There was no need to poll the audience this season. Fans of the Cleveland Browns were done with head coach Kevin Stefanski, and ownership clearly got the message on Black Monday.
Stefanski doesn’t deserve to be dragged for how things ended in Cleveland. In fact, he helped drag an injury-riddled roster to a pair of AFC North wins to close out his tenure. But he definitely played a role in riling up the Dawg Pound faithful, with some brutal in-game decisions over the season’s second half all but sealing his fate.
Browns fans were happy to shift their focus to Cleveland’s 2026 head coach search, which could heat up next week if the team interviews top league-wide candidates like John Harbaugh, Jesse Minter, and Mike McDaniel. It’s also impossible to ignore the storyline running parallel to the Browns’ search, and that’s Stefanski, who’s looking to get right back on the horse and has quickly generated substantial interest.
Stefanski reportedly had a good interview with the New York Giants on Wednesday. He’s expected to speak with the Raiders, Titans, and Falcons as well.
Oh, and in a hilarious twist for Browns fans — he just interviewed with Cleveland’s bitter rival, the Baltimore Ravens, on Friday as a potential replacement for John Harbaugh, a switch absolutely no fan saw coming at the beginning of this week.
Browns fans can only laugh as Kevin Stefanski pops up in Ravens’ HC search
In today’s world, with the news of this year’s NFL hiring cycle being broken and discussed on social media, the Stefanski-Ravens interview story is made for a meme.
On Cleveland’s side, fans can only laugh and drop a sarcastic line like, “You can have him,” while Baltimore’s side has fans scratching their heads over why their team would show interest in a coach the Ravens owned over the past six years. Harbaugh’s team’s went 8-4 head-to-head against Stefanski, and 28-8 overall against the Browns over Harbaugh's 18-year tenure.
This may be little beyond a leave-no-stone-unturned approach for the Ravens, who will need to pair their next coach with franchise quarterback Lamar Jackson. Stefanski's a good coach who's twice won AP Coach of the Year, but the Browns starting 13 different QBs over his six-year tenure, and his failure to make it work with both Baker Mayfield and Deshaun Watson, definitely led to his ousting this year.
Stefanski might be better off leaving the AFC North and pursuing a job like the Titans, as Cam Ward was a quarterback he reportedly liked during the 2025 pre-draft process. Even if Friday’s interview went well, he’s still a major long-shot to win the Ravens job over a candidate like Jesse Minter, who was a defensive assistant in Baltimore from 2017 to 2020.
Adding to the fun? Friday’s news adds a little smoke to a potential Stefanski-Harbaugh swap this offseason. That dream may already be dead on the Harbaugh side, unfortunately, but Browns fans will continue to monitor Stefanski’s journey, with their former coach landing with the hated Ravens now a hilarious possibility.