun with, and dynamic Tight End David Njoku. Many people on Thursday night, whilst praising the Browns moves, were still questioning the QB position and why they hadn't addressed it.
The next night they did address it. They selected DeShone Kizer out of Notre Dame, a player who in a very muddled QB class was considered by a number of talent evaluators to be the best prospect. But regardless of whether or not Kizer is the long awaited saviour at QB, the fact that they trusted their process and didn't reach for or overspend for a QB gives me hope for the Browns. As a British based NFL fan with a season ticket for the International Series I'll be seeing the Browns in the flesh this year. In years gone by that may not have interested me in the slightest, but for the first time in years I can genuinely say that I'm actually excited to see what they can be this year, they could still be the 'same old Browns' and I'll be proved wrong, but maybe they could be on to something. I for one hope that that is the case because rather than thinking what could have been for the City of Cleveland and its professional football team we might for the first time in my lifetime get to see them turn into something. As I said in the title, it's a long load to redemption for the Cleveland Browns but I feel they might be on the right path, and as a sports fan and knowing what their fans have been through it's hard not to want to see if this regime can do what seemed impossible just a few years ago, not only make the Browns relevant, but make them exciting.
To understand what a long road it has been for probably the most tortured and loyal fan base in the league we need to start with the heartbreak. In February of 1996 the then owner of the Browns, Art Modell, fired the Head Coach Bill Belichick and a week later officially announced that the organisation was moving to Baltimore. This move not only ripped the heart out of the city of Cleveland, the nearest geographical team to Canton which is where the NFL's forerunner league was founded, but also in hindsight was a tragic case what could have been.
Whilst the name, uniform and history of the Browns was saved for the NFL expansion team that is current incarnation of the Browns, that's all they were left for their inaugural 1999 season. The whole Browns organisation, front office and all relocated to Baltimore as the Ravens, in this front office was the legendary Tight End of the Browns Ozzie Newsome who would later become the General Manager of the Ravens. Under the stewardship of Newsome the Ravens have won two Super Bowls, the first of which was in 2000, only one year after the 'new' Browns reappeared. The Ravens have been a model of stability in the front office with Newsome consistently demonstrating the ability to build and rebuild winning football teams. The Head Coach of that Browns team that left the city in '96 was one William Stephen Belichick. He had had a long career in the NFL already by the time he was Browns Head Coach but his career afterwards has been legendary, it's included 5 Super Bowl wins, the first of which was in 2001, and he is considered the best Football coach in the history of the sport to many. So in two consecutive years key members of the Browns organisation (including effectively the old team) won Super Bowls, you can't help but wonder what could have been for that team if they'd have kept it in town.
Unlike the successes endured by the Ravens and Belichick post '96 the story of the 'new' Browns is very different. They've almost been a perfect model of dysfunction, only featuring in one playoff bout since being formed. There have been multiple regimes, a change of ownership and an absurdly long list of starting Quarterbacks. And it is that last point that has often made the Browns the butt of NFL fans jokes, the long list of inadequate and occasionally inept men who have stepped out under-center for the Browns is quite impressive. To try, and fail, that many times to find the answer at Quarterback is almost unheard of. The search for Franchise Quarterbacks often can consume General Managers and Head Coaches but the Browns have taken the art of swinging and missing to whole new levels. It's not just at the Quarterback position that regimes have failed, there is a long list of first round draft busts attached to the franchise too.
The lack of success many regimes had in building teams is ultimately what cost many people attached to the Browns their jobs and with each new regime came fresh ridicule. Then last offseason happened, after another clearing out of the front office and coaching staff the Browns, the second worst team in the 2015 season, hired Hue Jackson as Head Coach who had enjoyed success as an Offensive Coordinator for the Cincinnati Bengals and also been a HC before with the Raiders. Along with Jackson they hired Sachi Brown, a Harvard Law Graduate as their Executive Vice President. With him Brown bought Paul DePodesta, a baseball executive who achieved fame with his analytics based 'Moneyball' ideology which inspired the book and the Brad Pitt fronted film. With this appointment came a fresh round of ridicule, people misunderstanding how the Browns new front office would be approaching things. The whole dialogue around the decision would make you think that analytics was this alien concept that Brown and DePodesta had invented just to bring a new level of inadequacy to the Browns. In reality analytics is such a big part of the modern league, ProFootballFocus provide in-depth analytics for every play, FootballOutsiders also have a wide range of statistics, these along with many other websites analytics work are quoted all the time as part of the discussion and breakdown of NFL games. The Seahawks built their Super Bowl team using SPARQ, a formula designed to gauge athleticism, the very foundation of that team building process was analytics. The John Schneider/Pete Carroll Seahawks use these methods and are held up as model organisation, yet the Browns decide to go down this route and are roundly ridiculed.
This cynicism of the Browns approach, though valid when viewed through the prism of their recent history, never sat well with me at the time. I appreciated the Browns trying something different, because - and I know you won't believe this - what they'd done previously hadn't worked, so why the hell not try something new?! In the 2016 draft the Browns owned the 2nd overall pick, this was a draft that quickly became a QB led two horse race for who would be the 1st pick between Cal's Jared Goff and North Dakota State's Carson Wentz. The newly minted LA Rams traded with Tennessee for the first overall pick, they seemed to have their eyes on Goff. This left the Browns with Wentz. Draftnik's seemed torn on the top passer of the class, so depending on your view point and scouting the Browns could well end up with the better passer of the two. Wentz also seemed like the perfect body for the AFC North. Sound like a no-brainer for a franchise that has been searching for a QB since '99 right? Wrong. Sachi Brown traded out of the 2nd overall pick for a mammoth haul from the Philadelphia Eagles.
This move was met with hysteria, the mocking and disbelief continued. What were the Browns doing, Wentz was already being anointed franchise saviour and Brown passed over him for draft picks. Collecting draft picks in this manner has become the foundation of Sachi Brown's team-building philosophy. It's not groundbreaking in Football thinking, GMs have done it for years, including Bill Belichick, John Schneider and the godfather of pick trading Jimmy Johnson. However, yet again as this was Browns move it was questioned at every turn, the Browns still had a pick in the 1st round and selected promising Wideout Corey Coleman, they also made 13 other picks who all made it to their 53 man roster. If nothing else betrays how bad of a state the roster Brown took over was in, that stat should.
Last season, after Brown's first draft in charge of the team the Browns went 1-15. They just about avoided infamy by dodging joining the 0-16 Lions as the worst team in modern league history but were far from impressive. This can be attributed to many factors including an incredibly young and raw roster, and also absolute attrition at the QB position that led to 6 men plying the position for the Browns. But I'm not going to make excuses for last year's Browns, they were terrible and deserved to be picking first in this year's draft. This year's draft had one clear top prospect, Myles Garret the pass rusher our of Texas A&M. As always with the Draft, nobody truly knows what will happen and there was much speculation that the Browns would pass on Garrett for one of the underwhelming crop of QBs that had declared for the draft. This never was something that I bought into, after all why would you pass up the chance to draft Wentz (a QB considered worthy of a top pick) for Mitch Trubisky (maligned by some and with too many questions to take number 1)? Thankfully, as I said in my first round break down, the Browns did the sensible thing and took Garrett. They also added in the first round a versatile defensive play maker in Jabrill Peppers, for new defensive coordinator Greg Williams to have some fun with, and dynamic Tight End David Njoku. Many people on Thursday night, whilst praising the Browns moves, were still questioning the QB position and why they hadn't addressed it.
The next night they did address it. They selected DeShone Kizer out of Notre Dame, a player who in a very muddled QB class was considered by a number of talent evaluators to be the best prospect. But regardless of whether or not Kizer is the long awaited saviour at QB, the fact that they trusted their process and didn't reach for or overspend for a QB gives me hope for the Browns. As a British based NFL fan with a season ticket for the International Series I'll be seeing the Browns in the flesh this year. In years gone by that may not have interested me in the slightest, but for the first time in years I can genuinely say that I'm actually excited to see what they can be this year, they could still be the 'same old Browns' and I'll be proved wrong, but maybe they could be on to something. I for one hope that that is the case because rather than thinking what could have been for the City of Cleveland and its professional football team we might for the first time in my lifetime get to see them turn into something. As I said in the title, it's a long load to redemption for the Cleveland Browns but I feel they might be on the right path, and as a sports fan and knowing what their fans have been through it's hard not to want to see if this regime can do what seemed impossible just a few years ago, not only make the Browns relevant, but make them exciting.
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