The more I think about Eric Mangini saying he would be included in the hiring of the new General Manager of the Browns, the more puzzling it seems.
Puzzling isn't the right word, actually. Preposterous is the right word. Preposterous. That's it.
Preposterous because somebody is delusional here.
Mangini might be delusional to think even a teeny, tiny bit that he'll be included given what just happened with his hand-picked GM.
Or the Browns are delusional to think that Mangini deserves to be included considering what happened with Kokinis and (more important) considering what is happening on the field.
Or maybe I'm the one who's delusional. Because I keep expecting to hear some semblance of logic from the Browns.
I'm gonna go watch some Bugs Bunny cartoons.
{ 20 comments }
Gee, Tennessee, I think we could be the General Managers of the Browns. We're as smart as the others they've hired.
Chumley, that's absolutely right! We're going to Cleveland this very instant, or my name isn't Tennessee Tuxedo!
Pat Mac,
Until you cough up $800m for the Browns, you're delusional to think anyone cares what you think.
This Mangini nightmare has to end. If Brady Quinn does not start the rest of the season there is something terribly wrong. (well we no that already). It would be nice to know if he can get it and if he is a legit NFL quarterback. DA has shown us enough to know he is definitely not the man.
Mangini should not have a say in anything else the Brown's may want to do. I hope they don't let me have a say in whether he is fired or not.
Go Dawgs….
it's not just what pat thinks. it's what most browns fans with their brainstems attached think.
Yes, Pat, you're delusional. if you're holding a press conference and someone asks if you'll be involved in the hiring, how else can you respond? Say anything but "Sure" and you're a lame duck. (Plus, Mangenius might be delusional enough to think he can save everything with a good second half. Or he might be correct– that he will be consulted.)
Conversely, if you're Randy Lerner– even if intend to fire the coach 10 minutes after Game 16 ends and just want to avoid re-eneacting the last reel of Silver Streak by capping the coach this week– what response makes things better? "That'll be the day"? "You betcha! {WINK}"? The best response is silence.
The question you should be asking is "Why has Lerner damaged the franchise's image even further by letting Manegnius smear George Kokinis"?
I'm not that well-connected, but everyone I talk to says Kokinis is a Boy Scout who offers to pay the waitress for refills on coffee. Even after it became clear that his opinion was not welcome, he stayed quiet–not even complaining to friends on other teams– and continued to work 80+ hour weeks.
There is absolutely no reason this couldn't have been handled the way Dwight Clark's departure was– let the guy walk at the end of the year and pay him off. Especially since Lerner has paid absolutely everyone off (even Butch Davis, who quit on him, and Kellen Winslow, who violated his contract).
Letting Mangenius fire Kokinis in mid-year is bad. To let him say Kokinis doesn't deserve the money because he was fired for cause– and to imply it is so egregious that it can't even be discussed in general terms– is reprehensible.
There is no way Randy Lerner can ever recover from this. What credible candidate would choose to work for an owner who let this happen to a guy with a decent resume and a good reputation?
I would not have hired Kokinis– I don't like guys who've worked for only one team, because you don't whether the good decisions were his or someone else's. But even if you think he's a zero who lived off Ozzie Newsome's reflected glory– and that he was just doing research for his next team on Lerner's dime– there is no excuse for this behavior.
Geoff … I know I'm delusional … But here's what Mangini might say: "You know, I've got my hands full coaching this team, because we really need a win." … Not a strong answer, but better than implying he's included in the decision. To my delusional mind at least.
alan t.'s imposter, I'm guessing that NFL franchises are going to go for more than $800 million these days. And for good reason, given all the TV contracts the league has. Expansion franchises, old franchises, semi-new franchises, doesn't matter. Much more than $800 million. So where's Pat gonna dig up a cool billion, or even more? Is there some cute little rich dude that looks like the unofficial mascot of the old real Browns/Ravens hiding out in a bowl of Lucky Charms somewhere?
By the way, what's the name of that walrus? I can't remember. I remember Snagglepuss, but Snagglepuss was a cute pink bisexual mountain lion. What's the name of that walrus? Oh, and how long before some brainless bastard looking for a quick buck saws off his tusks because morons think if his tusks are ground up and then washed down with a can of Pepsi, they won't need Viagra anymore?
Alan
Are you thinking of Wally Walrus?
Alan, the walrus is named either "Chumley" or "Doug Dieken" (this joke was better when Nev Chandler– who sounded like Tennessee Tuxedo, the first banana in the cartoons– was the play-by-play announcer).
Also, for the record, Chumley is Hanna-Barbara, not Warner Brothers (much less Bugs Bunny) character.
Geoff, did Chandler really sound like Tennessee Tuxedo? When I was entering the very first post in this discussion, I was hearing Tennessee's & Chumley's voice in my head and getting all nostalgic. Geez, Alan, the answer was right there all along. Are you only reading your impostor's posts, these days? I'm kinda wounded, here. Knowledge of cartoon characters, and their voices, seems to be the only thing I can retain in my long term memory. Mom said TV would rot my brain, and like so many things, she was right.
Pat, you and most of the bloggers here are assuming that Mangini is this snake that backstabbed his poor friend George to save his own butt and got the guy fired. Do you have any evidence of this? For all you know, George could have been doing the chick that got fired a few days before on the conference room table or something. Hasn't anyone even considered that maybe, just maybe Kokinis did something that justified his firing, and it had nothing to do with Mangini? Lerner did say in his email that the firing was "unforseen". Doesn't sound like a conspiracy thing to get him out to save Mangini. And by the way, since it is assumed that Mangini was calling all of the shots anyways, why would firing Kokinis help Mangini at all? If anything, it would indicate that Mangini's time is numbered since Lerner would then presumably hire a GM that would make all football decisions and if that person didn't want Mangini around, he would get rid of him. It would have been to Mangini's benefit to have a figurehead GM stay on while he continued to call all of the shots. Just doesn't make sense to me. In my opinion, it's either Kokinis did something deserving of being fired, or he was let go to allow Lerner to get an experienced GM on board that will decide Mangini's fate after the season. Either way, it's highly unlikely that Mangini had anything to do with the firing.
I'm on board with that Tim. It would at least indicate that somebody in that organization is heterosexual.
Tim in Plantation FL, with all due respect, I think it's time for you to take another bong hit. For legal medicinal purposes, of course.
Alan, I know you hate Mangini and so does Pat, but I think you two and many others are thinking with your emotion of hatred and not with your head. Give me one logical reason how the firing of a figurehead GM that hasn't been calling the shots anyways half way through the 1st season at the helm is good for Mangini? Even if the two grew to hate each other and Mangini was ticking Kokinis off since Kokinis had no say about any decisions, what benefit would firing Kokinis have for Mangini? Wouldn't it benefit Mangini more if either 1) Kokinis just gave up and kept showing up just to collect his check and left Mangini alone to run things or 2) got ticked off enough so that he'd quit and Lerner wouldn't have to pay him a dime of the remainder of his contract? If the 2nd thing happened, then Mangini could assume the title of GM/coach officially or put another figurehead GM in there that he would hopefully get along with better. If you really thought this out, it only makes sense that Mangini had nothing to do with this and either Kokinis is guilty of something or that Lerner is going to put a GM in there with power and true authority, which would not be a good sign for Mangini since he'd either 1) stay as coach but would lose his authority over personnel decisions or 2) be fired at the end of the season. If you were Mangini, wouldn't you rather keep the status quo?
Mangini's comments might simply be what he does for his shy buddy Lerner to stay on the big guy's good side. "I'll go out there and field the questions, big guy!" "Thanks! You're the best, Eric!!"
Uh … Tim. It's like any management position in any company. It doesn't have to be the Cleveland Browns. If I were a weasel (I'm not, but for the sake of this post, let's pretend I am) and I was in Mangini's position, I would be doing everything in my power to deflect the blame from myself. I'd badmouth others to Lerner's weasel spy Kosar, I'd badmouth others when I'm having a discussion with Lerner, I'd leak BS to my few media friends.
This is no different than Al Davis who perpetually tries to build cases to fire guys "for cause" so he doesn't have to pay them their contracts. How much do you want to bet that Mangini, like a deluded Dick Nixon, even kept his own little dirty file on his "good friend" Kokinis. You know, just in case.
Seriously, dude, when you get to be as old and fossilized as Pat and me, with prostates the size of Spalding basketballs to prove it (that's me, I can't speak for Pat's prostate), you'll come to realize that the Browns are a company like any other company. It's survival of the fittest. Or, in Mangini's case, survival of the fattest. Common sense says that Mangini made the plan and bought the gun. Whoever actually pulled the trigger, who gives a crap. Irrelevant. This was Mangini's kill. When you're part of a retarded Mafia, which the Browns are, does it really matter who technically whacked whom?
Oh, and one other thing, Tim. The more miserable Lerner makes Mangini, the more likely he'll quit so Lerner doesn't have to pay him the remainder of his contract. It's a Lerner move made out of strategic weakness, but at least it's a move.
I guess Alan, you and Pat may be right, but it still doesn't make sense to me. If Kokinis was actually making final decisions on players, then it would make more sense since Mangini could say "this guy wouldn't let me get the guys I want, so he's the reason why we're off to such a bad start". However, since everyone knows that this wasn't the case and that Mangini's running the show, how does firing Kokinis make Mangini look good? Plus, the timing of this move doesn't make sense if it's really Mangini behind it. A move like this gives vibes that the organization is out of control and that the coach could be next. Not the type of speculation that Mangini would want to bring upon himself. Wouldn't he just want to have things be quiet during the bye week and the rest of the season so he could continue his "process"? Plus, wouldn't the chaos of this firing have an adverse effect on the players? Why would he want that? It would make more sense for Mangini to try and force him out AFTER the season ends, wouldn't it?
Now Lerner being solely behind this, and not Mangini, makes much more sense. Lerner doesn't like what he sees with the bad start and he hates that the fans are getting restless. So, he sends his spies in to try to find dirt on anyone he can so that he can fire with a cause so he doesn't have to pay the rest of the contracts. He can't find anything on Mangini, but just say he thinks he can make the case against Kokinis for some reason. So, he fires Kokinis to shake things up to make room for the experiences football operations guy to take control as GM, and puts Mangini on notice that the new guy's going to come in and determine Mangini's fate.
I admit that I could be wrong and that Mangini could have orchestrated this whole thing, but it just doesn't make sense, especially with the timing of it.
Read the stuff written in today's online Sports Illustrated, Tim. Pretty much echoes what Pat and I have been surmising all along.
And how does firing Kokinis make Mangini look good? It doesn't. But tell me, who literally still has a key to the office in Berea? 'Nuff said. It's not about making himself look good, it's about survival. Say what you want about his football acumen, but when it comes to office politics, Mangini is definitely no idiot.
How's it a head scratcher if Mangini is a snake who just won a power struggle?
Comments on this entry are closed.