DawgTalkers.net Forums DawgTalk Tailgate Forum Sashi Brown: Discuss Here

This is such a terrible take. I get you feel the need to throw one final grenade into the bunker but you could have made such a better final pitch.

I spit out my La Croix when I read this....

Hey, reality bites. Sashi sucked so he's gone. Just like Hue. I don't make the news. I just report it.

Whaddya mean? Players are giving back to Hue all the time!

And they both still suck.......

anybody could have came in and did what Sashi did.
Dorsey has the hard part to do.

As bad as Sashi apparently was a drafting, 20 out of 24 players he drafted are currently on an NFL roster. The ones that aren't are all 5th round or later, except for Howard Wilson, who was a 4th rounder but never healthy.

That's actually a pretty good percentage.

I was never a big Sashi fan, and I seem to remember ripping into him at some points along the way, probably after he got fired.

Since then, my opinion has shifted somewhat as I more deeply appreciate the importance of coaching, especially in a sport like football that has so many moving parts. We've also seen how Sashi did, in fact, find some real players, many of whom are still playing in this league. Some are on the Browns and some are on other teams.

Add in that we've been cashing in his cap space and draft picks to great effect and I now think I was too harsh on Sashi when he was fired. I still think his time was very much a mixed bag and I wouldn't want to re-hire him as GM, so make of that what you will.

That's a very good percentage. I was disappointed to see him go, but who knows where we would be at this point if he had stayed...

Had Hue pulled his weight, Sashi would probably still be with the team, but we would have hired a GM to overlook the rebuild.

Sashi was never the GM. He had to sit in the role because we knew we could never hire a quality guy while we tore it down.

Yikes. What an awful take.

My argument has been that Sashi wasn't the GM. And several people have responded with something akin to 'he was doing the job of the GM, therefor, no matter what you call him, he was the GM.'

Which begs the rather obvious question; why not just call him the GM? Why create a previously non-existent position of Executive VP of Football Operations?

I agree with you.

Haslam said when we hired Sashi that we would hire a GM. We never did. One of the next hires, however, was Andrew Berry. I would contend that the two of them most likely worked as a traditional GM.

Yes, we did, it just took almost 2 years to find the right guy. I can't find the quote, but I remember Sashi saying that he was part of the hiring process of John Dorsey. Or maybe it was Haslam saying Sashi was part of that process. Either way, Dorsey was hired within hours of Sashi being fired, which means the hire was in the works for some time. In my opinion, Sashi was fired over the McCarron fiasco. Had that not happened, Dorsey would have been hired any way.

Sashi was EVP/General Counsel from 1/13 to 1/16 when his title was changed to EVPofFO. This is purely speculation on my part, but I believe Sashi spent a fair amount of time in Haslam's office talking about whatever was on Jimmy's mind. He was General Counsel. I further imagine Jimmy sought his opinion on how to fix his team. IMO, it is in these conversations that the plan not hire a GM right away was born.

I'm with you 100% with this....

It's entirely plausible before Sashi was promoted there were talks about how to get the best coaches and best GM in the game. Speculating, yes, but I don't think Sashi sought the title GM. He wanted to help bring a winner to Cleveland and he thought he knew how to do it. I believe he succeeded in this regard. I also believe Haslam felt he had the right HC in Hue, but if Hue and Sashi were butting heads, one of them had to go. When Sashi was hired, he wasn't "supposed" to be fired midway through the second season of his tenure.

j/c

So let me get this straight. Sashi helped in the hiring process to replace himself?

If he wasn't the GM, why was he replaced with a GM?

Geesh....

You don't follow other people's comments well, do you?

Oh I follow...



That would indicate we were a rudderless ship for two years with no GM and Sashi helped in the hiring process to replace himself with someone who was a GM. So we didn't ADD a GM, we replaced Sashi with a GM.

Now whether he knew he was helping to find his replacement may be up to debate according to this post, but it says what it says.

Haslam looked at a thus far failed experiment and realized he needed a group of football people if he ever planned to succeed at the football business.

In came Dorsey, Wolf and Highsmith.

If not for the open conflict between Hue and Sashi, I don't think Sashi would have been fired. He probably would have moved back into his role as General Counsel. In that regard, I don't see the firing of Sashi and the hiring of Dorsey as directly related.

Part of Jimmy's logic in that decision may have been that, having finished the job of getting a top shelf GM, Sashi was more expendable than Hue. In that regard, the 2 events would be indirectly related. But I don't see it as the direct cause/effect that you see it.

So if there weren't a GM waiting in the wings, Haslam would have fired Sashi anyway? And if Dorsey didn't replace Sashi, who did?

In all of this, people continue to overlook Andrew Berry as the main talent evaluator and manager of scouts.

And who was his boss? Who had the final say?

Before I answer your question, why don't you answer mine...if Sashi was the GM, why create a whole new position instead of just calling him the GM?

Sashi.

Has anyone disputed he had the final say?

Edit: Final say except for when Jimmy trumped him. For example when Jimmy wanted Hue and EVERYONE ELSE wanted Sean McDermott.

So we were a team that had nobody in charge to perform the duties of an NFL GM for two years? Surely even you can't possibly believe that one.

Every GM has someone under them in charge of scouting and talent evaluation. I'm not even sure what point you were trying to make there.

Let's be a bit more clear about what I said regarding Berry:

I said "main talent evaluator and manager of scouts."

Yes, teams have people outside of the the GM role manage scouts. Let's look at that other component...."main talent evaluator".

Who is the main talent evaluator now?
Who was the main talent evaluator then?

That's my point regarding people overlooking Berry's role on this team pre-Dorsey.

So it's your assertion we had "co-GM's" but the acting GM, Sashi, had final say?

That is not what I have been saying at all. I have been saying that the GM job was vacant. Sashi's job was to turn the job into something that a top shelf GM would want so we don't have to hire a GM leftover. I the absence of a GM, his secondary job was to make the roster decisions normally handled by a GM. That may seem like semantics to you, but it changed the approach and intent of how he handled those tasks.

What is clear from your arguments is that you believe that 1) roster decisions are handled by the GM, 2) Sashi was handling the roster decisions, therefor 3) Sashi was the GM. I'm arguing that if Sashi was a GM, then he would have taken the title of GM. He isn't a team builder, but he could see what needed to be done to set up a team builder for success. So that is what he set out to do, set up a real team builder. Dorsey is the team builder that took the job.

Dorsey rightfully deserves all the credit for building the Browns. But without what Sashi did, Dorsey would not have taken the job.

So you're more caught up on the title of the job than the actual responsibilities of the job. Got it!

So he did the job of a GM but since he didn't have the title of a GM he wasn't a GM.

You'll have to forgive me if I don't see that as a logical conclusion.

No.

In fact, the title of GM or EVP argument that is going on today is completely irrelevant to me and could care less about titles...YOU simply need to do a better job and processing what people's opinions are on the matter, whether you agree with it or not. You're trying to twist people's posts and fabricate it into whatever you feel like. Even your "So it's your assertion of co-GMs" to me is ridiculously stupid and out of left field as I come nowherenear to that point-of-view. In the end, Haslem could call Dorsey's title "Director of Football Tape Watching", "Director of Trusting the Gut", "Director of the Anti-Nerd and Numbers Department", or Senior VP of "Final Decisions" and his role is no different than what he is doing now as General Manager. He is the lead talent evaluator and has final say.

"My assertion" is that Sashi oversaw two main components regarding football operations: traditional scouting and the new infusement of analytics into football decisions(the latter was essentially non-existent in Berea) and as an aside, the Analytics Dept. would influence all facets of the Browns organization from sales to training to nutrition, etc.

"My assertion" is that Sashi leaned on Berry to lead everything in the traditional scouting and talent department and Sashi leaned on DePodesta for everything analytics as it relates to the plan set forth. Sashi had to marry the two components based on the plan that was approved upon by Haslem, which has been explained several times here and by the Browns and it centered around asset accumulation in the way of increasing more early round picks, increasing/managing cap space, getting younger, and selecting talent where they were picking, if not trading. Managing all of that was Sashi's biggest job. There were wins and losses in everything (I submit FAR more wins than losses)--whether it came to picks, decisions to trade or not to trade, or whether to listen to a coach or scout about a player to draft. With all the information presented to him, and sticking to the heart of the plan, Sashi then had the final say.

That's "my assertion".

I know you are smart enough to get my point. So it becomes obvious that you are intentionally ignoring my point. Sashi wasn't trying to be a GM. So judging him as a GM is misjudging him. I judge him on how well he did in attracting the best available team builder to be the GM. In that, he succeeded.

It's called "Selective Reading Syndrome". Your mind wants to read only what it wants to.

Yeah, I'm done. If Pit wants the last word, he can have it.

So because I don't wish to give a lot of consideration to outrageous, far fetched, convoluted theories, that is somehow a problem?

He had the power and the authority of an acting NFL GM. All the rest is just spin and drivel.

This well said by Memphis...


And yes, I did say Sashi didn't have the opportunity to "build" a team, and when I say that, I mean as in his team. It also doesn't mean I wish he was still here or think that he should be here. I even commented in the link provided when Sashi was fired that I was ok with him being fired, but the retention of Hue was baffling.

Going back, Andrew Berry was a main cog in this operation. He is now just a step down in Philly from the role Howie Roseman plays for the Eagles.

I have no doubt in my mind that somewhere down the road Andrew Berry will be a GM for an NFL franchise. He was a great hire by us... And while I think it's entirely plausible that we could have hired a GM, I think it's entirely plausible that Berry could have assumed that role here. His knowledge and ability is probably why we held onto him for another year under Dorsey. I believe it's rare to see the head player personnel be retained by a new regime. It's happened, I'm sure, but I'm guessing not often. I would love to investigate this further... maybe I'll find out I'm wrong. Who knows.


Also, I would like to note that I believe I'm now the leader in the clubhouse with the most Sashi mentions in my posts. Wasn't fair to have an anti-Sashite with that title...

Ah, Andrew Berry was the GM and his boss Sashi was just the figure head. But then there's that "final say" sticking point. lol

Each of you has a different theory.

I guess one should ask what you believe to be the power and authority of an acting NFL GM is...?

Perhaps you're selling the title of GM short and you do not realize all the responsibilities that go along with being a GM... and I believe the responsibilities of being GM vary from team to team as I know some GM's do not have final say.

Yet one that does isn't the GM?

No. You just keep twisting what people say.