Given that the Browns have offered Mike Holmgren an obscene amount of money to fill a position where he’s never had any substantial success, and that nobody else wants to pay him as much (anything?) to do anything as much fun, it seems inevitable that Holmgren will accept a job as head of football operations for the Browns. WKNR’s Tony Rizzo said today that it will be announced on Monday.
I’ve tried to explain a bit about why I’d feel a lot better about Holmgren if the Browns leave Eric Mangini in place as head coach, and that such a result seems at least plausible, if not likely, despite media reports to the contrary. Along these lines, I have another question, which is, when has it ever worked? When has the high-profile GM/’czar’-type free agent signing ever worked? As far as we know, Bill Parcells’ tenure with the Dolphins is the only potential example, and his Dolphins not only haven’t broken ranks with the slightly-above-mediocre, but their chances of doing so look to be on the rocks.
So why do people always say, like they’ve said throughout the season, and like the OBR’s Fred Greetham said again today:
When Savage was fired, the move to get a ‘czar’ or GM should have been made first before hiring a coach. However, since it was done the other way, the Browns and Randy Lerner are faced with the dilemma they have now.
Does anyone else wonder why this has to be a “dilemma”? Why can’t the team hire a coach who can work with Eric Mangini? Why can’t Mike Holmgren work with Eric Mangini? Why would it have to be any different from, say, this, for example:
When Belichick accepted the Patriots’ head coaching position in 2000, Pioli joined Belichick and the two eventually became the first personnel director/head coach tandem in league annals to win three Super Bowls during a four-year span (2001–2004). He and Belichick split the duties usually held by a general manager on most other NFL teams, though Belichick had the final say.
Does anyone think that Pioli ever had much power, much less unilateral power, to fire Belichick?
Even Mike Lombardi agrees that “the game must be run through the head coach’s chair:
The hardest element of being in the front office, with or without all the power, is understanding that the game must run through the head coach’s chair. No matter how much power Holmgren might gain from his meeting with Browns owner Randy Lerner, the head coach must have substantial authority over the roster or the players won’t respond. Players must think they work for the head coach, and as we’ve seen in Dallas, Washington and Oakland, when they think they work for solely for the owner, there’s a disconnect.
So again, we already have a coach. So again: Why do we want to fire a young, hungry and well-trained first-year head coach who, after a painful but necessary housecleaning process, appears to have affected a turnaround in which his team most recently turned in the most effective AFC North-style smashmouth performance that Cleveland has seen in a decade?
And all of this for a guy who by all accounts is not wanted back in Seattle, who’s never had any success as head of football operations anywhere else,* to bring in a new coach to implement a “West Coast” style in the smashmouth AFC North, at the very same time that current Seattle Seahawks head coach Jim Mora is making news for telling his own team, the team that Holmgren built, that it’s known around the league as being “soft”?
Holmgren’s track record in hiring head coaches is non-existent. And we should be happy to have him run a guy who might be an excellent head coach to bring in an unknown entity for what?
“To reach back to his Bill Walsh/West Coast family tree for his coach, seeking someone who shares the same philosophies, terminology, vernacular and football ideology.”
Terminology? Vernacular? Why again do football philosophies have to be so unchangeable and incompatible?
Also, who’s the great new coach from this “West Coast family tree,” anyway? Or are we going to make one up? To keep it in the family?
Until someone can come up with good answers to at least some of these serious questions, I’ll continue to hope that the line that Holmgren won’t work with Mangini is as mangled as so many others about the coach, and that Mangini and Holmgren will end up working together after all.
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*From Cliff Olson of NorthwestFootball.Net (which looks to be Seattle’s version of The OBR) (h/t Malcolm Mathers):
Holmgren drafted 38 players during his GM years, with 6 first round picks. Of those 38 players, only 5 became consistent productive starters . . . . It would appear that the Seahawks produced a total of 8 productive draft picks (players making a significant contribution for their team, for a significant period of time), during the four years in question. . . .
Holmgren’s tenure as Seahawks GM was very forgettable. Maybe he could point to the flawed relationship between himself and Whitsitt during his years as GM. Whatever the reason, he was removed from his GM position because he did not get the job done during the four years he had his shot. No doubt that another team will give him the reigns of an organization again. I seriously doubt that the outcome will be any different than his time as GM with the Seahawks. Mike Holmgren’s over-loyalty to certain coaches and players, his inability to properly evaluate talent, and his stubbornness will lead – in my estimation – to another failed GM tenure.
