If we’ve learned anything about Todd Monken over his first four months as head coach of the Cleveland Browns, it’s that he’s a straight shooter. When asked about the Browns’ defense coming up with interceptions during 7-on-7 OTA periods on Wednesday, Monken called it “embarrassing” that his offense couldn’t execute and protect the football with no pass rush.
His style is a breath of fresh air in Berea for multiple reasons. It’s also why one of the first questions Monken fielded from local reporters this week was about the Browns’ startling 2026 schedule release.
Analysts expected Cleveland to have an easy road this year based on its opponents’ combined win percentage from 2025, but the NFL had other plans. By sending the Browns to Florida in back-to-back weeks, Week 1 at Jacksonville and Week 2 at Tampa Bay, the league managed to put one of its poorest-performing teams from the past two years in a situation that feels doomed from the start.
Fans definitely won’t be surprised by Monken’s reaction, though. When asked about his team’s brutal opening slate — which includes just three home games from Weeks 1 through 9, with one of them coming on a Thursday night — he responded with a simple: “I think it’s awesome.”
Say what now, coach?
“I think having two back-to-back Florida games… if our guys don’t understand what that means when we come to training camp, and it’s hot out, and that’s our opportunity to practice in it and get acclimated in it — I think they already get it. I think they already understand. We went out there yesterday (for Day 1 of OTAs) and we were fine. But they realized that it was only 85. It’s going to be 20 degrees hotter, and it’s going to be right at 1 o’clock like yesterday and we’re going to have to be ready to go.
“I am excited,” he added of the season opener at Jacksonville, a place he knows well after serving as the Jaguars’ wide receivers coach from 2007-10. “Playoff team, in Florida, 100-and-something degrees, middle of the day — and if that doesn’t get you fired up, doesn’t get our guys fired up for the offseason and training camp, I don’t know what will.”
Todd Monken believes the Browns’ ugly opening stretch could actually help them
With all due respect to Monken, the Browns got hosed here. Opening against a 13-win Jaguars team in their house on Sept. 13, only to travel back to Florida to play Baker Mayfield’s veteran-laden Buccaneers team the very next week is about as bad as it gets for a cold-weather team like Cleveland.
But Monken did make a great point, one that ties into the one advantage in Cleveland’s schedule that’s impossible to ignore. It’s best for the Browns to play as many home games after Thanksgiving as possible, and they have four on this year’s slate.
As for the Florida teams, it’s far better for Cleveland to get those out of the way early, fresh off a month-plus of training camp in peak Ohio summer heat. December is where the true home-field advantage lies for warm-weather outdoors teams like Jacksonville, Tampa Bay, and Miami.
You could also argue that it’s more advantageous to be an underdog in Week 1, which tends to be one of the most chaotic weeks on the entire schedule. Even the best NFL teams are still ramping up to full speed in the early going, and that often leads to big favorites going down.
Monken didn’t only coach in Jacksonville for four years, he also spent three years in Tampa Bay, including as offensive coordinator in 2018. He understands the assignment in September. The fact that he can drill that into his players and help get them prepared for what’s coming this summer might quietly work in Cleveland’s favor in a pair of games that no one’s picking them to win.
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