Cleveland Browns working through the head coach hiring process
By Thomas Moore
The Cleveland Browns are taking their time hiring their next head a coach, a process that is causing stress for some people.
The Cleveland Browns are currently in the process of hiring the 16th full-time head coach in franchise history.
Even though they are no strangers to searching for a head coach, this is the third time that the club has gone through a head coaching search since Jimmy Haslam purchased the Browns in 2012, the team’s search committee is taking its time and doing its homework.
During the first week of the search the Browns interviewed the usual suspects, including:
- Cincinnati Bengals offensive coordinator Hue Jackson
- Carolina Panthers defensive coordinator Sean McDermott
- New England defensive coordinator Matt Patricia
- Former Buffalo Bills head coach Doug Marrone
- Detroit Lions defensive coordinator Teryl Austin
- Chicago Bears offensive coordinator Adam Gase
Not a bad list of potential hires. And unlike when former owner Randy Lerner fell all over himself to hire Eric Mangini as head coach, the Browns are not offering the job to the first candidate to flash a little thigh their way, even if one report has the club ready to make a move for Jackson:
Things are about to get interesting. #Browns are set to make a big push to hire Hue Jackson, source said. They'd like to close it out.
— Ian Rapoport (@RapSheet) January 11, 2016
But for some reason, that has gotten some people fired up because it is the second week and the Browns still do not have a head coach!
Let’s take a step back here and look around the league at the other teams that have openings for the head coaching spot.
The Tampa Bay Buccaneers? Still have not hired a coach.
The New York Giants? Still have not hired a coach.
The San Francisco 49ers? Still have not hired a coach.
The Philadelphia Eagles? Still have not hired a coach.
The Tennessee Titans? Still have not hired a coach.
So, unless you believed that Gase, who took the head coaching job with the Miami Dolphins over the weekend, was the one and only person who could solve what continues to ail the Browns, what exactly have the Browns missed out on?
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All the candidates they have expressed interest in, save Gase, are still in play. The Browns don’t need to rush into hiring someone just to check off a box on the off season to-do list; they need to do their work and hire the person they believe is the best fit for the team’s new direction.
If that is tomorrow, great. If it is not until next week, or until after the Super Bowl next month, that’s fine, too. Just because the Browns have not made a hire based on some arbitrary timeline is not a problem. Presumably, the team knows how to get in touch with the candidates they have interviewed, so if it looks like they are going to lose out on someone they like, the Browns can always place a call to see if they can up the offer.
It is so rare that the Browns do anything correctly, so in some ways it is easy to see why people would get worked up about the pace of the coaching search.
But at this point there is no reason to rush and even less reason to stress out about the situation.
So let’s chill out a bit, Browns fans.
After all, there should be plenty of time for agita once the Browns actually do hire someone.