Agreed, that’s why I suggested they need a stable HC situation. Firing Jackson was the right move but they need to either commit to Williams or hire someone that will work in the long term.
I think there are plenty of offensive or defensive coordinators that could fill the bill, quite possibly better than Greg Williams. Williams has, as I recall, some baggage. And his resume is very hit and miss, at best.
But ride the hot hand though. And I think Mayfield has proven he can withstand a bizarre, crazy coaching change mid-stream and keep the team together (as a rookie!), as well as continue to be talented.
As much grief as Hue must be getting, his last two drafts were not terrible. Whether or not Hue gets sole or most of the credit for that is unknown though.
Hue had almost nothing to do with this last draft, that was all Dorsey, and not a big role in the previous drafts. His big plan at QB was AJ McCarron.
First, the team has to get to the point where they can then get to 13-3. The coaching skills needed to make a bad team decent are different from the ones needed to make a decent team dominant, and they rarely co-exist in the same person. Same goes for GM skills, btw.
Listen to Hue and you’d think he had nothing to do with any draft. After all, he wanted Wentz, Watson, Mahomes, and every other QB who’d been decent.
According to a sports columnist in the Cleveland Plain Dealer yesterday, fans can expect a 12-4 record and division title next year.
Seems a mite premature.
Playoffs (Playoffs?), OK.
The problem if they stick with Williams and the offense does well, Kitchens is gone after next year. That’s why the strategy seems to be Rookie QB + Offensive HC or Veteran QB + Defensive HC.
Still feel bad about Josh Gordon going to the Patriots? He’s about to be suspended for yet again another drug violation. This time, however, he’s not the Browns’ cancer, he’s the Patriots’.
I get the feeling Bill won’t put up with those shenanigans, and Gordon’s not going to be on the team for long.
Colin Cowherd thinks the Browns should go hard after Jim Harbaugh. I completely disagree. He’d be more of a distraction than Cleveland needs.
Long time, no see Beef! I have to admit that with the Dorsey hiring you guys really have turned it around. Mayfield’s ability to read the defense and audible to smart plays is not a good sign for the rest of us. Damned shame it all comes after Joe Thomas is gone but congrats to you guys. I hope you’re always behind the Steelers of course but glad to see the turnaround.
Yeah, drama seems to follow him everywhere he goes. He’s had success but it might not be worth it.
With the benefit of hindsight, it hasn’t been a bad year in terms of realistic turnarounds. The rookie QB is performing well giving long term hope they can keep building around him. Some of the other young players show promise. The team is still not mathematically eliminated from the playoffs after 14 games. 6-7-1 isn’t great but it is more wins than the last two seasons combined. Even two of the losses were from their 4 overtime games. They’ve kept it relatively close on average - 309 points scored against 348 given up over the season.
IMO that’s a pretty good turnaround. It’s just a longer trip than the bandwagon could expect to travel in a single season.
Correction… Last three seasons combined. Here is their record from 2015-2017:
2015: 3-13-0
2016: 1-15-0
2017: 0-16-0
That’s a combined record of 4-44 over three years. That’s a pretty bad stretch. They weren’t as bad in 2014, when they went 7-9, and they’re only one win away from having a better record than that year. They next get the Bengals at home which you have to think is a winnable game.
Unfortunately for them to officially have a winning season they’d also need to beat the Ravens in Baltimore the final week which is a tall order. But since reforming in 1999, they’ve only had two winning seasons so even a 7-8-1 record would be a really good year for them historically, and something good to build off of next year. They’d also be finishing 3rd in their division with that record, because if they beat the Bengals this week the best record that Cincinnati could have by the end of the year would be 7-9. The last time the Browns finished in 3rd place was 2010.
So this next game is pretty important. I personally will be rooting for the Browns on Sunday because I love seeing a struggling team improve themselves. (At least in the AFC.)
My wife’s family are Cleveland fans. I predicted they would get 6 wins at start of season primarily due to Baker Mayfield (and they had close losses last year). They all laughed at me.
They’re not laughing now.
Well this is a solid beating, which is nice to see. Williams is not my dream coach, but if they win out I can’t see replacing him. I wouldn’t want to risk shaking things up if we can avoid it.
I’m not too worried about him being bad at his first HC job. It was 15(?) years ago, and he’s probably learned a lot since then. There are a decent amount of success stories for HCs their second time around.
Wouldn’t it be the most Browns thing to blow a 23-0 lead and lose.
There was never a serious risk of losing. It was clearly just some garbage time scoring.