Mike Polk on the Browns’ search for a head coach

by Cleveland Frowns on January 10, 2013

Make sure to read the Craigslist ad at the 1:43 mark.

You guys are in charge again today (with special assignments to Bryan (professional retweeter tracker) and Chris and Jeff (parallel universe escape hatch monitors)). Column tomorrow for sure, NFL playoff picks this weekend (remember, Cheddar Bay picks and essays due to the Executive Committee by 4:30 PM tomorrow) and concordia salus as always in the meantime.

  • http://www.redright88.com/ Tom_RedRight88

    Came across this at UniWatch this morning; thought some would be interested: The Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian will present a symposium and community conversation on “Racist Stereotypes and Cultural Appropriation in American Sports,” on Feb. 7.

    The full release (with a familiar picture) is here: http://newsdesk.si.edu/releases/native-american-mascot-controversy-takes-center-stage-national-museum-american-indian

    • mo_by_dick

      FIELD TRIP

    • http://www.clevelandfrowns.com/ Cleveland Frowns

      Let the record show that the image in the promotional copy for this exhibit is actually the same Aaron Sechrist (aka Pants, aka @okpants) image that was created for Scene for the Wahoo cover story. WE IN THE SMITHSONIAN, B.

      That is all.

  • maxfnmloans

    Wooden crosses and bolo ties. That craigslist ad was out-freaking-standing.

  • ChuckKoz

    1) that is really funny.

    2) haven’t been around the discussion much, but curious if there has been any talks of Tressel. I know its not going to happen, but seems like it should. I especially thought that when reading the craigslist ad, which makes reference to how you have to fake to like the city and its citizens. with Tressel it would be genuine. and there is no reason to think he is less competent than any name we hear mentioned.

    and there is this, which got me excited: http://www.clevelandleader.com/node/19787

    • http://twitter.com/cpmack Chris Mc

      I still really like Tressel, and I don’t want any reason to hate the guy. That is my biggest hangup with having him coach the Browns.

      • BIKI024

        i’ve got it on good source that he just doesn’t want to coach, loves his current job, otherwise of course his hat would already be in the ring.

  • dinger

    Question: does Mangini have anymore years left on his Browns contract?

    • etc

      No sir. He signed a 4 year contract in 2009, this was his last year.

      It does make me wonder if he’ll be more likely to coach again.

      • dinger

        That was my thought as well. If he no longer receives a salary from the Browns and he’s eager to get back into coaching (not a given necessarily) then it begs the question, why is his name not being mentioned as a head coach for any of the opportunities available ?

  • http://twitter.com/JRichTCF Jeff Rich

    When I watched the Jimmy video last night, I ended up jumping over to some other Polk videos, and noticed in this one that Polk has replaced his Pontbriand jersey from the epic #FactoryOfSadness with a Christian Yount jersey. To Polk’s credit, he didn’t do the Tim Couch Masking Tape thing with the old long-snapper jersey; he went out and got the current edition.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZDpiGQf_CuM&feature=player_embedded#t=30s

    This reboot has hit me so hard that I stopped noticing things like, “he’s wearing Clay Matthews number.” I supposed it’s because it doesn’t matter and I don’t care, considering they tried to sneak Bernie’s 19 on to Richard Alston’s chest and back on year, but the further time takes away from 1995, the less it matters. Thanks Butch, thanks Phil, thanks Uncle Mike, and thank you Mr. Haslam for making sure that everything since (note: not re-signing beloved kicker from cited Craig’s List ad) won’t be worth sharing with my children and grandchildren after them.

    Soon, all I’ll have to take me back are dinners at Bubba Baker’s hard-to-find joint in Avon and maybe I’ll aimlessly browse the Clay Matthews lot in Euclid for a nice clean Pontiac, if it’s still there. Yeah, that would be nice.

    • Stephen Chema

      And the last Pontiac made rolled off the line 2009, so that dream is fading fast too.

  • https://twitter.com/jimkanicki jimkanicki

    seem to be having some dropbox problems over here.. while i troubleshoot this, here are the lines for this week’s cheddar:

    ravens +10 at broncos;
    packers +3 at niners;
    seahawks +2.5 at falcons;
    texans +9.5 at pats.

  • nj0

    To pick up something from yesterday’s comments, here is what Joe Posnanski (who has been very good at reading the tea leaves of the BBWAA’s Hall of Fame vote) had to say in a live chat about Thome making the Hall:

    “I’ve been shocked at the low level of support people have for Thome. Absolutely shocked.”

    #curseofwahoo

    • https://twitter.com/jimkanicki jimkanicki

      thome appears nine times on the single season strikeout leader list.
      thome is #2 all-time in strikeouts.
      belle and ramirez much better hitters, much more clutch, much more ignored.

      dont get the thome love. never have.

      • nj0

        The cynic in me wants to say it’s because he is a white, agreeable farm boy. Belle and Ramirez were minorities who dared to not be bland.

        • NeedsFoodBadly

          Belle actually did bad shit. People can be critical of him without pulling the race card.

    • Steve

      Ladies and gentlemen, these are your hall voters! They’re going to punish guys like McGwire and Bonds because they broke the records with yet-to-be-banned drugs. Then they’re going to punish guys like Bagwell and Thome because they didn’t reach the newly set McGwire/Bonds for power hitters. Brilliant!

      And Kanicki – Despite the strikeouts, Thome has a career OBP over .400. The strikeouts mean nothing when a guy is getting on base that often and hitting the ball that hard.

      Belle may have been a better hitter in his prime, but he was done by 33. Thome proceeded to hit 231 homers from his age 33 season on. If we’re electing guys based on just their prime, Grady Sizemore should retire today and get enshrined on the first ballot.

      I’ll give you that Ramirez was a better hitter, but I’m not sure how that says anything negative at all about Thome.

      • nj0

        What gets me is how arbitrary their decisions seem to be.

        Not to overdose people on Posnanski, but this is one of my favorite pieces about the insane level of the bar as set by the BBWAA – http://joeposnanski.blogspot.com/2011/01/willie-mays-hall-of-fame.html

        • Steve

          Absolutely agree with this and the Poz link

        • https://twitter.com/jimkanicki jimkanicki

          that was close.

          was about to take the alternative view on this, then realized i dont give a crap.

          we’re staring down the barrel of eight months of commenting on crap we don’t care about. i’m saving my bullets.

          • nj0

            Good call. If you were in a high things-to-care-about environment like April or September you could waste those bullets.

            Me, I try not to think about how little I give a crap about like 95% of the things in my life. Pretending like I care makes my time go by much more smoothly.

          • Steve

            Is it that bad to present a disagreeing viewpoint? People here can be reasonable enough to have an adult discussion.

          • https://twitter.com/jimkanicki jimkanicki

            lol, i know.

            but seriously, i stopped myself while constructing a whole ‘why strikeouts matter even vis-a-vis high OBP’ , took stock, and really couldnt muster the enthusiasm.

          • Steve

            But you’re going to stick with your original opinion and not try to get smarter about this? I get that you don’t care that much, but then why post about it in the first place? I find it pretty frustrating when people pop in, give their opinion, and then say they can’t be bothered to flesh out the argument.

            This really isn’t directed at you, but at the writers, which is exactly what they’re doing. They act like they are the gatekeepers, but when they get challenged even the slightest they go “it’s just my opinion, everyone is entitled to one, there’s nothing else to do, oh well”

          • https://twitter.com/jimkanicki jimkanicki

            [see what i did there? nothing. you get NOTHING on this.]

          • Steve

            Well at least you feel proud of yourself. Because that’s worth a lot.

          • SteamingPileOfCraphonsoThorpe

            Very good, because I don’t think I could muster the enthusiasm to read such a screed. Not in January, anyway.

          • http://www.clevelandfrowns.com/ Cleveland Frowns

            Comment of the Year nominee for Kanick.

        • bupalos

          I don’t know why they shouldn’t be arbitrary. It’s a hall of FAME, not a hall of greatness. So some banjo hitting Felix Fermin clone 3rd baseman that managed to hang on with the Yankees for the right 8 years (and managed not to be hispanic) is in like Flynn while much better players go begging.

  • Bryan

    It was a slow day at work yesterday, Frowns. MKC’s tweets had me especially enraged. Knew I could find support here in the comment section ;)

    Love Polk. But I do think the fanbase’s reaction to this search says more about us than Has-Ban. Has-Ban have not done ANYTHING different than 7 of the other 8 teams looking for a coach. Yet people are enraged. We need some patience here.

    Of course, if they deliver Lombardi and a shitty coach, I will be the first to go nuts. But let’s see how this shakes out.

    • bupalos

      >>> But I do think the fanbase’s reaction to this search says more about us than Has-Ban.>>>

      Exactly.

  • bupalos

    I must just be too “cleveland plus”ish to find Polk funny. It would be one thing to make fun of a fanbase that generates some kind of market for vehicles of self-loathing/outsider-ridicule like this. It’s another thing to just embody and further that impulse. There’s been very little wrong with the search to this point, and Trestman would be so preferable to Gruden it’s hard to enjoy the joke except as a joke on itself.

    I know, I know, reason #916 for hating Cleveland, because Cleveland Plus types have no sense of humor. It just seems to me you have to be a little bit right to be funny. I’ll take the Lombardi part but that’s about it. Cleveland fans are actually pretty slow to hate. Witness Shurmur.

    • Bryan

      Well said Bup. I actually like some of Polk’s stuff. But this fell flat to me because it just didn’t make sense. We are 10 days into a coaching search in which 8 teams are also looking for coaches, and only 1 of those teams has found a coach. Parodying Haslam for not finding a coach yet makes no sense.

      The only thing that is “parody-able” so far is the failed dinner with Chip Kelly. If Polk did a skit of Has-Ban sitting in a fancy restaurant in Arizona, checking their phones, their watches, and sending increasingly desperate texts to Chip… now that would be funny.

      • humboldt

        I don’t know, I detect a powerful undercurrent of hubris in the Kelly experience and general coaching search, and think Polk is channeling that a bit. Certainly not his best work, but better than some are giving it credit for

        • bupalos

          Haslam is as close to a natural enemy as genus Bupalos has, but where is the hubris in asking someone if you can pay them tens of millions to to captain your 1BB dream ship, and hanging around a godforsaken desert for 3 days waiting for the answer?

          I think where there might be a disconnect here is that a good part of this self-loathing fan-base actually believes that the owner should act like it’s impossibly hard to get someone worthwhile to say yes to scads of dough because Cleveland is so Cleveland. I admit it’s somewhat harder to be a big flaming douchebag in Cleveland than some other places, But it’s pretty much as good a place to be anything worthwhile as there is, and genius legendary head coach is included therein.

          • humboldt

            Fair question. I see hubris in the way Haslam/Banner have structured their organization:

            1) Haslam uses ill-gotten billions to purchase Browns asset.

            2) Hires Joe Banner to set up his organization.

            3) Banner purges the GM, positions himself to have greater internal power in football operations

            4) Banner (allegedly) leans heavily on advice/promises from the locally reviled Mike Lombardi, who promises to deliver a top tier coach

            5) All top tier coaches decline in due course and the deck of cards tumbles; Haslam and Banner are chastened

            I’m slightly exaggerating of course, and still am hopeful for a solid HC hire. But you have to admit, this has not played out at all according to their lofty plans, and I think it’s fair to point out some hubris in that

          • bupalos

            So by hubris here you mean they thought they could just waltz right in and buy whatever they want and name whatever coach they wanted and just kick the system’s ass…hubris in relation to the NFL generally.

            I guess I can see how that can be constructed I just don’t feel like it fits the evidence…at least not yet. I feel like Haslam’s been pretty measured in both tone and action, and I can’t say actively competing for the hottest candidate comes off as anything other than them honestly believing they are offering an attractive situation. Which despite the alarming Jerry Jones fetish, I think they are. There is a fine line between hubris and selling yourself short, and one might suggest that this line often appears as a sort of one-way lenticular in this town, where if you’re not pre-apologizing for your eventual failure, you’re just exhibiting the pride that shall goeth before.

          • humboldt

            “I guess I can see how that can be constructed I just don’t feel like it fits the evidence…at least not yet.”

            Again, I think this is fair. Clearly their Plan A was scuttled, and I would guess they are humbled by how things have unfolded. Let’s hope they are adaptive and resourceful in this important moment.

            What I think is more debatable is your characterization that Haslam/Banner have simply laid their cards on the table and things just haven’t worked out. A case can be made that the way Banner has structured the organization (essentially shoehorning in Lombardi as a key component of the front office) was a totally presumptuous and tone-deaf move that is limiting the field of candidates while rankling the fan base. I also think they can be dinged for letting Marronne get away (perhaps based on a misread of Kelly), but I acknowledge my own abject lack of knowledge as to what really happened in AZ.

            One thing we can all agree on: your coining of Haslam’s “Jerry Jones Fetish” ™ is brilliant.

          • bupalos

            Yeah, I will probably want to revise and extend if Lombardi really is going to be some big cog here and it turns out they were limiting their options on coach to the Lombardi-compatible. I’m holding out hope that this isn’t the case.

    • Chris P.

      lay off cleveland plus

      • NeedsFoodBadly

        What is cleveland plus?

      • http://www.clevelandfrowns.com/ Cleveland Frowns

        Like button just for the whole argument and “lay off” being used in it, not to take any particular side.

    • nj0

      As a Cleveland +er, I wholeheartedly agree.

      • http://www.clevelandfrowns.com/ Cleveland Frowns

        #TeamTrumbull

        • SteamingPileOfCraphonsoThorpe

          As in Trumbull County?

    • CleveLandThatILove

      You can borrow my avatar anytime, you know. Maybe somebody knows how to blingee or animate it, wouldn’t that be cool?

      • bupalos

        That whole stream sounds filthy.

        • CleveLandThatILove

          Sometimes I forget who I’m working with here.

          • bupalos

            be here all week.

    • SteamingPileOfCraphonsoThorpe

      I agree about “slow to hate”, but with a caveat: Cleveland fans are generally smart enough to separate the person from their job; that is, as men, Pat Shurmur, Eric Mangini, and Romeo Crennel all seem like decent-enough dudes that you might like to have a beer with and talk football. But we were awfully quick to hate the hiring of 2 of the 3 (or, at least Shurmur for sure, and possibly Mangini simply because he had just been fired – Favre-induced or not, we were still picking up the Jets scrap). I am not including myself in the anti-Mangini group, the only hire that seemed like a bad idea at the time was Shurms – zero track record for anything better than almost mediocre.

      And I thought the video was actually pretty funny, if only because it was outlandish and over-the-top. And c’mon, free truck stop showers at any Pilot Flying J?? Although I think Polk walks a fine line often between poking fun and actual self-loathing (says the commenter with the Factory of Sadness as his avatar).

      Edited to include link to FoS…still funny.

      • bupalos

        Well on Shurmur I’d add the caveat that, well… Shurmur. I mean…Shurmur. On Mangini I’d add the caveat that no fan base of anything in the world can lose17 straight and not get a bit restive, and Romeo really never was hated at all I don’t think.

        • SteamingPileOfCraphonsoThorpe

          I mean at the time of the hire, not after losing a bunch. And no, Romeo was too affable to engender hate, that’s why I said 2 out of 3. Which ain’t bad, per Meatloaf.

  • GrandRapidsRustlers

    A rare miss for Polk.

    Good guy though and his book is one of the funniest things I’ve read recently.

    • mo_by_dick

      it’s no Stupid Cat video, that’s for sure

  • Wiseoldredbeard

    I generally like MP, but this one didn’t do it for me. Craigslist ad was funny, but the rest wasn’t true to facts (which is usually the best part of Polk). I’m not sure what H/B have done wrong here, and there is still a very real chance they end up with a great HC.
    Relatedly, over the past 24-hours I’ve decided I’d be thrilled with Zimmer. I like that they were the first with the balls to interview him. Shows me they are serious and deliberate. Sure, they struck out on Chip — but I think that’s more of a reflection of Chip being a d-bag trying to squeeze more dough out of Nike than anything else, and that whole transaction made me really happy we didn’t get him. Wish-wash was Shurmur’s calling card, we have no need for that here anymore.

  • Bryan

    Back by popular demand – Amazingly Meaningless Tweets from MKC:

    Mary Kay Cabot ‏@MaryKayCabot
    #Browns interviewing at least one more unidentified head coach candidate today. It’s not Bruce Arians.

    • Beeej

      Browns ordered takeout for lunch today…Pretty sure it wasn’t tacos. Maybe Chinese. More as story unfolds.

      • SteamingPileOfCraphonsoThorpe

        @MaryKayCabot

        Post-lunch, Browns headed to the can. No word on #1 vs. #2.

        • Wiseoldredbeard

          @MarykayCabot

          If it was tacos or chinese, even if it starts as a #1 it might become #2, according to source.

          • Bryan

            Sources say that the unidentified coach handed either Pepto-Bismol or Tums to Jimmy Haslam. It was definitely in the tablet form. But its believed Banner ingested either no medicine at all or liquid medicine (likely liquid Pepto).

    • http://twitter.com/cpmack Chris Mc

      In a parallel world, she would be happily tweeting into an empty void.

      • bupalos

        That’s what she’s doing. Only the void echoes.

        • http://twitter.com/cpmack Chris Mc

          if by “void” you’re referring to the mindless zombies that actually lend credence to her vapid tweets, I’ll agree with this.

          • BIKI024

            good lord guys, she’s not nearly as bad as you’re making her out to be, but certainly not best beat writer the local papers have, albeit the largest circulation. Nate Ulrich for the ABJ is the man and always has good tweets: @NateUlrichABJ

            you should see the type of stuff the Jets beat writers tweet. it’s status quo for beat writers to tweet any bit of rumor they hear.

  • GrandRapidsRustlers

    Big thanks to whoever it was in the Cleveland community who convinced Bernie that he needed to get help.

  • Wiseoldredbeard

    EVERYONE STOP WHAT YOU’RE DOING RIGHT NOW, and look at Sammy Sosa’s new pintrest page: http://pinterest.com/sammysosamr609/sammy-sosa-sammy-sosa-official-pinterest/ Almost as amusing as his flickr account: http://pinterest.com/sammysosamr609/sammy-sosa-sammy-sosa-official-pinterest/ Is this guy hilarious? A total clown? Hard to tell…

  • 6thCity

    ” The fact that the Browns are interviewing him for a second time means they might be getting serious are probably getting serious about hiring him.”

    MKC and the PD editor’s finest work to date.

    • Beeej

      Sources say Haslem handed a note to Banner who handed it to coach that said, “I like you. Do you like me? Circle Y/N” Sources still unclear whether or not a proposition to kiss (no tongue) at Ashley’s boy/girl party on Friday was made.

      • bupalos

        I heard it asked whether they were getting serious or probably getting serious about liking them. Y/N way too black and white for this kind of thing.

        • SeattleBrownsFan

          after every interview, Banner turns to Haslam and says “Do you like him or do you like him like him?

  • alexb

    “and Owen Marecic!!”….omg lmfao!!

    • bupalos

      That one hit.

      • alexb

        damn right it did, have we cut that guy btw? That should have happened bright and early the monday after the Steelers game. Fck me running if he’s still on the roster next year.

  • Bryan

    MKC Watch Continues: She now appears to be accidentally publicizing direct messages to “Marc” (Marc Trestman?)

    Mary Kay Cabot ‏@MaryKayCabot
    Thx marc!

    • SeattleBrownsFan

      no, the grocer (Marc’s). apparently he delivers.

    • jpftribe

      She is a complete idiot. Listened to her on the PD Insider. This was just hours before the Browns announced Chud. She went on record saying she had no idea who the front runner was. Earlier, she flaunted here job as beat writer to say she has more credibility than others when asked specifically if the Browns talked to Gruden. She then sites her instincts that a man with Haslam’s power and connections, they surely had to reach out to big names like Cowher, Gruden, Saban then says she knows they reach out to SOME of those names.

      Comon MKC, did they talk to Gruden or not. Caplan was on a minute before you and said point blank, no way. The Steelers beat writer was on 10 minutes before you and said point blank he did not kñow for sure if they talked to Cowher it would be surprised if they didn’t.

      Do you actually know something? Maybe a fact or two? Fuckin eh what a dope.

  • munasrevenge

    CHUD?!

    See what happens when you abdicate, Frownie?

  • bupalos

    Pretty shocking. But not bad at all. I’m down with chud, he’s fine… Now the norv thing is a little weird. Technically an excellent choice, just a little weird to have sd’s old combo, but inverted. Also kind of feels like the important side of the ball is being forgotten. I guess they are down with jauron, which would suggest they are unwilling to take a step back from the apparent progress we’ve had there. I’m agnostic on that. Have to mull this a bit more…

    • http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I1kbBmlAvdI PML

      I’m okay with Norv too – being out here in SD, the feedback I’ve gotten from pretty much everybody and from watching the Chargers myself is that offense was never the problem until this year. The dude can call an offensive game with the best of em.

    • jpftribe

      OK, I’m going to say it, Rex Ryan comes back. Now maybe I can interview for the next Browns PD beat reporter.

  • https://twitter.com/jimkanicki jimkanicki

    ok, this 3-4 transition rumor has me spooked. didnt we learn the hard way that there’s a completely different personnel skill set needed for this? bulky block-eating linemen anchored by a wilfork-ngata-raji NT? backed by fast athletic aggressive linebackers, at least two studs .. have we identified our patrick willis and aldon smith?

    meantime our rotation of d-tackles is the strength of the team. hughes is the most blocker-occupying-ish of the group but call me crazy, i like seeing winn-rubin-taylor blowing up the line and disrupting the backfield. none are NTs. and the morality of asking of them to adopt an obesity program and to get up to 360 pounds is suspect.

    i seriously would need at least two sessions of rodo’s xs-and-os to begin to feel ok about this move. we all were taught about the importance of correct personnel for the 3-4 from 2005 to 2010. that was six years and if we learned anything it was this:

    finding four linebackers is hard;
    free-agent nose tackles are unicorns.

    rod-o, dwhale, anyone? you got anything on this?

    • bupalos

      I say that depending on 3-4 concepts, and assuming we’ve got gocong coming back, we’re really only a couple people away. Sheard is the piece that worries me, they’d probably want to convert him. I see mingo in our future. We actually have a good and deep 1 gap type 3-4 o-line as i understand these things. We need barky and some backer beef and this thing can get done yesterday. Fear not. Unless we hear that Lombardi is going to be the one slinging around that 46 mil in cap space. Then be afraid. Be very afraid.

      • https://twitter.com/jimkanicki jimkanicki

        but but but… wont we need to overpay free-agent-shaun-rogers to anchor the line? wont we be trading up to draft stout high-motor LBs from hawaii who ‘fit the system?’ isnt DQ obviously a 4-3 mike and by history a mediocre 3-4 ILB? is it not clear that sheard will need to be traded to the raiders for a 3rd rd pick and then proceed to have his best years there?

        this is all too fresh in my memory. appreciate the help bup. i need more.

        • bupalos

          Say what you want about gocong, I feel like he’s more suited to 3-4 than 4-3. And sheard was projected as a 3-4 will in the draft and should do well there theoretically. This has to be primarily one gap, that’s the only thing that makes a lick of sense, and honestly this personnel is just as good for that as 4-3 I think.

          • https://twitter.com/jimkanicki jimkanicki

            no argument that gocong is more a 3-4 backer.

            hm. let’s play it out. are we putting barky mingo in a demarcus ware role or jarvis jones in a von miller/aldon smith role? looks to me like we have to strike gold with mingo since we dont have a dumerville/willis to enable a miller/smith.

            are we looking at taylor-rubin-hughes up front with gocong/winn-robertson/fort-dq-mingo/benard as LBs? i dunno. those three d-linemen will get tired and there’s nothing backing them up.

            i just think that right now we’re a 1st round CB (and a non-usama young safety) away from being a stellar defense. hate blowing it up. hate trying to shoehorn guys into unnatural slots. simply put: great 3-4 defenses require transcendent linebackers. the closest we ever got to that was chip banks. i reserve the right to be sullen at our prospects of finding one.

        • rodofdisaster

          Shaun Rogers is a worthless football player. He’s too lazy to be worth anyone’s trouble. He can’t keep his weight under control.

    • rodofdisaster

      Sometimes it seems like teams transition easily from a 4-3 to a 3-4 like when Wade Phillips did it with the Texans or when the Packers did it. I would argue the Colts have seen it work quickly. Most of the time however, it’s proven to be a painful, 2-to-3 year process (see Browns, Jets, Chiefs and I would argue the Niners didn’t hit the ground running either).

      Here are some highlights of the problem:

      1. You need a nose tackle. A real one. Mangini’s NY defense didn’t really start thumping until Kris Jenkins showed up. These guys certainly don’t grow on trees. This isn’t just about being a big guy. You need to be able to fight the double team on every play and you have to have the best gap discipline of any defender.

      2. DE’s. The 4-3 tackle will try to play DE if he’s not big enough for nose but the ends have to now stand up and play OLB which means agility and footwork in space. Freeney and Mathis seems to have done this well in Indy but some guys can’t. What if I told you that Sheard couldn’t do it? Well then. You have an up-and-coming 43 DE who is now useless to your organization unless you can trade him.

      3. MLB. There are so many guys that are good at the Mike in 4-3 that can’t convert it to the 3-4. Perhaps they can play the weakside ILB as they tend to be a bit smaller but that’s not always true. The Mike in the 4-3 is a guy that has to play sideline to sideline. He typically has fewer linemen taking free runs at him. In the 3-4, the defensive line typically eats up double teams but the ILB has less protection from being blocked. The guards (in a straight up 3-4) are uncovered so they can typically get to the ILB easily. Perfect example is Jonathan Vilma. When the Jets went to the 3-4, this guy was horrible; He took himself out of plays and couldn’t fight through blocks at all. In New Orleans he was back in his element and did better. D’Qwell Jackson is not a 3-4 LB. Anywhere.

      4. CB- People don’t seem to realize it but the 3-4 CB is typically a bigger corner who’s good in run support. That’s not universal obviously but generally they’re looking for bigger guys. When Parcells took over the Jets who had run a 4-3, undersized Aaron Glenn was not of use.

      You’re right when you say the hardest thing to find is the NT. Beyond that though, it’s not that the parts to fit the scheme don’t exist, it’s identifying them. Most college teams run 4-3 so you’re constantly having to project whether guys can play in the 3-4. Another factor in finding players is “what is everyone else doing?”. If the majority of teams in the division/league are 3-4 teams you’re going to have more competition to find those parts. Trends shift though. Coaches get fired. People switch schemes. By my count (and if I’m off it’s only by one) 13 teams ran a 3-4 last season which is less than half the league. That means more teams are looking for 4-3 parts than 3-4 parts. In my view, it’s always better to be in the minority because you have less competition for free agents and draft of defensive players. That’s how the Patriots built such a great 3-4 in the early ’00s. There simply weren’t a lot of teams running a 3-4 back then.

      This offseason, watch and see what changes come. Monte Kiffin is rumored to be on Jerry Jones’ mind which would mean a switch from 3-4 to 4-3. Buffalo hired Mike Pettine from the Jets which will mean switching to 3-4.

      I will take the versatility of a good 3-4 team over a 4-3 any day but a mediocre or bad 3-4 is just awful.

      • jpftribe

        rodo
        Once again, very thoughtful analysis here, much appreciated. Before I get too spun up about this, is there a legitimate source for this switch to 3-4 other than everyone repeating MKC’s speculation? She’s an idiot and got scooped on Chud by Mortenson. I see independent reports on Norv becoming OC, but no one else confirming her story on 3-4.

  • BIKI024

    CHUD! his resume speaks for itself in terms of his ability to work with young QBs dating back to Dorsey in Miami to Rivers, DA and Cam. aggressive play aller and a lifelong Browns fan which should fire him up when it comes to his passion and commitent to the team.

    of course this all will come down to which coordinators he brings in. if he can returm the favor to Norv and Romeo (or Lovie or Horton) to run each side of the field, I think we’ve got a great coachng hierachy. i give it a B right now but could be an A depending on experienced coordinators who could make up for his inexperience as HC.

  • SteamingPileOfCraphonsoThorpe

    Did Chud answer the Craigslist ad, or did he call the number he saw on one of those sweet posters?

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