The Cleveland Browns have one of the best defenses in the National Football League. That has been the case since Jim Schwartz took the reins of the unit.
And while Kevin Stefanski has had a revolving door of offensive assistants, the defensive coordinator has stayed the same. If anything, that unit is always ready to play, and it looks like the offense and the defense are two entirely different teams from different organizations at times.
With that in mind, Fred Greetham believes it’s time Schwartz gets his chance.
He doesn’t see him staying as the defensive coordinator for someone else if the team fires Kevin Stefanski.
“If Stefanski is fired, I doubt if Schwartz would stay on as the defensive coordinator with another guy coming in. If you’re gonna move on, to me, he’s the most logical candidate, is make Jim Schwartz the head coach because then you still have your defense intact,” Greetham said.
That makes perfect sense. Schwartz has earned his stripes.
He’s got previous head coaching experience, and while his tenure in charge of the Lions didn’t end well, he’s paid his dues since. More than that, he’s done an outstanding job with the Browns’ defense. The players seem to respect him and believe in him.
That’s not to say that he should be the only candidate to consider for an eventual head coaching position. Still, not giving him a chance to at least make his case would be a disservice to what he’s done for the organization.
And as much as any new coach would love to keep him around as defensive coordinator, it’d be easy to understand why he’d feel undermined and wouldn’t want to stay.
The Browns can’t allow that to happen, all things considered.
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