Mike Holmgren? Sure. Absolutely.
But does he want to?
Ron Wolf? Great, bring him.
But why would he do the Browns routine again?
Rich McKay?
They didn't hire him last January, so why would he now?
Ernie Accorsi?
If he's willing to leave retirement.
Those are the four names to hit the air and internet waves Sunday, as the Browns rumor mill heated up. Randy Lerner isn't confirming those names on or off the record, because he figures it's counter-productive.
But they're all on the wish list, and they're all legitimate, credible people who would bring an instant sense of reality to the team's front office.
If they can be hired.
And that's my question. Can any of them actually and truly be hired?
The Browns goals have become simple: Make like Miami.
They point to the Dolphins as their latest model (a few years ago it was New England and Philadelphia, but these things change). The Dolphins hired Bill Parcells to run the football side, he hired a GM and they together hired a coach … well … Parcells suggested a coach and Ireland … agreed.
So would it be in Cleveland — the idea being to hire a credible, respected voice and football guy taking over the football end. He would hire a GM and both of them would decide on the coach. (Hint: It's probably not going to be Eric Mangini, who appears to be Fired Man Coaching for the rest of the season.)
Holmgren might be the one guy who could be convinced to take over. He's as good a name and as good a guy as there is available right now.
But … the Browns would be putting him in a role he's never filled. In 1999, Seattle hired him away from Green Bay to be coach and GM. A few years later, Seattle took the GM duties away.
There are other questions. Holmgren might prefer to coach as opposed to take over in the front office. It also might behoove him to wait until after the season to weigh his opportunities. Let's be honest — at this point the Browns job is not the most attractive in the league.
But if he did want it … hey … it's a great idea.
Holmgren could be an outstanding football leader. He's credible, smart, football-wise, experienced and he communicates incredibly well (being able to communicate with fans and media has suddenly taken on high priority in Berea, perhaps because there's nobody there willing or able to communicate). He'd represent the team, the city, the owner extremely well.
Put Holmgren in a position like the one Parcells occupies in Miami and let him hire a GM and coach (remember Jon Gruden once worked on Holmgren's staff in Green Bay) and the Browns could have something.
There's a little trepidation given what happened in Seattle, but that would be tempered by the fact that Holmgren would be in charge and not doing two jobs.
It also would take us full circle. It was back in 1998 that Carmen Policy joked about hiring someone like Holmgren at a Cleveland City Club Forum, which led to Policy being fined for tampering.
Now there's no worry about tampering, because Holmgren is part of a Hall of Fame free agent coaching class that includes him, Gruden, Bill Cowher and Mike Shanahan.
The others in the rumor mill? They seem like longer shots.
Wolf was with the Browns once, but left in a hurry when Butch Davis basically treated him like a second-year scout.
Wolf would be outstanding, but he like Accorsi seems blissfully happy in retirement, and not likely to move out of that comfortable zone.
McKay? He couldn’t distance himself from the Browns fast enough after last January once it was evident they were hiring Eric Mangini as coach. Would he come now? Not if he had to swallow Mangini.
If he could truly take over and hire his own GM and coach, bring him in. They don't come much better than Rich McKay — or Holmgren for that matter.
Look at it this way, too: Wouldn’t we all feel a whole lot better looking to the next few years if someone like Holmgren or McKay were guiding the ship?
So perhaps Randy Lerner can salvage something from the mess of the past week.
The one thing that can't be ignored is that Lerner is liked by folks in the NFL. Because of that, they will pay more attention to helping him — provided they get the millions in the contract that they want.
Lerner may make mistakes, but he just might have enough goodwill to pull something off. It'd be 10 months too late in that he could have done something like this in January, but in this case 10 months too late would be better than never.
You just wonder if he can really and truly make everything come together to make it happen.
Because at this point when it comes to the Browns, we should all be living in Missouri.
As in they need to show us they can do what's needed.
It is amazing to think what a sensible hire would do for public perception. Last week we were (and may still be) a franchise spiralling out of control. Lerner was making Al Davis look competent. Now with a hire of one of the aformentioned individuals – we have direction. And possibly hope.
Ed, we would only have "hope" if the new, credible voice (seems funny to say that…and certainly screams that Randy realizes he did NOT hire a credible person in Eric Mangini!) has the sense to immediately send the surly, disliked, ineffective, egotistical Mangini on a one-way ticket to Newark.
MIAMI HAS DONE NOTHING SINCE PARCELLS TOOK OVER
A crappy gimmick offensive set because no QB or WR.
A burnout pothead feature back.
A defense that is near last in the league in points allowed.
Superbill hasn't been relevant since… since… I can't remember when.
Pat, I have read multiple times that "the Browns job is not the most attractive in the league." Is your reasoning for this that the Browns are horrible and have very little talent? That's reasonable, but I could argue that it's an extremely attractive job. Here's why:
- An owner with tons of money who can overcome his mistakes and is more than willing to spend it.
- An owner who wants no public voice or credit in the team's decisions. He desperately wants to be in his box and watch the games, not be in front of the cameras.
- As has been said here a few times, an owner that is fairly well respected in the league.
- A storied team who is on the down and out.
- An amazingly resilient fan base who will show up even when the team is this bad.
We've got an owner that wants to win and a team that can't get worse. If I'm a coach or GM, I'm looking at this situation as a dream job! I get all the credit if the team turns around and none of the blame if I can't make it better. Oh, and success is defined by a +.500 season and a playoff appearance. If I can win the Super Bowl with the Browns, I'll be treated as a deity.
This is a chance to mold a team in a GM's or coach's image, build it from the ground up and put the pieces in place for a championship team. After this season, the expectation will be that the team lose close games rather than being blown out. That makes for a pretty easy step forward.
Compare that to becoming coach of the Steelers or Patriots or Cowboys. Heck, playoffs are no big deal. In fact, if you don't take your team to the Super Bowl every year and win it, you're considered a failure. And being compared to Landry, Johnson, Cowher and Belichik? Ugh. Just what I want. It's almost a no-win situation. Just ask Wade Phillips.
alan t.'s imposter, that's just plain dumb. Whoever heard of going from 1-15 to 11-5 in one season? Miami didn't acquire Larry Bird, Tim Duncan or LeBron James. I don't know if it was because of Parcells or because of steroids in oranges or because Oprah's Book of the Month just gave good vibes. But to proclaim Miami hasn't done anything since Parcells took over is beyond absurd.
And not that it matters at all, but that "burnout pothead feature back" is neither Miami's feature back nor a bad player. It's not a leap of faith to say that Ricky Williams would be, by far, the best player on the Browns' roster now, bar none. The guy makes the fans' ridiculously overrated sweetheart Josh Cribbs look like Josh Brolin.
This isn't about Parcells or even the right qualifications for the job, because giving Holmgren a high management football position and then saying he's the right man is just silly. It's about public perception and pandering to the media. Ed is absolutely right. Right now it's not a reach to say Lerner could hire that alien Alf, hold a press conference saying Mangini is now Alf's bitch and both are now under the direct mentorship and stewardship of Ernie Accorsi, and 100% of the media would approve. Even Marla Ridenour would wake up from her Rip Van Winkle stupor for this. The first round of drinks are on Bernie!
Yeah, I know Alf likes to eat cats, and technically a female cat is not a bitch. Sue me.
yeah, there's certainly a valid argument against hiring holmgren for a front office position. but i'm pretty sure i don't want the guy with low standards that elia freedman is talking about. plus .500 may be good for the dummies in the dawg pound but i'd rather have a coach/g.m./whoever who wants to be held to the standard of super bowl champions.
The solution to this disaster is to hire someone who failed as a GM-coach and has never worked in a purely administrative position?
Yeah, right.
All of the Jets brought in who couldn't even manage to be an upgrade over the Browns of last year they replaced, getting rid of playmakers because Mangini doesn't like players with egos to match their talents, the play of both quarterbacks this year as opposed to last year (when the Browns stunk and the coach and GM were fired), and a draft strategy of trading down to make sure the Browns don't get anyone who might have an ego to match their talent — all mean to me that anyone with real and actually established skill level for evaluating players and making roster moves is absolutely necessary for the Browns before the next draft at the very latest. Holmgren would do quite nicely!
If we could get him now, there might be moves that can be forced on Mangini — such as who plays or some modification in offensive strategy.
And to those who criticize Parcells because the Dolphins don't average 11-5 every year since he came, I would suggest that a dip like Henne was against Ohio State year after year isn't quite how he's playing as a pro and somebody had to project that … or consider Hartline with Miami versus Robiskie with the Browns.
Truly, someone who has years of experience (and a couple of Super Bowl appearances) evaluating the roster and coaches of the Browns going forward would be the absolute best we fans can expect of the owner!
McKay over Holmgren, easy call.
He drafted Sapp, Brooks, Lynch, Dunn, and Alstott in Tampa, laying the ground work for Gruden to win the Superbowl.
McKay and Gruden, One
Holmgren and Mooch, Two
Talk about having wasted an entire year! We are right back to where we were a year ago. Looking for a GM and Coach and it shows how much the Owner knows about owning a pro football team……NOTHING! Holmgren, Shanahan, Gruden are all credible choices. The question is, can you get any of them? The other problem is, why are we trying to mimick everyone else? We need someone who knows what they are doing and has a history of success in building a team and instituting a successful system. The three names above have done it more than once.
I know what I do not know, which is more than I can say for the rest of you. Would Holmgren be a good choice? I don't know. He's never had even a sliver of success running a front office, so that's not good. Ditto for Shanahan, who took Denver down the tubes once he got full control. So, the idea of hiring another guy to have full control as coach/GM seems insane to me. Especially if that guy is a guy who has already failed as a coach/GM.
Cower is about the only no-brainer out there. He worked with several front office incarnations in Pitt, and he was successful with all of them. He also seemed to have full control during his last contract, and he went to two Super Bowls during that time. So, if we want to turn the keys over to Cower (who I don't think would ever come here), fine. But other than that . . .
But comparing Holmgren to Parcells is crazy. Parcells had run the last two organizations he was in before he took over Miami, and even then he knew enough to know he couldn't be both president and coach. Holmgren has run one organization, and he failed miserably at it. Only after he lost GM power did his team begin to succeed, and even then they only succeeded short term.
I just don't know, and neither do any of you. But there are people out there who do know, and I only hope Randy consults AND listens to those people when making his next hire. He's never done it before, so I'm not sure he will now, but I hope he does. But if anyone thinks it's a good idea to just hire Holmgren or Shanahan or Gruden and turn everything over to them, that's really not much different than hiring Mangini and turning everything over to him.
Personally, however, I don't think Mangini is going anywhere. I think Lerner is delusional, and if the Browns can pick off three wins in the second half (a real possibility given the schedule), then he's coming back next season. Because the only thing I believe strongly is that Lerner does not want to have to fire Mangini. He still hopes it can work out, and he's going to use whatever glimmer of hope he can find to keep EM around.
Randy Lerner is off his rocker, people. That's the only thing we really know for certain. Anyone hoping he will suddenly make a rational decision is simply banging away against Einstein's definition of insanity.
Real Alan,
Who is to say that the following wasn't true:
1. Miami took advantage of a weak schedule in 08.
2. Miami wasn't as bad off as you would expect a 1-15 team to be (lost some close games).
http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/teams/schedule?team=mia&year=2007
They are 2-5 against non-Braylon teams in 2009. This is after Parcells has had a couple years to build. There's no major injuries (Pennington, c'mon, don't bring him up- he IS an injury). So what's up, where is the almighty Bill Parcels this year?
Here's my point… I'm beginning to think that people over-rate team management. They throw out all kinds of money & for what? All the 'great' coaches have had down years. Some more than others. As great as Parcells was, he only won a little over half of his games (.569).
Holmgren was .670 in Green Bay but only .541 when he was in Seattle with full control. He's better than what we have (which is nothing). He's certainly better than that bobble head doll that was GM last week (always nodding yes to Mangini). However, I'd be surprised if anyone comes in here and has success. Nobody in this town wants to wait it out and everyone second guesses everything.
McKay sucks. Sam Wyche ran the draft when the Bucs landed Lynch, Sapp, Brooks, etc. McKay put the team in a terrible hole, stabbed folks in the back and then went to Atlanta where he signed Vick to a gargantuan contract even as dog fighting rumors circulated and then signed Petrino who lasted about five games. He's been shamefully demoted, though his backstabbing ways keeps him popular among reporters.
Who cares, you should spend some time covering a winner, the number one soccer team in the country, the Akron Zips
The Beacon's coverage of Akron Zips Soccer is disgusting; you should be ashamed.
yes, all 15 people who care about zips soccer must be real upset.
15? Stop exaggerating.
Joe, check out the soccer coverage on the zips blog – http://www.ohiomm.com/blogs/zips/category/mens-soccer/