If Paul DePodesta is truly leading the Cleveland Browns coaching search, look for these three coach-front office tandems to be hired.
The offseason keeps chugging along for the Cleveland Browns, as the organization has shocked the football world, parting ways with general manager John Dorsey.
DePodesta’s plan worked to a tee. He won. Dorsey, who had reportedly become irritated by his influence, is gone. The analytics guru will have a major say in who the Browns hire as their next coach.
Recently, it was written here how DePodesta is now “The man.” Some may misinterpreted this as meaning he’s going to pick the players. While that isn’t true, he’s looking to replicate the success of other teams in the division.
When you think of the AFC North, you think of the well-run franchises such as Pittsburgh and Baltimore. Steelers coach Mike Tomlin packs the punch in that organization, but Kevin O”Connell isn’t a slouch either, as he continuously supplies the Super Bowl winning head coach with players we always wish played for the Browns.
the same is true of John Harbaugh, another strong leader who is now working with first-year general manager Eric DeCosta.
DePodesta may not be leaving La Jolla, Calif. to permanently reside in Berea, but his ascension is clear. It’s why ownership offered John Dorsey a lesser role–something he refused to accept.
It’s been Tweeted how DePodesta’s status as the franchise’s chief strategy officer hasn’t changed, but he’s leading the coaching search, as well as the Browns’ “total reorganization process,” according to TheLandonDemand’s Tony Grossi.
With DePodesta leading the search, here’s the three most likely coach-front office tandems the Browns may hire to lead Cleveland in 2020.
1. McDaniels and Ziegler
Grossi had previously reported that Josh McDaniels was probably out of the running because he wouldn’t want to answer to DePodesta.
That said, ownership really likes the Patriots’ offensive coordinator. Will the Browns’ CSO appease his bosses and land their top candidate?
PFN’s Ben Allbright gave the opinion that the McDaniels/ Dave Zeigler combination is in the running for the gig. Zeigler is currently the Bill Belichick’s pro scouting director.
Nick Caserio, who currently works as the Pats’ director of pro personnel, has also had his name floated, although Allbright picked Ziegler.
As for McDaniels, the Pats’ offensive coordinator wasn’t interviewed a season ago when Dorsey was leading the search. This helps you understand why the final two came down to Freddie Kitchens and DePodesta’s guy, Kevin Stefanski.
The Patriots have granted permission to Cleveland, as well as the Giants and the Panthers to interview Belichick’s top offensive lieutenant.
The MMQB’s Albert Breer recently wrote, if the structure is right in Cleveland, “He’ll go.”
With DePodesta running the search, only time will tell if McDaniels agrees with how the Browns’ hierarchy is being restructured. Grossi stuck to his sources, writing about DePodesta’s presence (subscription).
"“They point to new successes being enjoyed by the most recent coaching branches of the Belichick tree. Bill O’Brien in Houston, Mike Vrabel in Tennessee, and Brian Flores in Miami each have a trusted personnel leader but none has an overseer bending the ear of the team’s owner. Thus, each has a much better chance of surviving a bad year – even a very bad one – than Dorsey and Kitchens did.”"
McDaniels’ name has been floated as Browns coach, seemingly forever. With the feeling that the party is ending in New England, McDaniels seems poised to finally leave the nest. If not now, then never.
2. Stefanski and Berry
The marriage of Kevin Stefanski and Andrew Berry was another opinion of PFN’s Ben Allbright, and the union makes sense, considering Paul DePodesta possesses the top voice (of anyone who is not an owner) in the coaching search.
It’s no secret Stefanski was his choice to be named coach last off season, while Berry worked in the front office when the Browns started to heavily lean on analytics with the hiring of Sashi Brown and DePodesta.
Berry, who works for the Eagles, has seen his stock rise as a GM candidate. If DePodesta wanted to advocate for a high who he knows, then this certainly makes a ton of sense.
Throw in Stefanski, whom he lobbied for a season ago, and it becomes obvious.
We’ll never know how Stefanski would’ve performed had he gotten the gig to coach the Browns because he was just as unproven as Kitchens. With that said, he just seems a little more seasoned, and he’s proving it with what he’s doing with the Vikings.
This might be the toughest sell to the fan base, because no season ticket holder has forgotten how analytics delivered a 1-31 mark between 2016-2017. The current roster has a lot more talent than those teams did, so Stefanski and Berry would have to put their offices together and get ready to win.
3. McCarthy and Wolf
Here’s what I’ve been able to gather from the countless words spoken about the Haslams in the last 48 hours. They really like Paul DePodesta. They love his brilliance and the fact that he’s been right and they’ve been wrong the past two searches and only made his stock jump through the roof.
At one point, and it still may be this way, they really held Browns’ assistant GM Eliot Wolf in high regard. Wolf’s still here, and he’d be an ideal candidate to pair with Mike McCarthy, with whom he has a history with dating back to their time in Green Bay.
McCarthy, a Super Bowl winning coach, may be more willing to take a job under DePodesta because the perception is he may be more desperate. While he won in Green Bay, there are some who believe he squandered Aaron Rodgers‘ talent and should’ve won more.
If McCarty replicates what he did in Green Bay with the Browns, he’ll have the next statue on order at FirstEnergy Stadium.
As for Wolf, he seems like the other personnel guys on this list. He’s not someone who is perceived as being power hungry and being a big personality. Like Berry and Ziegler, he’ll let the coach be the figurehead, while he goes out and supplies the player.
McCarthy becomes more and more intriguing by the day because he’s climbed the mountain before. The discipline problems that haunted the Browns constantly throughout the 2019 season should disappear.
Plus, he knows how to work with a quarterback who has an ego. It didn’t end well, but it worked for a long time. He was the coach for 12 years in Green Bay. If he did that hear, he’d be THE elder statesman of Browns football.