The Cleveland Browns had a lot of intriguing names come in for interviews during their extensive 23-day coaching search, and they ultimately landed on former Baltimore Ravens offensive coordinator Todd Monken. He wasn’t the most exciting hire, and other teams with openings around the league weren’t blowing his phone up to get him in for an interview, but he has a ton of experience and has led his recent teams to a ton of success.
Now that the dust has settled a little bit, excitement is starting to build around Monken as so many former players and colleagues have spoken out in support of him. It makes sense why the Browns went with a career coordinator who has so much experience, and one insider recently shared more insight into how the team may have landed on Monken.
Jason Lloyd of The Athletic said on a recent episode of The Ultimate Cleveland Sports Show that Monken is far from the sexiest hire, but it does imply that owner Jimmy Haslam is more involved and invested.
He believes Monken is a Haslam hire, whereas if general manager Andrew Berry had his way, it’s possible the Browns would’ve gone the younger and more analytical route to hire Nathan Scheelhaase.
“Is it a home run hire? No. Are they going to win the press conference with that? Probably not, but the Browns have won a lot of press conferences and lost a lot of games. We’ll wait and see. It feels like Jimmy is Jimmying again,” Lloyd said.
It does feel like a Haslam hire, but the hope is that everybody was on the same page. Far too many times this organization hasn’t been aligned, and it’s why things have been so unstable for decades.
Kevin Stefanski brought some semblance of stability and was at the helm for six years, and before him it felt like there was a new head coach every month. Stefanski was able to do this despite starting three, four, and sometimes five different quarterbacks every year, so hopefully Monken can keep things going in that direction.
This team can’t afford to be firing general managers anytime soon, so it’s time for everyone to get on the same page.
The new coach is here, and anyone who isn’t excited about it needs to get on board.
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