Bill Walsh Diversity Coaching Fellowship sends analytics specialist Elena Griglevich to Cleveland Browns

The Cleveland Browns are visited by six coaches, including Elena Griglevich from Bryant University, part of the the Bill Walsh Diversity Coaching Fellowship

The Cleveland Browns are being visited by six young coaches, including Elena Griglevich, an analytics specialist from Bryant University, for three weeks of the team’s offseason program under the Bill Walsh Diversity Coaching Fellowship, as reported by Andrew Gribble on the Browns website.

The Bill Walsh Diversity Coaching Fellowship is designed to help allow minorities to break into NFL coaching ranks and front offices. It allows for young coaches to visit NFL teams during the pre-season and participate in the training programs.

It allows them to take their knowledge back to their current jobs and apply it.  In some cases, the candidates could be offered a job working for Browns head coach Kevin Stefanski, while others will go on to careers in high school or college.

The six interns are Chris Cook, the tight ends coach at the University of Akron, Angela Baker a women’s professional football player for the past eight seasons with the Pittsburgh Passion; Leonard Hankerson, wide receivers coach at Stephen F. Austin; Ashton Grant, quality control coach at the College of the Holy Cross; Ray Smith, Jr., Southeast Missouri State passing game coordinator, and Elena Grigelevich, a graduate student at Bryant University who has a particularly interesting resume and background in analytics.

She was a founding member the Bryant Think Tank in her time as an undergraduate student. Think Tank, according to the Bryant University web site, is a group of Bryant Data Science and Applied Analytics students who conduct hours of research in search of team tendencies. According to Grigelevich, “I look at the game film of our upcoming opponents and I chart plays by down, quarter, hash, and more to try to figure out what they are most likely to do in a certain situation.”

Grigelevich graduated from Bryant in 2018 with a degree in Finance and Economics. She is nearing completion of an MBA from Bryant.

Tom Brady is a prime beneficiary of this style of analytic information.  If you watch him on the sideline while the defense is on the field, he is usually huddled with a tablet computer, breaking down plays and formations to make real-time adjustments.

That’s the type of thing that will be increasingly used in the future by other quarterbacks and teams. This isn’t to replace the human coach, just to provide some information to help him/her make a decision. Pete Carroll could have used some analytics when it was 2nd and goal at the one-yard line with 26 seconds to go in the Super Bowl — you get the idea.

The coach that can think the most clearly and make the best data-driven decisions will usually have an edge.

No one can say whether Grigelevich will actually get an offer from the Browns, but this is the type of opportunity that should interest Browns management. Lest anyone question whether gender might be a consideration in the hiring process, the Browns have already crossed that bridge with Chief of Staff Callie Brownson, not to mention Dee Haslam, who is increasingly the focal point for management decisions.

However, the Browns are not the only team interested in her.  She has also interned with the Baltimore Ravens.  You know what? It might be much better to hire her for the Browns than let her get corrupted by Baltimore.

It is a very interesting match between Grigelevich and the interests of the Browns front office.  Let’s just see where this goes.