OT: Cleveland reporter asks Browns owner "Is team run by the Three Stooges?"
Unlike Detroit, Cleveland is NOT happy about our HC getting fired. General consensus around here is that Chud did a pretty good job given the circumstances: GM trading 2013 picks in draft for 2014 picks, trading his #1 RB to the Colts (say what you will about the trade itself or Richardson - he WAS his #1 back), a team 24MM under cap and having to play arguably the worst QB in the NFL, Brandon Weedon. As a matter of fact - during the short tenure of Brian Hoyer (a decent but certainly not great QB) the team looked pretty damn good and won all three of its games. So Browns fans are generally confused, pissed and frustrated at the front office decision to make Chud a "one and done".
So yesterday the Brown's front office held a news conference to discuss Chudzinski's firings and one of local reporters asked a question that I'm sure our "brain trust" was not expecting.
http://www.19actionnews.com/category/240218/video-landing-page?autoStar…
December 31st, 2013 at 3:35 PM ^
You are the owner, Mr. Haslam. The dollar stops on your desk. And when your prolonged coaching search yields a coach fired after one season, sir, I question your ability to lead this team. One would almost think there were deeper motives at stake for spending $1 billion on a sinking ship of a franchise, such as expanding one's base outside of Tennessee in search of fracking profit.
So. Where do we go from here? Do we hire and fire new coaches every year as it pleases you? In any case I am not invested in the result and will laugh heartily when your Pilot fraud schemes catch up with you and you go to jail for 18 months in some cushy white-collar facility.
December 31st, 2013 at 3:44 PM ^
Mangini was fired after two years, Shurmur was fired after two years and Chudzinski got one year. It's not like these teams are loaded with talent and ready to win now.
If you're not going to get time to fix things, why would anyone want to coach there?
December 31st, 2013 at 4:29 PM ^
that's my point, most coaches, especially with a bad franchise like the Browns, need a few years to rebuild / win. Look at Saban, arguably the best college coach, flopped in the pros with the Dolphins. So to give Chud one year and say put together a winning record or your gone, is typical Browns failure philosophy. This move alone shows that Haslam doesn't know how to own a franchise. As much as being a Bears fan can be frustrating, I feel for the Browns fans who will have to put up with this ownership.
December 31st, 2013 at 5:07 PM ^
I'll chime in for the minority - I too thought it was totally unprofessional. Really? Shouting anonymous Facebook comments and then saying "Don't blame me, blame the fans." Facebook is where stupid, irrational people live. Don't give them a chance to gloat in their cowardice.
Sports make people so irrational - it's not like you can get better by just flipping a switch. Do people really believe that the Browns or the Lions are not trying to get better? Do they think that there's more that could possibly be done?
Sports have winners and losers. That's a fact of life. If you think a sports team losing too many games is a personal affront to you, then you need to get away from a computer and go fishing or read a book or grow up or all three.
December 31st, 2013 at 5:51 PM ^
When owners ruin a franchise. It's not a personal affront to you, but the Brown's front office, from the owner down, are a complete joke. You should have to earn the right to be treated as a professional, and no one working for that organization has done so.
Sure, asking a question off Facebook is kind of shitty, but it's not like the team has been a paragon of professionalism. You don't fire a coach a year after you hire him for on the field reasons, it doesn't happen. He got fired because he was either doing some shady stuff off field, or him and the front office didn't get along, and if it was the first you can be damn sure we would have heard something about it. So either they didn't do nearly enough research on him before they hired him, and thus aren't really working as hard as they can to get better, or they got in a pissing match because the owner and Lombardi are both pompous jackasses who believe their shit doesn't stink, which again shows that they aren't doing everything they can to win.
Teams are not down that long in professional sports due to bad GM's or coaches, they are down because of bad owners. Hell, even Jeff Loria, who is in the business for no reason other than to bilk the people of Miami of every cent he can while putting out trash, has had good teams. Sure guys like Ford or Dolan want to get better, but they can't, and the ridiculous decisions they make only ensure that the teams are mired in mediocrity for years to come. Of course fans get pissed at that, they do stupid things and run franchises into the ground, essentially because they wanted a new play toy for a couple hundred million.
Also, of course there is more they could do. How do some franchises stay succesful for years while other's stay terrible? It's not dumb luck, the succesful franchises do things the right way, and when the owners and GM's of the terrible ones do things that directly conflict with the method succesful franchises use, it is going to raise questions of their motivation or intelligence.
The fact is, they knew what they were getting into, they bought the team anyway, they cashed the checks they get from all of the fans. I don't see any owners saying they're going to start donating what they make from the team until it's succesful, so they should have to answer some press conference questions a bit harder than "Do you think this next coach will take you to a world championship, or just a league championship Mr. Owner, sir"
December 31st, 2013 at 8:30 PM ^
December 31st, 2013 at 8:36 PM ^
Firing a HC after one season is indeed a bad move but really the Browns fans should calm down. Unlike many other long suffering fans (i.e. Lion Fans) they actually have had very good teams that went far in the playoffs (Brian Sipe teams, Bernie Kosar teams) and of course they did win the Super Bowl - only they were called the Ravens.