http://www.cleveland.com/sports/
January 1, 2018
Cleveland Browns head coach Hue Jackson walks off Heinz Field after losing to the Pittsburgh Steelers, December 31, 2017, at Heinz Field in Pittsburgh. (John Kuntz, cleveland.com)
BEREA, Ohio -- What exactly, Hue, did you do well?
Throw out the 0-16 record and every time Hue Jackson himself or owner Jimmy Haslam has pointed to the Browns playing hard as a sign of coaching acumen.
Coaches in a rebuild like this are more than only their record.
Coaches at all times are more than the effort police.
What did Hue Jackson do to help the Browns win this year? What did Jackson do to help the Browns avoid the second 0-16 season in NFL history?
The Browns finished with the worst record in the league while playing four of the other seven teams that won five games or fewer. The Browns are swathed in infamy because they couldn't find a win against 4-12 Houston (33-17 loss), 4-12 Indianapolis (31-28 loss), 5-11 Chicago (20-3 loss) and the 5-11 New York Jets (17-14 loss.)
The Browns lost four games by 4 points or fewer in regulation and another two in overtime. They led in the second half of five games and had a coach always left waiting for a player to make a play, while the rest of us wondered if the Browns had a coach who knew how to get them over the top.
Jackson after the season-ending loss Sunday claimed most coaches couldn't have endured this 1-31 record over two seasons.
But couldn't most of them have sprinkled a couple wins into this winless four-month march? Yes. Yes, they could have.
"You're entitled to your opinion," Jackson said bright and early Monday morning at his wrapup news conference, as coaches with better records around the league were getting fired. "Me saying whatever I feel is not going to change. I'm sitting here. I'm gonna be here. I'm gonna coach this team until I can get this team to winning. Nothing I say is gonna matter, so I get it."
That wasn't an answer, but coupled with what Jackson said Sunday, I'm going to assume Jackson believes that no coach would have done more.
If he does believe that, he's wrong.
NFL.com analyst Bucky Brooks crystallized what Jackson could have been in a tweet last week when Jets coach Todd Bowles had his contract extended after a 5-11 rebuild year, following 10-6 and 5-11 records his first two seasons.
The way Todd Bowles handled this situation is the perfect blueprint for how other coaches should deal with a bad hand from the dealer. Instead of crying about the lack of personnel during the rebuilding phase, TB coached his tail off & won games despite the odds. That's coaching twitter.com/nfl/status/946…
Instead, Cleveland has a coaching staff intent on arguing the merits on how talent-less the roster is. Jackson and new GM John Dorsey have said that before. After Sunday's loss, veteran corner Jason McCourty told reporters this roster was more talented than 0-16, and he was tired of people outside and inside the organization saying there weren't enough players on this team.
I read McCourty's words back to Jackson on Monday.
"Let me say this, I respect what Jason says. He's a player on the team who works extremely hard and who has been in the National Football League, and that's his opinion," Jackson said. "You guys asked that right after the game and I respect Jason and what he feels."
But what does Jackson think of that?
"I don't want to get into the roster and if we're talented or not," Jackson said. "We're 0-16 and to make it more than that and to say the roster is or isn't doesn't do anything."
That's Jackson's approach now, certain of his opinion because he is employed. There may be only three people in the world who think Jackson should still be coaching the Browns, but those three people are Dee and Jimmy Haslam and Jackson himself, and those are the only three people that count.
For me, the 0-16 record doesn't matter all that much because this was going to be a losing year, and if you lose, you may as well lose big. The season is over and 19 other teams missed the playoffs just like the Browns did. What the Browns have now that the other teams don't is the No. 1 pick in the draft and the shot at the quarterback of their choice.
But I would fire Jackson.
.I'd fire him for stubborness and for being a bad teammate within the organization.
I'd fire him for messing with the head of a rookie quarterback and not designing gameplans that could put an overmatched DeShone Kizer in more comfortable situations.
I'd fire him for abandoning the run game and coaching in a state of desperation.
I'd fire him because he talked Monday about the stigma of 0-16 and the need to re-recruit fans and potential free agents, and if you believe that needs to happen it would be much easier to do with a new head coach.
I'd fire him because if Jackson was a hot candidate with a sharp offensive reputation two years ago, the Browns could get the next hotter, smarter offensive candidate now, dangling the chance to get your quarterback with that No. 1 pick and a roster with some pieces in place.
I'd fire him because he claims his responsibilty for this as the head coach, then time after time leaves bread crumbs with his comments that this isn't really on him. I'd fire him because Jackson too often presents himself as a victim of 1-31, and not a primary cause of it.
"That's you saying that," Jackson said, and I have said it many times. "I've never said I'm a victim of this. I said it the other day, I'm just as big a part of this as anybody. I don't know what it is that you want me to say that would make you feel OK.
"I think at the end of the day I'm the leader of this, part of the leadership group of this, and I've been very disappointed in all of it. But at the same time we're going to fix it. Jimmy and Dee have given me the support needed in order to feel that we're moving in the right direction and I think that's what we're gonna do."
I'd feel better if Jackson said he wasn't going to coach this team any longer. I'd even have taken a reasonable explanation from him on what he has done well here, other than a team playing hard while continually falling short.
"I think there's some players that have been developed," Jackson said. "When I look at Duke Johnson and what he's done this year. I think there was some hit and miss with David Njoku, it's not always consistent when you're talking about young players. I think there's even at times where DeShone did some good things.
"But again, I know what you're getting at, but at the same time, I think there's a lot of things that we've done well, we just haven't won the games. I think players playing hard in the National Football League is important. I think a locker room sticking together and fighting every week, I think that's really important in the National Football League, because it doesn't happen all the time. So I think there's a lot of things that we have done well. Obviously, the record is what it is, we can't run from that either."
Johnson totaled 1,041 yards from scrimmage but feels he could even do more. Njoku flashed here and there as one of the youngest players in the league. Jackson pointing to Kizer as one of the things he did well this year, after spending a season blaming the rookie and yanking him in and out of the lineup?
Still wondering what you did well, Hue Jackson. And why you're still here.
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