Delusional Hue Jackson ... Did Cleveland do us a favor?

[|BlackJesus|]

I’m starting to think that Hue Jackson might be delusional and that the Browns did the Bengals a favor by taking him off our hands. Now before you just assume that this is bitter homerism masquerading as objectivity, I’d ask you to examine what has happened since he arrived in the Mistake by the Lake.

 

The Browns said they wanted to concentrate on retaining their own guys rather than going after big name free agents, and then they let the only home grown talent they had walk out of the door in free agency with plenty of money to spend [they lost four of their best starters from 2015]. This has now left them with probably the weakest roster in the entire NFL (latest power rankings has them at #32, and many pundits have started to wonder if they will go 0-16 next season, which I think is a realistic possibility).

 

But even before that, Hue was showing poor leadership and pussy footing around with Manziel, and missed an opportunity to set the tone when hired, by just canning his drunk stupid ass immediately. I’d imagine this also factored into guys like Alex Mack’s decision to hightail it out of the Factory of Sadness as they saw the writing on the wall.

 

Now setting aside Hue’s horrible 2 pt conversion call in the playoffs that likely lost us the game (which might be the worst play call in playoff history), if you go back to his time in Oakland, he also showed he would mortgage that teams future for Carson Palmer and made an asinine trade to the Bengals. The more I observe Hue, he strikes me as a guy who thinks he is very clever (6-7 man OL formations that shift for no reason other than giving the false impression of complexity) but he actually isn’t very clever at all. His ego is too big for his resume, which is probably why he gelled perfectly with Chad Johnson when he coached him back in the day. It wasn't that Hue made Andy better, Andy has been improving every year, it was that Andy excelled in spite of Hue.

 

Now we hear that Hue is talking up RGIII, a monumental bust as a “tremendous talent”, which again makes me wonder if he thinks he is so clever that he can take this damaged goods QB without NFL level skills, and create some offense that surprises the league with him at QB. I have little doubt that would fail spectacularly.

 

When all of this is factored in with the fact that Hue chose to coach the worst franchise in the history of organized team sports (Browns) over waiting a year or two to ascend to the Bengals job where he would have had ultimate job security if successful and been a de-facto GM like Marvin is – rather than working under these Baseball ‘Moneyball’ Jackoffs that Cleveland is handing over the keys of their organization to in despair, then it tells me that Cleveland like always, tried to do something good, but ultimately harmed themselves again, and in painful irony, did the Bengals a huge favor by taking Hue off of our hands before the Bengals got stuck with him as head coach.

 

Thoughts?

[|BlackJesus|]

Hue Jackson: Robert Griffin III a 'tremendous talent'

• 
• By Marc Sessler
• Around the NFL Writer
• Published: March 20, 2016

BOCA RATON, Fla. -- If we know one thing about the Browns this offseason, the team is spreading a wide net in search of a savior under center.

Cleveland is expected by many to select a passer with the No. 2 overall pick, but the franchise's hunt also extends to veteran options, with the Browns still a candidate to trade for San Francisco's Colin Kaepernick or even sign former Redskins signal-caller Robert Griffin III.

New coach Hue Jackson has opinions on all these players, calling Griffin, who visited the Browns on Friday and Saturday, a "very talented" performer.

"It was a great meeting. I think he's obviously a tremendous talent and a great young man," Jackson told NFL Media's Steve Wyche. "He had a lot of success early in Washington and then things just didn't work out. Those things happen in the National Football League. But at the same time we are going through our process. We are going to be very diligent in what we are doing -- trying to make sure that we put the right quarterbacks on our football team and in that quarterback room. And that's one of my biggest responsibilities and also one of our organization's biggest responsibilities."

On the stalled talks for Kaepernick, Jackson told Wyche: "I can't comment on players on other teams. But it is where it is and eventually I think all those things will show itself."

The Browns will also have their choice of either Cal's Jared Goff or North Dakota State's Carson Wentz when they go on the clock next month at No. 2. Jackson has committed to personally attending the pro day of all the top arms in this year's draft, but emphasized again on Sunday that "we may draft a quarterback and we may not."

If they do pick a rookie passer, the Browns might be wise to red-shirt him until this team-building process led by executive VP of football operations Sashi Brown enters its next stage.

Jackson, though, wants nothing to do with calling this latest chapter in Cleveland a rebuilding effort. He emphasized to Wyche that it's closer to a Browns "reboot," which is fair because, from another angle, there was nothing to rebuild.

"We wanted to keep every last one of the players that left if we could. But there's also a price in doing that," Jackson said. "They have a right to exercise their option to go. So it's not like we did not want them back. I mean they have to want to be back as well. And it just didn't work out. So at the end of the day, I know it looks to a lot of people like it's a rebuild. You can call it a reboot. You can call it whatever you'd like. But I do know this much, that we are doing what we know we need to do in order to have a sustainable football team for years to come."

http://www.nfl.com/news/story/0ap3000000645873/article/hue-jackson-robert-griffin-iii-a-tremendous-talent

[|BlackJesus|]

Skeletor's Ghost: "Give me back my draft picks!"

[|BlackJesus|]

You spend years building up your resume ... just to squander it all in Cleveland.

The land with the toxic burning lake, where hope goes to die.

[knomage]

Is it possible that Hue was bedazzled by the money and title and will be nothing more than a football face on a metric meltdown?..perhaps "fall guy" is a so far unmentioned part of his role...just someone else for the fans to flay while the real rulers flee

[Hooky]

RGIII is a tremendous athlete. So is Tebow. Not the same thing as talent.

[BlackBengal]

BlackJesus- you make some good points, but also some that I disagree with.  I agree that Hue has done things and has some tendencies that would worry me if he were my head coach; (the Palmer deal, his crazy offensive formations.)  And this thing with RG3 is crazy.  He is not an answer.  

 But you can't fault him for not cutting Manziel right away.  First, that is clearly not even his decision.  It's a front-office decision.  It would be stupid to cut him sooner from a cap management perspective.   Hue got it right by making it clear when he was hired that Manziel would be gone.  You also can't fault him for taking the Browns' job.  There are only 32 HC jobs and for the most part only bad teams have job openings.  

[|BlackJesus|]

Is it possible that Hue was bedazzled by the money and title

I'd actually guess it was more a matter of extreme overconfidence, and the belief that he is smart enough to fix the Browns regardless of the limitations against him. Which to a certain extent I can admire, but at some point it starts to look more like delusions of grandeur.

[|BlackJesus|]

RGIII is a tremendous athlete. So is Tebow. Not the same thing as talent.

I'm not even sure how good of an athlete RGIII is at this point, post injuries. He does have some quickness, but that is near the bottom of what is required for a quality QB.

[Hooky]

I'm not even sure how good of an athlete RGIII is at this point, post injuries. He does have some quickness, but that is near the bottom of what is required for a quality QB.

True. I was going to mention the declining athleticism due to injuries. And the injuries were a lot of his own doing from trying to do way too much on his own.

[|BlackJesus|]

You also can't fault him for taking the Browns' job.  There are only 32 HC jobs and for the most part only bad teams have job openings.  

While that is true, the Browns are one of the only NFL jobs where being their head coach is arguably a lower position than being a OC or DC on a playoff football team. The Browns are monumentally bad, and to a certain extent beneath Hue's pedigree. The Browns is a position which only a no name coordinator or college coach in his late 30's who needs to break into the NFL should take to prove himself. Hue was in demand from several teams and was a rising name ... had he waited or been more patient he could have landed a job like the NY Giants which would have been far superior to Cleveland or gotten the Bengals job, which I'd argue at this point is one of the top 5 NFL jobs since you are also a de-facto GM and only need to make one call to Mike's daughter. Plus, the Browns have shown they are an organization that destroys coaching careers in the last 15 years. After fired from there you fall down to ST coordinator of college coach at some shitty school outside the BCS conferences.

[Steve4192]

^ What BlackBengal said

 

Most of the stuff you attributed to Hue wasn't his call.  Free Agency and Manziel were front office decisions, not coaching decisions.  So are RGIII and Kapernick, though one would hope the suits at least ran that by their coach before trying to bring those guys in.

 

Regarding the 'Moneyball guys', I have two things to say. 

 

One, everyone forgets that Moneyball was an abysmal failure in the draft.  The young core of that team was built BEFORE the move to Moneyball.  Hudson, Mulder, Zito, Tejada, and Chavez were all drafted by scouts, not spreadsheet wizards.  The 'Moneyball guys' weren't nearly as good at projecting amateur talent as they were at evaluating established talent.  They tended to draft 'safe' guys with good skills but average athleticism, and they got what you would expect with that kind of strategy, a bunch of skilled but unspectacular players.  The problem is, once the core of guys mentioned above got old, there were not any 'star' caliber players to replace them.  If that carries over to their NFL experiment, the Browns are fucked.  Unlike the A's, they don't have a young core of superstars already on the team that just need to be supplemented with competent teammates.

 

Two, I wonder if the RGIII and Kapernick interest is being driven by Hue or the 'Moneyball guys'.  I wonder if they think they've found a market inefficiency where mobile QBs are undervalued.  It would be interesting to see if they try and build an offense around one of those guys and forego pocket passers.

[|BlackJesus|]

Regarding the 'Moneyball guys', I have two things to say. 

Those Harvard educated 'Moneyball' dickbags are obnoxious and I can't wait to see them spectacularly fail. Btw, Katie went to Harvard too, so the Bengals can have Ivy League 'smarts' without the annoying 'I'm the smartest guy in the room' aura that those dildos put off. Why Hue would want to work under non-football guys who have never shown they know shit about football even more calls into question his decision making and wisdom of taking the Cleveland job.  

[Hooky]

Those Harvard educated 'Moneyball' dickbags are obnoxious and I can't wait to see them spectacularly fail. Btw, Katie went to Harvard too, so the Bengals can have Ivy League 'smarts' without the annoying 'I'm the smartest guy in the room' aura that those dildos put off. Why Hue would want to work under non-football guys who have never shown they know shit about football even more calls into question his decision making and wisdom of taking the Cleveland job.  

Limited to +1.

[|Dr Tarzan|]

I can see why he took the job.  He wants to make HIS team.   not take an existing talent base and mold them into a winner.  The Browns are as close to an expansion team that Hue will ever find for the immediate future. So I think he wants his stamp on the team and if he enjoys success there will be no question about who was source of it.    That is what I THINK THAT HUE IS THINKING......that said, I hope it all blows up in his face and he and his "outside of the (cracker jack) box" administrative team, fall flat on their collective faces and are never heard from again.

[|ArmyBengal|]

tough not to make analogies about what coach he reminds me of or the situation. But I'm thinking more along the lines of General's Patton and Bradley. Hue might be the ablest aggressive OC's like Patton was the always in attack mode but you don't want him in charge of the Army, you need a more level headed guy like Bradley. I'm not sure this marriage is going to work out for Hue any better than the Raiders did. Hue as the HC with Marvin as the GM probably would have won a SB or at least gotten there. Seems like Cleveland's goal is limited to a wildcard spot and hope for an unexpected run, or at least my interpretation of money-ball in the NFL. Hue likely won't be given that much time to get to even that level of proficiency.

But to answer the question. I lean towards Yes, assuming Marvin wasn't going to give up the HC position.

 

voted the OFF would be worse but that's more about the current roster vs new HC.

[|Numbers|]

To a certain extent every single team in the NFL runs on a Moneyball approach.  Before, during, and after every game the team runs the stats, tendencies, etc.... of players and teams.  Same approach before the draft.  They may not ever draft the guy they're looking at but you can bet they're taking notes for the future.

With that said, Cleveland might just take stupidity to a whole new level.

[Steve4192]

To a certain extent every single team in the NFL runs on a Moneyball approach.  Before, during, and after every game the team runs the stats, tendencies, etc.... of players and teams.  Same approach before the draft.  They may not ever draft the guy they're looking at but you can bet they're taking notes for the future.

With that said, Cleveland might just take stupidity to a whole new level.

Moneyball is more about economics and market inefficiencies than it is about stats.  Stats are just the tool they use to identify those inefficiencies.  It actually worked really well too, as far as it went.  The A's did a great job identifying players who brought something to the table that other teams didn't value, but could help them win games.  The problem was that it only worked (or worked best) when they had real live data to work with.  The system wasn't nearly as efficient at projecting performance as it was at identifying undervalued performance.  It won't surprise me at all if Cleveland starts getting really good production out of veterans who everyone else has written off.  I just don't have much faith in 'Moneyball' helping them in the draft, which is where they need help the most.

[happyrid]

The Browns strategy is smart, but no strategy is going to work if you don't nail a good number of draft picks (especially the first rounders). What they do with their picks the next few years is going to either doom them to more shittiness or set them up to be competitive for a long time.

Here's what I think they are doing:

1. Spending under the salary cap for the next 2 years when they know they aren't going to be very competitive anyway. They will carry that money over to future cap years so that 2 years from now, they will go into FA with $80-100M to spend and they will add some impact young FAs as core players to build around. (Jacksonville and Oakland did something similar and are poised to be good in Year 3 after big FA hauls.)

2. Hoard and use a ton of draft picks over the next 3 drafts to add a bunch of cheap young talent. They have 11 picks this April and by letting a bunch of guys walk in FA, they will have 11 picks (8 picks in the first 4 rounds) next April too. They have the #2 pick this year and are probably planning on being bad and having top picks in the next two drafts also. So not only will they be adding a ton of numbers, but they'll also be adding three elite prospects with top picks and have a bunch of extra picks to work with. (Jacksonville and Oakland again are the models. Jacksonville added Blake Bortles, Allen Robinson and Dante Fowler over the past two drafts and draft 4th this year (Joey Bosa?). Oakland added Derek Carr, Amari Cooper and Khalil Mack in the past two drafts.)

It's not that hard to pull off a 3 year rebuild plan if you nail the picks. If they take Carson Wentz and he's the real deal for example. Add an impact WR at the top of the 2nd round. Add a stud pass rusher and stud DB with top 5 picks in the next couple drafts. Find a couple steals with the dozen picks in rounds 2-4 over the next few years. Then use your huge cap carryover to add a couple top FAs in 2018 and they could have a pretty loaded roster in a few years.

The Chicago Cubs did something similar over the last few years in baseball and look like they are going to be damn good for a while after their rebuild.

[PatternMaster]

BJ I think you are way off base on this one and here is why:

Hue made the decision to take the Cleveland job for many reasons, money and family are two big ones. His family lives in Ohio so staying close to them was a plus and Cleveland offered him millions of dollars to do what he loves to do; with that in mind how can you fault him for taking this opportunity. 

As for the Manziel situation, they cut as soon as they could and Hue basically said they were going to cut him the day he took the job. Not quite sure what more you wanted him to do, Manziel is done in Cleveland does it matter if it happen a few days after you thought it should have? As for the FA that left, that's not Hue's call at the end of the day and the Browns weren't that successful with those guys so why over pay for players that don't want to be on your team. It's best for Hue to start fresh and build this team with his guys, not disgruntled holdovers with baggage from past regimes that didn't have success. 

As for the success of the team this year, remember in 2011 when the Bengals roster looked depleted and every pundit picked us to finish last and some tossed out 0-16 they ended up making the playoffs. Not saying the same results will occur in Cleveland but it's possible. Hue is a coaching genius, his ability to play call and develop players is top notch and that's what they want him to do. 

I definitely think Cleveland will surprise people this year, Hue will have those guys ready to go come September.  

[|SF2|]

The Browns can't sign anyone that doesn't want to be there.  Hue is getting paid and if he can last 2 years he will pocket around 3.5 mil after taxes.  Also, there are ZERO expectations  so it's easy money.

[Phish]

I'm not even sure how good of an athlete RGIII is at this point, post injuries. He does have some quickness, but that is near the bottom of what is required for a quality QB.

And to go even further, RGIII has even come out himself and has said that he wants to be more of a pocket passer.  Remember when we had Crazy Legs Fitzpatrick running around with his head cut off, he'd look more like that now than he did when he was a rookie before that knee got shredded.  Would love to see Hue try to repair this broken not enough NFL abilities leftover from Washington, chalk up +2 wins next season right now...

[-GoBengals-]

give me a break.

 

 

[|Bunghole|]

The Browns strategy is smart, but no strategy is going to work if you don't nail a good number of draft picks (especially the first rounders). What they do with their picks the next few years is going to either doom them to more shittiness or set them up to be competitive for a long time.

Here's what I think they are doing:

1. Spending under the salary cap for the next 2 years when they know they aren't going to be very competitive anyway. They will carry that money over to future cap years so that 2 years from now, they will go into FA with $80-100M to spend and they will add some impact young FAs as core players to build around. (Jacksonville and Oakland did something similar and are poised to be good in Year 3 after big FA hauls.)

2. Hoard and use a ton of draft picks over the next 3 drafts to add a bunch of cheap young talent. They have 11 picks this April and by letting a bunch of guys walk in FA, they will have 11 picks (8 picks in the first 4 rounds) next April too. They have the #2 pick this year and are probably planning on being bad and having top picks in the next two drafts also. So not only will they be adding a ton of numbers, but they'll also be adding three elite prospects with top picks and have a bunch of extra picks to work with. (Jacksonville and Oakland again are the models. Jacksonville added Blake Bortles, Allen Robinson and Dante Fowler over the past two drafts and draft 4th this year (Joey Bosa?). Oakland added Derek Carr, Amari Cooper and Khalil Mack in the past two drafts.)

It's not that hard to pull off a 3 year rebuild plan if you nail the picks. If they take Carson Wentz and he's the real deal for example. Add an impact WR at the top of the 2nd round. Add a stud pass rusher and stud DB with top 5 picks in the next couple drafts. Find a couple steals with the dozen picks in rounds 2-4 over the next few years. Then use your huge cap carryover to add a couple top FAs in 2018 and they could have a pretty loaded roster in a few years.

The Chicago Cubs did something similar over the last few years in baseball and look like they are going to be damn good for a while after their rebuild.

I agree with most of this but the caveat is that ownership of the Browns has to be patient with Hue. The question is will they? If I were Hue interviewing for that job I would have demanded a minimum of three years to rebuild before being able to be fired, or something similar.

[|Dr Tarzan|]

I agree with most of this but the caveat is that ownership of the Browns has to be patient with Hue. The question is will they? If I were Hue interviewing for that job I would have demanded a minimum of three years to rebuild before being able to be fired, or something similar.

I believe that was one of his biggest criteria when interviewing with the Lerners...if they are willing to be patient, then don't call on me.   I think the Lerners are seeing the errors of their ways that blowing it up every year or 2 will get you nothing but more L's