DawgTalkers.net Forums DawgTalk Pure Football Forum Sashi Brown and Paul DePodesta Press Conference

Yes. And add Scheiner: Commanding officer in charge of the business side and you have 4 in the same rank. A very different feel from a couple of years ago.

yes. 4 in in the same rank all answering to haslam instead of banner... you guys can spin it but thats the way its setup.

If they gave a detail layout and explanation, how can you possible trust or believe?

On paper, this structure isn't bad. There are natural born leaders in many companies who can run a company with little or no knowledge of the business.

Many times you becomes so ingrained you can't think outside the box. People who walk in with no knowledge questions everything as a child learning. Nothing like explaining something realizing it doesn't make any sense.

DePodesta touched on the very matter in which this will work and that is collaboration. It really doesn't matter who is in charge of the 53 or makes final decision. Collaboration is the root. If successful, Browns win.

How is stating fact spin?

Anyone who objectively looks at that set up can easily see how it actually takes a lot of decision making out of Haslam's hands while still holding people in HIS company accountable to him. Unless you somehow believe that Haslam, as owner, should somehow be completely removed from the situation all together?

I keep hearing accusations about Haslam being a micro-manager, and how this set up allows him to meddle even more than he supposedly did before (how that's even possible), and that he's purposefully trying to run a billion dollar corporation in to the ground to prove how smart he is.... yet so far no one has been able to provide any evidence or proof showing that this is how he operates and thinks.

I'm not the one on the merry go round spinning things my friend

Amazing. Yet some poster takes rumors and then attributes those rumors as facts regarding Banner and y'all believe his stories w/out a question. He then compares the two systems as being similar and later says they aren't alike. Again, no one questions any of that.

But, you become incredulous that Haslam doesn't interfere despite him blowing things up repeatedly?

Well, if you notice, I don't ever really weigh in on anything Banner/Lombardi related. I didn't actually start paying attention to FO stuff until these last several months...

and blowing things up is not the same as him telling coaches who to play, how to play, and who to draft.

Look, I've made some pretty lengthy posts in the past about how successful companies put together their management structures and how quick firings is sometimes a part of that. I'm not going to go all in to that again (but the basis of those posts was a book titled From Good to Great).

Look, I wanted Pet to stay and Farmer and Oneill to go. But seeing how much of a mess the FO was, the first thing Haslam had to do was get the right structure in place. If Farmer and Pet couldn't bring themselves to work within that structure, so be it, that's on them. At that point there's no reason to keep anyone who isn't willing to work in that structure around. It makes zero sense.

Yes, it would have been nice had Jimmy figured all this out sooner, but he didn't, and he's basically admitted as much.

the firing of chud, banner after a year... now the firing of farmer/pettine and the lawyer in charge of the roster. come on lol. he finally got his perfect yes man...

proof enough for me.

heck.. the wild accusations are that he isn't micromanaging things, there is zero proof that he isn't.

I don't understand what is sashi saying yes to?

Seems like from the bottom up we are in a position to make better decisions

Analytics and operations - we hired the best in the game
Coaching I wanted continuity but - Hugh is better than pet
GM - addition by subtraction, I don't even know who our player personal guy is but thank the maker farmer is gone.

Even if Haslem has some maniacal micromanagement machinations - are we not at least ensuring he has better info?

I will say this. I watched the presser and I have listend to what these guys have said in other itnerviews and I have come away very, very impressed with DePodesta.

I have also come away very unimpressed with Sashi Brown. When asked what makes him ready for control of the 52 its I have been around contracts and signing free agents and handling trades for 12 years. Dotting the I and crossing the T in a contract for the Jags doesnt exactly instill confidence.

Maybe haslam's plan was to promote someone thats so incompetent the HC and Personnel guy has to be on the same page lol

Maybe he can do the job. Hell I think I could be the GM lol and he is probably a hell of a lot smarter than me with almost as much ego lol. I still however just dont see anything from the guy that gives me confidence that he will take this roster and help make it better.

Depo however is the smartest guy in the room. Something about him, I think he may have a long term future here with an ever increasing role.

I love how people bash Haslam as a"micromanager". He spent a billion dollars on a team, I think e has the right to have some input.

He has fired three sets of coaches ad GMs, but aside from Chud's crew, who honestly would have kept any of the others. Many bashing him for firing Pettine and Farmer were the same ones who bashed Pettine and Farmer and complained that they were horrible.

I'm it was not a pleasant feeling, for Haslam, at the end of the year, knowing he could not leave things as they were. Many bash Hslam as someone who knows nothing about football, yet he has been around it for quite a while. He may well know more about it then any one on these boards, yet many act as if they have superior knowledge compared to him.

I doubt highly that any owner in the NFL has a complete hands off approach. It's their money. But according to the super geniuses that live on these boards, the man knows nothing about anything. You don't become a billionaire being a fool.

Changes needed to be made, I'm sure that was not the situation he envisioned, but he had to do something, the team and FO was a mess. Many will state that it was his hirings that failed, and they would be right. But act as if because he was the one who hired them, he was supposed to just leave the situation alone. That is foolish thinking. The man made mistakes, and has made moves to correct them, IMO, that's what any intelligent business person would do.

Not particularly impressed with either.

Sashi just seemed to be bloviating with his smile all over the place. He seems to be caught up in his role and final say on the roster. Ego, maybe not, but he appears to like control.

Paul was a bit more impressive. I liked his comment: " I am self aware enough to know what I don't know".

Couldn't imagine, from what I have seen, Sashi making this comment.

Only time will tell. They seem to have given themselves a broad window to prove their talents a worthy additon.

As non-traditional, front-office execs adjust, Cleveland Browns must lean on coach Hue Jackson

Tom Reed
updated January 22, 2016 at 7:24 PM

BEREA, Ohio – The Browns introduced deep-thinking baseball maven Paul DePodesta as their chief strategy officer Thursday.

He did not promise to revolutionize the game by punting on third downs or drafting tall water-polo players as quarterbacks because research suggests they possess superior arm strength in the face of stiff lakefront breezes. Instead, DePodesta said he's self-aware enough to "know what I don't know," and understands the skepticism surrounding his dramatic job switch.

Seated next to him was fellow Harvard man Sashi Brown, the contract negotiator/capologist turned director of football operations. Three months from the draft, the executive with the final say on the 53-man roster noted that studying film "will become an increasing part of my role."

That should calm jangled nerves around Browns Town.

Although the day belonged to the organization's two non-traditional hires, Hue Jackson was never far from thought. The head coach is often the most important decision maker on any NFL franchise and Jackson's presence is even more critical in the first year of the Browns' grand experiment.

DePodesta and Brown are intelligent, self-assured and accomplished in their respective fields. They might grow into their new roles and prove valuable assets to a club that rebuilds as often as Habitat for Humanity. Each finds himself perched on a steep learning curve, though.

Jackson, 50, is the only significant new figure with experience at his current job. It was just one season with the Raiders four years ago – Jackson won eight games before being sacked -- but it makes him more qualified than the Browns' last three new coaching hires combined.

He's also spent the past 15 years in the league, often working with quarterbacks, a position that has befuddled this franchise since 1999. Nobody in the organization has a better feel for what makes a good one than Jackson. His decision to add longtime offensive assistant Al Saunders – who worked with the "Air Coryell" Chargers and Super-Bowl-champion Rams – might be the Browns' most underrated move over the past two weeks.

In the short term, anyway, Jackson is the one driving the team and should be charged with making key decisions.

"I think one of the first steps in pursuing that kind of change, the state that Paul talked about, is going out and finding a head coach that could change the tone here," Brown said. "Set a tone and change the culture so that our players were going out with a little more confidence on Sunday and expecting to win.

"In Hue we feel like we found that. We absolutely will look at this and study this quite a bit. The pieces will get in place. As Paul said, this is going to be a process. Hiring Hue was a big first step and we have plenty more steps to go."

Brown and DePodesta helped land Jackson, a coach who should earn immediate credibility with players seeing as he wasn't the club's third, fourth or fifth choice. It also should allow the executives some time to ease into their roles once they complete their front-office team with the hire of a player-personnel director.

DePodesta has the longest leash in the organization and with good reason. He's making a major transition and needs time to adjust. Don't look for a series of splashy moves. That's not his style. His impact will be more subtle and nuanced as he incorporates his philosophies into football.

Brown's task demands more urgency. He's been around the league for more than a decade and has a good reputation as a consensus builder. The NFL is filled with tough decisions and egos, however, particularly on draft night. Brown can talk all he wants about arriving at a majority opinion. That's rarely a reality, though.

My advice: Don't send many text messages on Sundays and ignore any on draft night vowing to "wreck this league."

"I feel like it's a natural transition to me," Brown said. "Actually, it probably makes me a little less scatterbrained during the day so I can focus on one area of the organization and dig a little bit deeper there."

It all sounds good and maybe Brown and DePodesta can succeed where others before them have failed. Especially, if they get the quarterback right in the draft. That buys everybody time.

For now, the Browns need to lean on Jackson to guide them through a difficult first year.

link

Brown can have "Final Say" on the roster all he wants.

Hue is going to build this team.

I don't think he'd be here if he couldn't.

That is what I was thinking as well. However, to get your foot in the door and prove yourself as a head coach, one may opt to accept the otherwise "unacceptable".

Hope you are correct about Hue carrying more weight. Would make sense to me.

Nice read Mac, thanks.

As I have said, I think Coach will have a big say. The others will be the balance.

Kind of like my comparison with Marty wanting Junkin and Charlton. At some point a voice of reason needs to step in and say "no".

This can work. Hue says this is what he needs and wants. The others come up with 4 names, then the 4 of them hash it out and come to a pick. If they can't agree, then Brown casts the final vote.

I don't think Brown is going to run renegade and start selecting players outside the parameters set by his Coach, top talent man, and Depo.

Both Brown and Depo are smart guys. Hue is a smart guy with football experience. I am sure whoever we hire as VP of Personnel will be a talented evaluator with a solid football background.

I think they will get it right.

As I said before, I'm not a fan of Brown exercising his control over the roster. Just because he's a smart guy doesn't mean he's qualified to draft and stuff.

The one silver lining is that both Brown and Depo are supposedly good at working with others and not causing internal issues (basically the anti-Farmer/Pett). I hope this is true and they're able to make this work.

I was hoping that they would take a backseat and only exercise that roster authority as a tiebreaker, but reading the transcript of that press conference doesn't seem to back that theory up. Maybe I need to actually watch and listen to get proper context.

Nothing that's been said backs up that theory. The message has been vague and all we really know is that Sashi has final say.

Everything else posted is simply how people hope it works out.

Or hope it don't.

It's really pretty simple. None of us really have any idea thus far. We know we've been told more than once that Sashi controls the 53 man roster. Other than that, everything is guess work.

Exactly. I explained what I think about it and qualified that by saying, "In the story I'm making up...", because we know nothing.

Sashi is always the tiebreaker as Alec is always the tiebreaker for the business side of the house. These are right now the 2 that JH trusts. Alec number 1 for now. Alec is the one that can drive to Bratenahl unannounced.

Either I didn't explain fully enough or you misinterpreted my meaning. I meant that if Sashi is doing his job then there will be no tiebreakers. Everyone will be on the same page and will work out an agreement on their own.


btw... I live in Bratenahl. What happened there I don't know about?

You just love to stir the pot more than Cheech & Chong in a movie don't you

j/c:

While researching another topic, I came across an article that also addressed DePodesta's role w/the Browns. I really like what he says about analytics. Check it out:



This may be the smartest guy in the building. Nicely said and I like his thought process.

I believe the Cleveland home for the Haslams is in Bratenahl

+1, and thank God...for all those who want football guys making the draft picks...just look at our first rnd picks since Haden, an impact player...Taylor, Richardson, Weeden,Mingo, Gilbert, Manziel, Shelton, and Erving...our football minds have spent 8 first rd draft picks...not a single starter left from those picks....WOW, we got great football minds making decisions...wish we had a computer on automatic and taken best player available....then we MIGHT have a starter.....looking at it in black and white sure hurts, not a single starter...why are we in cellar over and over, because we can't hit on VITAL picks.....GO Browns!!!

Wow!

You do realize there are football men who are good at their jobs and there are football men who aren't?

Maybe he was being sarcastic LOL But there is a small bit of truth there. Our "Football" guys haven't exactly been great either.

That's sort of the point of using analytics. It takes the "bad football men" out of the equation, and puts statistics in the driving seat. If we start drafting guys that have a say, 50% chance of being successful ... then we're already miles ahead of the guys we've drafted before.

I Have never met the guy. Never even passed him in a hall way and introduced myself. I have no clue about him, other than to hear good things from two other people who do know him. So I have to reserve judgement.

Sure, but it works the other way as well. There are non-football men who can identify players.

I don't know either, bro. I'm just saying I like what he said.

I believe there is good thought here. One person I see throw water on the fire is Haslam. Does he have patience?

This is not going to be a quick fix. DePodestra and gang forge a new path. I foresee a lot of mistakes this first year getting started.

I predict fans will start building gallows and sharpening axes right after Browns don't make a big splash in FA.