I don't care if the Browns make blunders. Hey, the Red Sox traded Babe Ruth.
I do care if the Browns' ownership can not learn from past mistakes.
 |
| Joe Banner came up with the idea of tanking to get draft position. He was eventually let go despite being one of the best executives the Browns have ever had. |
One time the Browns had an absolutely brilliant guy in the Front Office. He wasn't officially the GM, and wasn't really a football guy, but had tremendous business skill, and eventually exerted great influence on player acquisition. He devised a scheme whereby the team would shift resources to future years, let go the veterans, and collect high round draft picks and eventually win the Super Bowl. However, he could not get along with the Head Coach because his methods were too extreme. Basically they could not stomach weakening the team on purpose. So they fired the guy, and replaced him with a highly regarded personnel guy who had been with the Kansas City Chiefs.
Does that sound familiar? However, I'm not talking about Sashi Brown, but Joe Banner. Like many fans, I was livid when the Browns traded Trent Richardson during the 2013 season for a first round draft pick. The whole point of football is to do everything in your power to put the best team on the field that you can, and then try to win. It's not football when you deliberately take away a player who can help the team win, and don't replace him with anyone.
Joe was probably right that the way you build a team is to cut veterans who do not figure to be contributing three years in the future. You're better off if you don't overspend on temporary fixes, and if it costs you some games, you'll make up for it in the next draft because you're getting better players.
You let some of the veterans leave via Free Agency so that the team can pick up compensatory draft picks. You trade this year's seventh round pick for next year's sixth round pick, and that sort of thing. You increase the level of talent on the future team.
To some degree, the Browns did that in 2013 by signing Willis McGahee to fill Richardson's role, but the perception was that they were giving up on the season. Players don't like playing for an organization that is not committed to winning, and agents won't steer their players to a team like that in Free Agency.
The 2014 draft was positioned to be one of the deepest in history because underclassmen were being permitted to enter the draft. Hence Banner had accumulated several extra picks and figured to bolster the Browns with several good players. But what happened was that they promoted ex-Chiefs front office man Ray Farmer to GM, replacing Banner. Farmer managed to squander draft picks, trading up to get players like Justin Gilbert Johnny Manziel and Pierre Desir. Though they entered the draft with ten picks, they came away with only six, and the top two players had lifestyles that were incompatible the NFL. Whiff! Whiff! Farmer did better with Christian Kirksey and Joel Bitonio, but the damage was done.
This same pattern has repeated itself. When Jimmy Haslam III hired Sashi Brown, I hoped that Brown would implement Banner's basic draft strategy, minus some of the more draconian moves. Instead, Brown was even more destructive to the roster, purging current year payroll as much as possible while cutting or failing to re-sign an incredible number of valuable players: Joe Haden, Alex Mack, Mitchell Schwartz, Gary Barnidge, Paul Kruger, Karlos Dansby, DeMario Davis, Josh McCown, Travis Benjamin, Tashaun Gipson, Starter Craig Robertson, Taylor Gabriel, Jordan Poyer, Johnson Bademosi, Terrelle Pryor, Barkevious Mingo, Tramon Williams. These moves allowed the Browns to pare down payroll such that active salaries are an amazing 57 million dollars under the nominal 2017 cap of $167 Million. As a consequence, the 2018 Browns figure to have the first overall pick plus a Top 5 pick via Houston. But the Browns won only one game in 2016 and are currently 0-14. Attendance has fallen off dramatically, sponsors are jumping ship, ratings are down, and generally Sashi Brown's tenure has been a disaster. So once again, Mr. Haslam has fired the effective GM, and hired a personnel guy from Kansas City in John Dorsey.
I can't believe the Browns made the exact same mistake with Sashi Brown that they made with Joe Banner. That shows a lack of growth and a failure to learn from past mistakes. So, my question is whether anything has improved by hiring John Dorsey, or will the results be the same as with Ray Farmer?
Joe was probably right that the way you build a team is to cut veterans who do not figure to be contributing three years in the future. You're better off if you don't overspend on temporary fixes, and if it costs you some games, you'll make up for it in the next draft because you're getting better players.
You let some of the veterans leave via Free Agency so that the team can pick up compensatory draft picks. You trade this year's seventh round pick for next year's sixth round pick, and that sort of thing. You increase the level of talent on the future team.
To some degree, the Browns did that in 2013 by signing Willis McGahee to fill Richardson's role, but the perception was that they were giving up on the season. Players don't like playing for an organization that is not committed to winning, and agents won't steer their players to a team like that in Free Agency.
The 2014 draft was positioned to be one of the deepest in history because underclassmen were being permitted to enter the draft. Hence Banner had accumulated several extra picks and figured to bolster the Browns with several good players. But what happened was that they promoted ex-Chiefs front office man Ray Farmer to GM, replacing Banner. Farmer managed to squander draft picks, trading up to get players like Justin Gilbert Johnny Manziel and Pierre Desir. Though they entered the draft with ten picks, they came away with only six, and the top two players had lifestyles that were incompatible the NFL. Whiff! Whiff! Farmer did better with Christian Kirksey and Joel Bitonio, but the damage was done.
This same pattern has repeated itself. When Jimmy Haslam III hired Sashi Brown, I hoped that Brown would implement Banner's basic draft strategy, minus some of the more draconian moves. Instead, Brown was even more destructive to the roster, purging current year payroll as much as possible while cutting or failing to re-sign an incredible number of valuable players: Joe Haden, Alex Mack, Mitchell Schwartz, Gary Barnidge, Paul Kruger, Karlos Dansby, DeMario Davis, Josh McCown, Travis Benjamin, Tashaun Gipson, Starter Craig Robertson, Taylor Gabriel, Jordan Poyer, Johnson Bademosi, Terrelle Pryor, Barkevious Mingo, Tramon Williams. These moves allowed the Browns to pare down payroll such that active salaries are an amazing 57 million dollars under the nominal 2017 cap of $167 Million. As a consequence, the 2018 Browns figure to have the first overall pick plus a Top 5 pick via Houston. But the Browns won only one game in 2016 and are currently 0-14. Attendance has fallen off dramatically, sponsors are jumping ship, ratings are down, and generally Sashi Brown's tenure has been a disaster. So once again, Mr. Haslam has fired the effective GM, and hired a personnel guy from Kansas City in John Dorsey.
I can't believe the Browns made the exact same mistake with Sashi Brown that they made with Joe Banner. That shows a lack of growth and a failure to learn from past mistakes. So, my question is whether anything has improved by hiring John Dorsey, or will the results be the same as with Ray Farmer?
No comments:
Post a Comment