After the Browns dropped consecutive disappointing road games to 2-win teams, the sports punditry seems to have decided once again that Eric Mangini is running out the clock on death row.
I’m still not entirely sure that I agree with this opinion or, if it is true, the actual decision. As Mike pointed out earlier, good teams require continuity, and firing a coach every two to three seasons is a pretty huge impediment to continuity. It’s also no secret that the Browns’ are still lacking in the personnel department, and they’ve had a rash of injuries to make matters worse. In light of all that, dumping Mangini seems at best a grey area.
Still, nothing reflects more poorly on a coach than losing games to teams like Buffalo and Cincinnati. Even if the Browns somehow manage to beat either Baltimore or Pittsburgh in the final two weeks, losses in games like the previous two carry a stench that clings to the head coach.
With all that in mind, the punditry has begun flinging around names for possible Mangini replacements. There’s almost universal agreement that whomever would come in would be a client of Bob LaMont, Holmgren’s agent and possible shadow President of the team. But aside from John Gruden (who still may not coach at all next season), the other early favorite appears to be Carolina’s John Fox.
Fox is one of those coaches who the NFL analyst community loves unconditionally. They talk about what a great motivator he is, what a sharp football mind he has—all kinds of intangibles that would make him a steal for any organization.
This is precisely the problem for laymen like us, though. Coaching is essentially all intangibles, and everyone but the players is cut off from most of those. We’re not in the locker room; we don’t know what the players think of the coach; we can’t access the X’s and O’s side of what he provides. Hell, most of the time we don’t even get to see what formations he’s running out on defense since the standard NFL camera angle doesn’t show the secondary.
Really, there’s only one quantitative measure that people like you and me can use to try to decide whether or not a coach is “good”: his win-loss record. So the question is, does John Fox’s record support the euphoria from the NFL congregation?
Counting the current season, John Fox has coached Carolina for 9 years. To date, he’s compiled a 73-69 record (51.4% wins) with the very real probability that Carolina loses its final two games of the season and drops that record to 73-71. In short, through his career, Fox is a .500 coach.
What about the topic of consistency? Well, here’s a year-by-year recap of the Panthers under Fox:
2002: 7-9, missed playoffs
2003: 11-5, lost to NE in Super Bowl
2004: 7-9, missed playoffs
2005: 11-5, lost to SEA in NFC Championship game
2006: 8-8, missed playoffs
2007: 7-9, missed playoffs
2008: 12-4, lost to ARI in NFC Divisional game
2009: 8-8, missed playoffs
2010: 2-12 (currently), worst record in the league
There are two ways to look at the above. One is that with the exception of this season, Fox has never won fewer than 7 games, and 44.4% of his teams have made it to the playoffs.
The second is that his career is marked by a serious yo-yo effect. Fox’s Panthers (which sounds like a villainous faction in a Disney movie) have never posted consecutive winning seasons. Further, every time they’ve made it to the playoffs, they’ve performed worse than the previous time. Super Bowl losers in 2003, booted from the NFC Championship game in 2005, blown out in the Divisional round in 2008.
Call me a pessimist if you will, but this doesn’t exactly give me a great deal of confidence that Fox is the guy to turn the Browns around at a coaching level.
In fact, it reminds me of a disturbing parallel. It was less than a year ago when the members of the NFL analyst fraternity collectively started touching themselves over Washington’s hiring of the great Mike Shanahan. I am on record as being critical of Shanahan’s godly status in the football world, at least based on recent reality. For all the clamor about his defense and rushing expertise, he won a grand total of 2 playoff games in the 10 years after John Elway retired. Flash forward to today: Washington is not only tied for last place in the NFC East at 5-9, but their personnel situation and Shanahan’s handling of players like McNabb and Haynesworth has been almost universally panned.
The truly scary part: even in the post-Elway era, Shanahan’s ten-year record with the Broncos (91-69) was still significantly better than Fox’s nine years in Carolina, regardless of what happens in the final two games of the 2010 season.
I’m not saying definitively that Fox is a bad candidate. On some level, coaching is sorcery. But I am saying that based on the only hard facts we have available, I think it would be wise for Browns fans to be skeptical.
As I concluded in the coaching post I linked to regarding Shanahan, the goal for GMs around the league should be to find the next great coach, not hire some guy beloved by the old guard who’s had some past success. Analysts talk all the time about how the keys to the AFC North are smash-mouth defense and a good running game. It’s rarely mentioned that the consistent rulers of the division, Baltimore and Pittsburgh, not only have good-to-great young QBs, they also have (supposedly) two of the great young coaches in the league in Mike Tomlin and John Harbaugh—both of whom were hired out of obscurity and initially met with skepticism around the pundit community. If Mangini is fired, the Browns’ brain trust would do well to keep that in mind.
I was perusing ESPN’s NFL Rumors section earlier today, and just like every other day, there was an update on Chargers WR Vincent Jackson and his hold-out / suspension situation.
For those of you who don’t try to escape your job by reading about sports as much as possible during office hours—oh wait, that’s probably exactly what you’re doing right now. I forgot. Anyway, Vincent Jackson was facing two separate 3-game suspensions before today: the first for violating the league’s personal conduct policy, the second for being placed on the Chargers’ roster-exempt list by the front office, which basically amounts to a penalty for his hold-out stance. Like teammate and star LT Marcus McNeill, Jackson’s agent convinced him to hold out in hopes of negotiating a bigger money deal this season. The Chargers, of course, are having none of it and are looking for any way possible to tweak Jackson before they put together a deal to send him out.
Why the hell am I talking about Vincent Jackson? Because, for some reason I can’t totally fathom, the Browns keep coming up in ESPN’s updates as a possible trade destination for him.
When I read this initially, I felt like the Browns should absolutely do this deal if it’s there. According to NFL gossip guru Adam Schefter, the price to pry Jackson away from the Chargers would likely be a “premium” draft pick, which Schefter translates as…a 3rd rounder.
This is what baffles me about the NFL. I understand the high turn-over rate of players, and thus the value of the draft. But in this case, Jackson is a Pro Bowl wide receiver who just turned 27 in January. His number of receptions and total receiving yards have increased every season. He’s averaged just over 1,100 yards per season for each of the past two seasons. His career average for yards per reception is 17.2. He’s scored 25 touchdowns in 6 seasons and has fumbled only once in his entire pro career. And he was drafted in the second round in 2005.
In other words, now that Jackson’s ability is a known quantity, the Chargers are asking for a future draft pick that is a round lower than the one they actually acquired him with in the first place. And apparently, teams have been hesitant about pulling the trigger.
In fairness, the two hurdles to a trade seem to have been the question of how many games Jackson will miss this season due to suspension, and his salary demands. Schefter reports that Jackson is seeking a multi-year deal in the range of $9MM per. That’s significant money to pay for a receiver on a team with no playoff aspirations whatsoever. But the idea that no team—let alone the Browns, who are constantly in need of talent—is willing to sacrifice this money and a 3rd round pick for a Pro Bowl receiver just leaves me confused. The ice may thaw in the next few days now that the length of his suspension is clear (4 games if he’s traded by Wedneday) is clear, but we’ll see.
If the Browns are seriously considering this trade, they have two major aces up their sleeves: first, all signs are that their 2011 picks will be very high in their respective rounds; second, the Chargers seem to be pissed enough at Jackson that they would go out of their way to deal him to a shit team. In that case, the Browns could easily become a favorite to land him, and the argument for acquiring him seems to get stronger.
However, after considering further, this trade seems like it could be one of the most ignorant, mis-prioritized moves the Browns could possibly orchestrate.
By all accounts, Jackson is a legit star-quality #1 wide-out. But as usual, the problem is that the Browns still don’t seem to have anyone who can actually throw the ball to him accurately. (I should give Seneca Wallace a chance, and I don’t even want to throw Jake Delhomme over the railing yet, but it’s safe to say the team hasn’t established a consistent, quality answer at the position as of now.) In that sense, trading for Vincent Jackson would be equivalent to filling your tank with high-octane gas despite that your car is missing an engine, or buying specialty condoms even though, as a sex survey I got in the mail in high school put it, you are “unable to find a willing partner.”
Theoretically, having a “star” wide-out is great. But in all fairness, no one really has any idea how good the Browns’ current crop of young receivers is because the QB situation continues to be a disaster. Why blow a good draft pick and $9MM per year on one receiver when the team still has a gaping hole at QB that cripples all receivers regardless of quality?
In short, I can’t really come up with a good reason. Unless Heckert and Holmgren are convinced that Colt McCoy is the answer starting next season. And I don’t think there’s anywhere near enough evidence to make that claim.
I would be floored if the Browns actually made this trade. In the event that it does go down, though, I think it’s a major warning sign about the front office’s evaluation process.
You’re returning to the same team you coached the prior season.
Judging by your team’s record, that last season was not successful. Ten losses will put any coach on the hot seat. You had more than that.
So you know that this season, your program must show colossal improvements, or else in all likelihood it’s time to book a moving company.
You’re confident this improvement can happen. You played a major personnel role last year. Part of your impact there was to get rid of the bad apples and bring in your own hand-picked replacements. Veterns who understand what you want. Young players who can be taught to play the game the right way from day one.
The stars look like they’re aligning. Almost everything is in place.
Then, in the off-season, your boss and the General Manager combine to pull a major power move on you.
They bring in a new starting quarterback. One who’s been to the Super Bowl. But not all that recently. Still a “name” guy, but one clearly on the twilight side of his career. A QB known to have a quick release and a big arm—but also one with an increasingly nasty reputation for poor decisions and interceptions. Both of which are near the top of your black list.
In particular, this quarterback had some issues in his final year at his last stop. He’s the type of guy who, it’s believed, might just need the infamous change of scenery to get him back on track. Or else he’s past the point of no return, and only the team who’s employed him for his entire career as a starter knows him well enough to realize it. That would make your team the patsy.
Nevertheless, the higher-ups pay big money to install this quarterback at the front of your system. They believe he’s got a veteran presence that will help guide the team to victory. Just as importantly, they think that he’s still got the talent to get it done.
In so many other areas of the team, you’ve gotten your way. But the most important position has been filled by someone who fits a profile that is, in many ways, the exact opposite of what you’d like.
Then, when that QB goes out and begins making exactly the types of mistakes you feared he would make, you get a sick feeling in your stomach. Because when the expectations for improvement aren’t fulfilled, you know that the guillotine isn’t hanging over your quarterback’s head so much as it’s hanging over your own. And unlike your new quarterback, you’re going to end up having to take a bullet for something that isn’t your fault.
OK, given this story, who are you?
If you guessed Eric Mangini, you’re correct.
Now, what team are you coaching?
If you guessed the 2010 Browns, you’re correct.
But if you guessed the 2008 New York Jets…you’re also correct.
Welcome to Eric Mangini’s deja vu experience.
Prior to both of the seasons mentioned above, an eerily similar drama played out. In New York, owner Woody Johnson and GM Mike Tannenbaum supposedly put Brett Favre in place against Mangini’s wishes. In Cleveland, Mike Holmgren and Tom Heckert have essentially done the exact same thing with Jake Delhomme.
Admittedly, these two situations aren’t identical. Even if they didn’t meet the high bar set out for them, the Jets of 2008 were still much improved from their 2007 counterparts. They tacked on 5 more wins, going from 4-12 to 9-7. Yet there were hopes that with Brett Favre at the helm, they would at least make the playoffs, if not make a surprise run to a conference title game. Despite a strong start, they collapsed in the second half and missed out on the wild card. From there, Mangini was canned, and Favre was shipped out shortly thereafter.
None of us has any idea what the final record of the 2010 Browns will be, but no one licensed to live outside of an asylum believed they were capable of a +5 win improvement, let alone a playoff berth. Jake Delhomme, as I’ve mentioned earlier, is by almost all passing statistics a worse quarterback than Brett Favre. Unlike in New York where he had Chad Pennington at the helm, 2010 Browns Mangini didn’t have a previous starting QB that he loved and wanted to keep. He may not even have been against Delhomme in spirit. But one difference that’s indisputable: after wetting the bed against Tampa Bay to open the season, a strong start (and therefore, a late-season collapse) by this year’s Browns squad is by definition impossible.
Mangini knows he’s on the hot seat. Everyone in the city and the league knows it. But I doubt that any of those other people know it in their blood the way that Mangini does—not just because he’s the one who stands to lose or gain, but because only he would recognize just how many parallels are in action between those two situations. Because as our little guessing game proved, there are a lot of them, down to the fact that Mangini’s current Defensive Coordinator is a shave and a haircut away from essentially being the same guy who ultimately took his job in New York after the 2008 season.
In the winter of 2011, will Rob Ryan become the new Rex Ryan by usurping the head coaching gig Mangini just vacated? It seems unlikely to me. But as irrational as it may be, you can bet that every time Mangini looks at his defensive coordinator, his quarterback, or his GM, he gets a little jolt of deja vu. Only time will tell if this movie concludes the way the last one did. But Mangini can’t be thrilled about the plot so far.
As I was trolling the internet for any Cleveland-relevant sports news, I found the following letter to the Plain Dealer’s Tony Grossi in his weekly “Hey, Tony!” column:
Hey, Tony: I was really impressed on the first day of camp [with] something I haven’t seen or heard since the Browns have come back. We were sitting … when who other than Mike Holmgren drives up to us in a golf cart and thanks the fans for coming out and supporting the Browns. This guy is a real pro. He should with time and patience bring back the Browns to an elite team. Thanks Mike Holmgren for making the average fan feel like someone important….LeBron James should come out and watch to take some pointers from these guys on how to be classy. — Mike Varga, Mantua, Ohio
This, in a nutshell, resurrects my initial fears about the Mike Holmgren Era.
The press and fans of Cleveland are eating out of Holmgren’s hand thus far. Part of this has to do with the fact that it’s the pre-season. There are no ugly results to hold in front of Holmgren’s face, no hard answers for him to have to provide. This is a circumstance true of many executives, coaches, and players around the league. In that sense, Holmgren is not being granted any unique favors.
However, the larger part of the equation seems to be Holmgren’s demeanor, which I doubt will change regardless of the team’s record. He answers direct questions. He takes time out to mingle with fans and press the flesh (which, to this day, I still can’t believe doesn’t mean something dirtier than ‘shake hands’). In short, he seems to be open and inclusive despite that he occupies the most powerful position in the organization short of Randy “Lost in Space” Lerner.
What I can’t decide is how much this should worry me.
The real problem is that I don’t have a very clear concept of how exhausting Holmgren’s job is. My original line of thinking was that the President job entailed as many hours and as much stress as a head coaching job. In my experience, people who are fantastic at an all-consuming job are, well, entirely consumed by that job. They don’t necessarily have time to do PR for themselves or the organization that employs them. They’re busy getting things done—things that actually matter to the overall success of the organization.
In that sense, my great fear is that Holmgren could be pro football’s Manchurian Candidate: a man who mesmerizes his constituents with his reputation, his poise, his manner—but who is ultimately too good to be true.
However, I don’t necessarily think that my initial concept of the team President job is accurate. Holmgren’s responsibilities are supposed to mirror those of Bill Parcells in Miami. Parcells retired from coaching due to the effect the long hours and constant stress were having on his health. If his new post was close to as demanding as that of coaching an NFL team, there’s no way that Parcells should be able to handle it. Yet here is, already balls-deep in year number three of his four year contract.
Instead, Parcells and Holmgren’s jobs are supposed to be about building and shaping the organization as a whole. Not just among the coaches and players, but from the equipment staff to the administrators and legal counsel. In short, they are supposed to be the CEOs of their respective franchises.
This leads me to believe that Holmgren’s main character traits may not actually be the crippling flaws I feared. Being a good chief executive requires you to be a great communicator. This is part of the reason Mangini was seen as such a tyrant within the organization last season: he had many, if not all, of the same responsibilities as Holmgren, but treated his staffers and other wings of the franchise to the same stonewall campaign that he used on the press. Having once worked in an organization driven by this kind of absurd secrecy, I can tell you first-hand that it is a disaster for all involved.
Holmgren seems to understand this notion. He also seems to be in a position where things like openness, honesty, and inclusiveness can be great assets. Do I want him making any more advance comments about what the Browns will or will not do in next year’s draft? Definitely not. But do I want him making sure that, say, the training staff can voice their concerns to him about the adverse impact one of Mangini’s drills is having on the players’ bodies? Absolutely. So with the exception of the former circumstance, I am beginning to feel like this guy and his Great Communicator style could, in fact, be the right choice for the job.
As usual, my opinion on this issue remains liable to shift as new information arrives. But coming from a noted cynic such as myself, I thought it was worthwhile to point out that I can, in fact, see cause for realistic optimism about the Mike Holmgren epoch. But only time will tell if, a few years down the line, it’s viewed by Browns fans in the same way that Reagan’s presidency is viewed by today’s conservatives…rather than by today’s liberals.
