Cleveland Browns: A front office fiasco, just another offseason

The Cleveland Browns general manager search is turning into a clown show. Where have we seen this before?

Another offseason in Cleveland and another botched search for an important role within the Cleveland Browns organization. Smelling like 2013 and 2014 where owner Jimmy Haslam and CEO Joe Banner bungled two coaching searches that led to the unimpressive hires of Rob Chudzinski and Mike Pettine, Haslam is at it again.

The only qualified candidate to interview for this position, George Paton, needed a second interview more for his sake, to decide on whether or not to take the opening and work alongside longtime co-worker Kevin Stefanski. Paton took his name out of consideration for the job, leaving all of us left to wonder, why?

Mary Kay Cabot of Cleveland.com reported this about the situation:

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"Paton headed back home Wednesday night with some reservations about the organizational structure and his role. Although he would’ve had final say over the roster, he was still working through some things when he picked up the phone on Friday afternoon to inform the Browns he was out."

Awesome. Reservations about the organizational structure. Wasn’t the idea of bringing Paton here was so that the organization could align between him and Stefanski?

This is going down a road that we have seen before. Andrew Berry, former Browns executive and current Philadelphia Eagles V.P. of football operation is viewed to be the lead candidate. But why after one interview with him already have we heard nothing about him come from Berea?

Could it be that he has already seen this mess before first hand and is far too smart to come back to it when he already has a great job within a stable organization? That would seem logical, and hence the Browns heading further down this rabbit hole in its general manager search.

My guess would venture to say that after every candidate with a pulse stays far away from this disaster. And that current assistant general manager, Eliot Wolf, would be asked to take a promotion. Would Wolf jump at the chance to earn millions of dollars while building a roster and balancing that with Jimmy Haslam’s version of organizational alignment?

Only he would know the answer to that but it wouldn’t be a shock to see him say no thanks. Leaving this mess to only continue.

Just another offseason for the Browns.