Jim Schwartz promising accountability among the Cleveland Browns is largely a hollow gesture

Jim Schwartz is following in Andrew Berry’s footsteps by claiming he’ll hold players accountable.

Accountability, it’s a term that fans have heard over and over for the past few years. A term that fans have heard so often that no one actually believes it when they hear it. We heard Andrew Berry tell the world that he wanted guys who were “tough, smart, and accountable”. Well, the team employed Jadeveon Clowney, and Odell Beckham Jr. and currently employs the disgraced Deshaun Watson. Now we’re hearing it from Jim Schwartz.

Accountable and smart really isn’t something to expect from this front office. Berry burned that good well. He burned it when he brought in someone Ronnie Harrison, who was a perpetual headache. He burned it when he signed Malik McDowell, a player with a laundry list of obvious issues, and he burned it when he gave huge contracts to guys who have shown to be issued on and off the field at various points in their careers.

Then there’s the Myles Garrett of it all, whose wreckless off-and-on-field behavior is starting to overshadow everything else about him.

So you’ll have to excuse us if we don’t take Jim Schwartz seriously when he talks about holding players accountable. Speaking to the Cleveland media this past week, he said that the “secret sauce” for a good defense is getting everyone to play together, and holding one another accountable. A tall task.

"The secret sauce is getting guys playing together and that accountability that goes into it. I would say this, if I’m doing a good job, we’ll hold our best players the most accountable. And if you start from that position, then everything else is gravy."

The Cleveland Browns have not been a model of accountability since Andrew Berry took over

There’s been a few reasons to not believe a Browns’ higher-up when they talk about holding players accountable. Firstly, Clowney and Garrett were the pinnacles of unaccountability. Clowney refused to play 2/3 of his defensive reps at one point this year, and all that was done to punish him was that he missed out on one series the next game.

Garrett not only has shown a pattern of irresponsible and dangerous behavior off the field but has now also gotten into it with coaches and players through the media. Never mind his series of reckless driving incidents that culminated in a car accident this past summer that nearly killed himself and another, that’s bad enough, but now he’s getting into the habit of becoming a distraction by throwing coaches and players under the bus. How is he punished for a season full of distractions and nonsense? One missed series.

Garrett isn’t the lone issue, we didn’t talk about Denzel Ward’s public tiff with Grant Delpit, a tiff that Ward was not seemingly disciplined for. Then of course you have Ronnie Harrison, the same guy who tried to fight an opposing team’s coach once.

There’s the Watson of it all, Jarvis Landry and Beckham acting like upset children when they didn’t get the ball, Kevin Stefanski treating a sport like it’s the CIA and giving fans no real answers to the litany of growing questions and an ownership duo that threw their own daughters under the bus when they were asked why they brought in a man who was lacking the moral convictions you want in a leader.

This is a team that has not had anyone hold anyone accountable for years.

So you’ll excuse me if I laugh at Schwartz talking about holding anyone accountable. It’s just not going to happen with this current squad as is.