DawgTalkers.net Forums DawgTalk Pure Football Forum Browns fire Freddie Kitchens

I don't want McDaniels. The ONLY thing going for him is that he's already had a spell as a HC that was a failure so if he did get the gig here in CLE there is a chance that he learned from that? But I really want a proven guy. McCarthy or Rivera. After those two choices there is a big big drop off. There was an interesting article with info on Harbaugh the other day - I'd forgotten how well he did in San Fran. While he has been average in Michigan, maybe he's just a better NFL coach? He might be 3rd choice right now since I really don't want to take a chance going the up and coming coordinator option.

This is pretty damning. I don’t live in Cleveland but I follow the team intensely. I don’t remember Donovan ever criticizing an outgoing coach.

Edit: The tweet link I posted got deleted. It was Jim Donovan criticizing Kitchens.

He was even doing it on air! Saying it’s ridiculous that we’re so ill-prepared, etc. Jimmy has a good pulse on the team obviously ... and he’s right. It’s time to make Baker be COACHED and held accountable as the QB

more of a shot at Lindley, which I haven't seen one person say he's a good coach..but in the end thats on FK as well

What makes you think Baker isn't being held accountable for his performances already?

I think it was pretty obvious from the get-go. He told Baker in the off-season to "not worry about football" for a few months, and had a nonchalant approach towards guys missing OTAs in the off-season. That attitude sort of spilled over into the rest of the season, where it felt like everyone just thought we'd win on our talent alone. Baker needs a coach pushing him to be better. Not one trying to be his buddy.

Every guy who has had a head coaching job failed or he wouldn't available. Relevancy time frame is usually pretty small. McD, if honest to himself, hopefully sorted his shortcomings out. Every good man should be doing just that. I'm liking Roman and McD. Josh should take Carolina unless he's absolutely infatuated with being a Brown.

I would take Baker over the uncertainty of Cam Newton. I would take David Tepper (and basically every other owner) over the Haslams.

One year ago, I got flamed hard for saying Freddie sounded like a big dumb hick and hoped he wasn't actually. I know I shouldn't expect apologies...

All of Freddies fan club are in hiding or they no longer post.they can't admit they were wrong

Does this make you feel better about being "right" about Freddie? Ugh...

I wasn't really on board with the Freddie hire, but I don't have the stomach for kicking a guy while he's down (like the clowns employed by the Cleveland media), or even gloating about who was 'right/wrong' about the hire. Yuck...

j/c...

Re: the "Freddie Fan Club"...

Freddie was basically hired because of his playcalling as interim OC, his work tweaking Haley's offense into something that worked surprisingly well, and having Baker playing pretty solid ball. For me, I was hoping they would promote him simply by dropping the interim tag, and bring in someone that could potentially groom him for the HC position (and that person was available, in Arians).

Now, fast forward to today... we all saw what we saw on the field week in and week out. We "knew" that Kitchens might not be the most solid leader in terms of discipline and everything else that goes into leading a team, but the most shocking thing was how bad he ended up being at the things that got him hired...

1. Putting together an offense that got all his guys playing really well.
2. Calling plays well.

Those 2 elements were not only bad, but were ridiculously and hilariously bad. And those were the things that got him hired!!!

I'm just shocked how a person/staff can go from one extreme to another over a single offseason. It's mind-blowing.

I;m not sure why you think you'd be entitled to one? There's nothing about his failures this season that proves he was a "big dumb hick".

I didn't care for his hiring to begin with, but there were plenty of reasons in favor of it, plenty of reasons to be critical or skeptical of his selection.

Unless you are looking for validation in being discriminatory and prejudiced? That would be weird...

I wanted Arians or Williams. I would have been happy with McCarthy. I just wanted a decent, experienced head coach. Was tired, and still am, of On The Job Trainees.

I think Freddie cost himself the job by not letting Monken call plays, at worst he could have fired monken and bought himself another year..But I venture to say that Monken calling plays with his offense we would prob be in playoffs.

I'd say it's in his own tone. He's already being dismissive of the need for a private coach in the off season... because he doesn't need anyone to teach him how to do a three step drop. That may be true, but it was clear even to me that his mechanics sucked this year. When it's obvious a person needs to improve, and admit as much, it's usually not a good sign when they are prematurely deciding what they don't need to do.

This isn't to say that he's played it Lone Wolf all year. I think it's just that no one in the organization has sat him down and laid out for him what its going to take to be successful, how much time and effort it will take.

I'm not sure that a person or staff went from one extreme to the other.

Freddie was promoted into a completely different job and both the OC and DC were changed. The staff was pretty much overhauled and very few parts of the 2018 staff were still here in 2019.

I was not in favor of naming Freddie the HC. I didn't throw a fit about it and I'm certainly not one to toot my own horn and say I told you so. But I think as we can now all see it was too much, too soon for Freddie.

I was hoping to see him evolve and things to progress over the course of the season but alas that simply didn't happen. If anything, both the Cardinals and Bengals games showed regression.

I saw regression as well, but sometimes I feel like it wasn't so much regression as what felt to me like we ran out of ideas within the first few Weeks? Most of the latter half of the season was stuff we'd already seen before. Plenty of opponents essentially said as much.

I guess maybe it's semantics. If you are failing and not correcting the reasons you're failing, I consider that regression.

Edit; I guess stagnation may have been more appropriate.

I was hoping to spark some more thought-provoking convo. I'm not a fan of the "haha, told you so" posts about a guy that just got fired.

I also just think it's crazy that a guy that was hired almost solely based on 3 things

1. Mayfield looking good
2. His crafting of an offense on the fly
3. Playcalling

could flip those things 180 in a matter of 1 offseason. The 3 things that landed him the job got so so SO bad the moment he became head coach. That boggles my mind.

It really doesn't surprise me that much. We've seen all too many times people who performed very well as both OC's and DC's simply aren't cut out for the head coaching role. That's a big step up and with Freddie, very little experience in anything even remotely close to such a role only compounded the problem.

And we all have our opinions and for the most part they are just that. I don't actually believe that Freddie "crafted on offense on the fly" last year. There simply wasn't time in mid season for that to happen. I think most of it was the already in place system of Haley's with some wrinkles here and there. Even at that, we could have never have ran that same offense this season.

I know we were very predictable this season but the same would have been said had we stuck with the very simple offense we had last year. Once teams had ample film on Baker and what we were doing last season, the whole thing would have folded.

I feel like we were outcoached almost every game this season. Even wins we were outcoached but we were just more talented. Most notable the Jets and Bengals wins felt like losses.

It was hard to watch this season and we never seemed to get on track.

Jim Donovan said it well....

We certainly didn't see the progress one would hope to see develop. Unlike many, I expected a slow start given the schedule and inexperience of Kitchens. But as far as progress, there was zero evidence that was happening.

If we kept Freddie I would have had a very uneasy feeling during the whole offseason based on the way I saw us play. I didn't feel things were going to get better if we kept him. I hate to see another coach of ours get fired so quickly but I believe in the long run it was the best thing to do. Maybe now if we find the right HC and add some good players we can make that playoff run next year.

Mangini is the biggest pile of crap that the franchise ever hired.

And there has been a lot of crap piles.

Played favorites, had team spies.

j/c

My holiday wish last year was to keep as much the same as possible. That meant taking the 'interim' label off FK's OC post, hiring Williams as HC, and finding a new DC. Minimal disruption, minimal upheaval.

So of course, CLE had to disrupt as many avenues and channels as possible, because that's what CLE always does. Cyclic insanity.

That's why I was calling 8-8 most of the year.

Too many folk that predicted 10-6 or better are now ready to use razors on their wrists as they jump from the Terminal Tower. I suspect that a good many of those fans looked past the 'startup syndrome' that has perennially plagued this team for 20 years.

We will never know how good an OC Kitchens might have made because he was too busy being a bad HC. And we will never know how good a HC Kitchens might have made because he was too busy being a bad OC.

If you are looking for immediate success, you give a man ONE freakking job to learn/master. You don't give him two full-time jobs when he had zero experience with one, and only 2 months experience at the other.

John Dorsey put together a Lamborghini, then tossed the keys to a 16 yr-old Kitchens who was still operating on a temp driver's license.

Dumb ish at the top leads to dumb football at the bottom.

Barring a Holy Lightning Strike, this experiment had a lot more 'fail' baked into it than just about any other outcome.

I'm disappointed, but not surprised in the least.

I actually wish FK a solid, happy future. He seems like the kind of guy who could have a long rewarding career as position coach. No shame in that whatsoever. Friends with the players, liked and respected for his knowledge and experise, right amount of responsibility for his personality make up. Better to become really good at one thing, than to be lousy at lots of things.

_________________________


Many years ago, I was offered an admin post at my job. Big pay boost, new skills to learn, change of profile. I asked to see the job description in writing. Two days later, I got that job description. Took me about 10 minutes to realize that it wasn't for me. Not because the job itself was too much. It was because I knew that my on-stage playing would suffer, my admin learning curve would be slowed because of the rehearsal/concert schedule, and that I'd fail to do justice to either job. Smartest decision I ever made.

It's too bad that FK lacked the same level of self-awareness. He might have actually been good at one or the other.

Now, let's see what fresh insanity CLE will concoct to dismantle the team we have in favor of building a new untested team with unrealized potential.

That's the Cleveland way.
#groundhogday/356
#sotiredofthis


.02

I hate to say it but I still thought they’d give him another year. Damn glad they didn’t. He cost us big this year by not instilling discipline like Williams did. Our defense sucked without Williams. And Garrett is the example of no discipline.

Lol ......yep he was...it’s ok to let it go bro.

https://www.yahoo.com/sports/taking-shot...-173228834.html

Taking shots or talking truth? Jarvis Landry on respect, leadership after Freddie Kitchens' firing
Cassandra Negley
Cassandra NegleyYahoo Sports Contributor
Yahoo SportsDecember 30, 2019, 12:32 PM EST
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Jarvis Landry had a lot to say the morning after the Cleveland Browns put themselves back on the decades-long coaching carousel by firing Freddie Kitchens after one season.

The Browns (6-10) were supposed to finally be good this season with a cast of superstars, but 2019 was one issue after another. Landry answered questions with the media Monday morning and was either taking shots at the former coach, or simply telling the truth depending on how you look at it.

Landry: Browns need respect, leadership
Kitchens’ short tenure was filled with missteps both on and off the field. Landry’s comments about respect, via Aditi Kinkhabwala of NFL Network, indicate concerns it was never present.


Aditi Kinkhabwala
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@AKinkhabwala
Asked WR Jarvis Landry for the key traits needed in the #Browns next head coach: “Someone who demands respect, someone who respects his players and someone who respects opponents.”

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11:22 AM - Dec 30, 2019
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In December alone, Kitchens got into it with Landry on the sidelines and the following week did the same with Odell Beckham Jr.

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Then there’s the “Pittsburgh Started It” T-shirt he wore out to the movies after defensive end Myles Garrett hit Steelers quarterback Mason Rudolph in the head with his own helmet. Kitchens defended wearing it, saying his daughter got it for him, but he also proudly stood for at least one photo with a fan.

All of this was while the Browns were still in the hunt for a playoff spot; a second win against the rival Steelers would have put them in an even better spot. The organization stood by the coach, even saying on the final weekend that a win over the Cincinnati Bengals might save Kitchens his job. That never came to fruition.

Landry also told reporters the team needs leadership, which could be a reference to any of the above, or even quarterback Baker Mayfield.


Tony Grossi
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@TonyGrossi
To Jarvis Landry: what’s needed here? Landry: ‘Leadership. Just leadership.’

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Mayfield was brought back to earth his sophomore campaign with 22 touchdowns and 21 interceptions, second to only Jameis Winston. His quarterback rating took a hit and he found out that venting frustrations at the post-game podium isn’t the way to handle business. On the final day of the season, he got into with a fan before losing to a one-win team. And he’s already stated he won’t work with a private coach, as some of the best in the NFL do during the offseason.

Cardinals loss showed it wouldn’t work
The Browns woes started early with a season opening 30-point loss to the Tennessee Titans. But it wasn’t until the Week 15 game against the Arizona Cardinals that Landry said he realized Kitchens time might have run out, per Keith Britton of 92.3 The Fan.


Keith Britton
✔
@KeithBritton86
#Browns WR Jarvis Landry says "maybe the Arizona game" was when he thinks they realized this wasn't going to work out

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At that point the Browns were 6-7 and alive in the playoff race. But a 38-24 loss dimmed that light, and made the franchise the only team in the decade to have a losing season every year. It was also the game that Landry got into with Kitchens on the sidelines, though he downplayed the fourth-quarter yelling after the game.

Landry could be out 6-8 months
The 2019 issues that arose for the Browns are lengthy. Part of that is how the franchise has handled medical issues. Mayfield publicly ripped the medical staff in Week 14 when asked about a report that Beckham needs offseason surgery. The struggling star receiver reportedly played through a sports hernia.

Landry has also dealt with an injury all year. Late last week he divulged a hip injury that started with a fractured bone at the base of his spine last summer.

Via the Associated Press:

''Just talking to the doctors and the early scans from OTAs, I began with a fractured sacrum and then, from there, everything else just kind of started going bad,'' the 27-year-old said.

''My hip has been bothering me since then and it's definitely been a battle. I wouldn't say it's gotten worse — I'd call it nagging — but it definitely is not getting better.''

He didn’t skip a game, but if he needs surgery it might put the start of 2020 into question. He said he would be out 6 to 8 months if he needed surgery, per Britton. If he had it now, eight months would be the start of August if all went well. Beckham will reportedly also undergo surgery for his hernia.

Cleveland Browns wide receiver Jarvis Landry had a lot to say during locker clean-outs. (AP Photo/Tony Dejak)
Cleveland Browns wide receiver Jarvis Landry had a lot to say during locker clean-outs. (AP Photo/Tony Dejak)

Baker being a donkey. If 2019 is an indicator of how he does on his own he should seriously rethink it.

Sounds like Freddie was kind of a weiner.. .

Dumb would have sufficed

Hmm... does anyone else find it a bit ironic Landry is talking about the need for respect and leadership? I mean, I'm glad we have Jarvis, but he certainly had no problem of taking advantage of the teams weak leadership when he decided to get cute with OBJ and the shoes.

For 16 weeks we saw other players having to tell OBJ where to line up (I'm pretty sure I even saw some of our no name TEs direct him a couple of times). I'm curious to know how many times Jarvis had a heart to heart with OBJ and said "Look man, I love ya, but you've got to get on the same page and figure out what you're doing".

After last season Landry emerged as a team leader. I didn't see that guy all 16 games this year. Where was he?

Sorry. He's certainly in a position to talk about the lack of leadership this year, but he's got no room to criticize the lack of.

Did you watch Landry's mic's up? The guy is a leader and great teammate. And he balled hard. While injured.

If you want to rag on a player, pick someone else, because Landry has been outstanding.

You should watch Building the Browns. He seems like the only real leader on the team.

Our defense sucked with Williams.

Considering the injuries, rookies, and the dismantling Dorsey did, I'd say that Wilks did a pretty good job. On top of that he slowed Lamar as good or better than anyone.

Our defense was markedly better last year based on DVOA. We were 26th this year and 12th last year. Losing Myles Garrett for a significant portion of the season definitely had something to do with that. Also contributing to the drop off was a major regression from Larry Ogunjobi, Damarious Randall, and Joe Schobert.

The good thing is that defenses are pretty inconsistent in how they perform year to year. For example, last year the Bears had the best defense by a wide margin and this year they were 11th and Tampa Bay was dead last in DVOA but this year finished 3rd.

I'm still scratching my head wondering why we didn't blitz the young and/or inexperienced qb's we faced.