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http://www.nationalfootballpost.com/A-lesson-learned-in-Cleveland.html

Signs were clear that Kokinis, Mangini didn’t mesh. Jack Bechta

November 03, 2009, 03:08 PM EST

Last February, I was asked by another agency to help them with their top free agent. It was the biggest free agent client this agency had ever had, so they asked me to guide them and their client through the process to make sure he got the best deal possible. I agreed.


When free agency kicked off, the player was being courted by seven teams. My job was to help set an accurate market for the player. I weeded out a few teams right away and helped narrow it to two. Then I got a call from the Browns’ new general manager, George Kokinis , who asked me to bring the player to Cleveland for a physical and signing. I told George the contract numbers that were needed to get the deal done. He didn’t blink and said he could do it.

Then, as we agents have to do during the fast-moving free agency period, I told him I would only send the player to Cleveland if they were 99-percent certain they were going to sign him at the numbers I requested. He said, “All I need is for the head coach to get a look at him and for him to pass the physical.”

I agreed to send the player with the approval of the other agent, but under one condition: If for some reason they decided not to sign him, he had to be out of the building at 1:30 p.m. the next day and on to the next team. George agreed.

I had worked with George on several players over the years while he was in Baltimore, and he had always been straightforward, professional and honest.

The next day, I spoke to George at about 10 a.m. that morning to see if they were ready to move. He said he needed a little bit more time. Keep in mind that this player was probably the first high-value free agent the new GM, head coach and current salary cap manager had brought in. So it was their first opportunity to work together.


At 1:30, I called the Browns but couldn’t get hold of anyone. This is very unusual during free agency. I finally reached the cap manager and salary negotiator, Trip MacCracken, but he had no direction yet from Kokinis or coach Eric Mangini. Two years earlier, I had worked fast and fluently with Trip on bringing top free-agent guard Eric Steinbach to the Browns, so he and I had a strong history of working together.

A few more hours passed, but there was still no decision from the Browns’ brass. Finally, at about 4:30, they sent the player to the airport with no contract. At that point, I was very pissed because we had just burned a whole day of free agency. I called George and gave him an earful. He was apologetic, but he couldn’t give me a good reason why they didn’t sign the player. I could sense he was very frustrated.

The Browns were obviously never on the same page with this particular free agent and had yet to formulate a way to work together and make decisions. Another agent I spoke to had a similar experience. The signs were there from the beginning that Kokinis had little power and that the team was somewhat rudderless.

Luckily, the next day, we ended up signing the player with a good team near the contract numbers we wanted. But the wasted day in Cleveland could have left a lot of money on the table had his new team gone in another direction. Free agency is a lot like musical chairs; you have to move fast to win.

Since then, the salary cap manager is now working in another department and a Mangini assistant was recently released. The player in question had a huge game in Week 8 and is happy with his new team. If the agent community gets the sense that quick, definitive decisions can’t be made with a particular team, they will dismiss them quickly as well.

I would love to know the player.

i wonder if we could deduce who it is?

CB Jabari Greer is my guess. I got that from the comments section of the webpage.

Somebody talented, and someone who didn't play in new york previously.

Yeah he had a int for a TD in week 8, it fits. Nice player, but big name FA? Hardly.

Who had big week 8's that were free agents?

Here were some free agent signings and their week:

Player/Position/Carries-Catches/Yds/TDs
Leonard Weaver (FB) - 8/75/1
Maurice Morris (RB) - 14/63/0
Kelley Washington (WR) - 4/58/0
Jabar Gaffney (WR) - 3/43/0
Bryant Johnson (WR) - 2/43/0
Nate Washington (WR) - 2/21/1
Correll Buckhalter (RB) - 6/30/0

Player/Position/Tackles/Sacks/FF
Jason Babin (DE/OLB) - 4/1/0
Ketih Brooking (MLB) - 11/1/0
Anthony Hargrove (DT) - 3/1/0
Marques Douglas (DE) - 5/1/0
Bart Scott (MLB) - 15/1/0
Jim Leonard (S) - 0.5/5/0
Gibril Wilson (S) - 7/1/0

sounds like the deal fell throgh b/c Mangini did not approve

I think the bigger issue is how we missed out on this yet uncomfirmed player. It really doesn't matter who the player was.. What matters is the dysfuntional way in which it appears to have been handled.

Again, this is one persons view of how it went down.. There always is another side and we aren't gonna get that anytime soon..

But if true, it's no wonder we are in the mess we are in., when the left hand doesn't know what the right and is doing,, only a mess results...

Its almost like putting the cart before the horse. GK was pulling that dead ass EM. I have never seen anything like it before.

All I can figure is that Lerner is just wading through the crap and trying to determine what the heck Mangini was or was not doing here and what is truth and what is in fact crap. Seems Mangini thought Lerners hands off method either made Randy a rube or gave him carte blanche around Berea.

It sure looks more and more like he needs to go...soon.

My guesses are Bart Scott or brian dawkins

This is why we absolutely cannot keep Mangini past this season. Does anyone really believe that any decent free agent will come here? There's really no chance.

If we want to have the kind of productive offseason that we need, Lerner's football executive needs to be inserted very quickly, and Mangini needs to be fired subsequently thereafter.

I would sooner think it was one of the safetys.
We were and still in dire need of a REAL safety that can stop the run and run to the ball and make plays.
I still don't trust Mangenius with 11 picks in the draft.
I hope if they bring in a REAL GM that they can his arse so quick his head snaps.
I hope that Lerner can get the structure that is needed in the organization.
There needs to be a president of football operations that is a strong figure and knows what the hell is going on.
Then hire a GM that knows talent and will get the CORRECT coach in here to run the disfunction.
There is some talent here, just not nearly enough.
We shall see what transpires.
I still LOVE MY BROWNS, just really going crazy thinking that we may be the new Bungles or Loins.

Free agents would come here. They always follow the money.

With that said, the Browns fired the wrong guy. I like Kok more than Mangini.

Weebbagie

Bob Hunter commentary: Powerless GM made Browns' scapegoat
Wednesday, November 4, 2009 3:09 AM
By Bob Hunter

THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH

Could the Cleveland Browns have fired anyone more blameless for that horrendous football mess on the lakefront than the general manager who really wasn't a general manager?

How about a secretary, maintenance guy or parking lot attendant? Or maybe the guy who walks team owner Randy Lerner's dog?

There is only one way this ridiculous fire-the-GM-who-was-hired-by-the-coach move works: That's if Lerner, who is quickly establishing his credentials as the dumbest owner in NFL history, hires the smartest, toughest, doesn't-give-a-damn-about-Eric-Mangini guy he can find and gives him carte blanche to do whatever is necessary to make this dysfunctional operation work.

If that means firing Mangini, the coach who would be king, do it. If that means turning offensive coordinator Brian Daboll into a glorified ball boy, do that, too. If it means trading quarterback Derek Anderson for a bag of footballs, go for it. It's the only way any of this makes sense.

Story continues belowAdvertisement Everybody in football gasped when Lerner, after firing his previous coach and general manager, hired the new coach first -- a guy who had just been fired by the New York Jets -- and then let Mangini name his pal George Kokinis as general manager.

That might work in a third-world dictatorship -- really, the guy with all of those strings attached to him only looks like a puppet -- but it doesn't work with a pro football team, especially one where the owner seems clueless and the coach is determined to always get his way.

To see coach Mangini standing in front of reporters yesterday explaining that " We felt organizationally this was the best decision in terms of moving forward" and then refusing to say much of anything else about Kokinis' firing was bizarre. Did the coach fire the GM, or did the owner? Or was it some mysterious man behind the curtain?

And if the coach can't say anything about it -- "I hope you can also respect I've added all I can add right now" was Mangini's repeated response -- why is he serving as the spokesman? Lerner said earlier that he wanted to add "a strong, credible, serious leader within the building to guide decisions in a far more conspicuous, open, transparent way," so why wasn't he at least standing before an angry public taking all the questions that Mangini refused to answer?

Lerner's predicament is easy to understand: If he dumps Mangini at this point, he's on the hook for his contract (Mangini is in the first year of a four-year, $12 million deal) while still paying the salaries of former GM Phil Savage through 2012 and ex-coach Romeo Crennel through 2011. And he also faces the public ridicule of admitting that he totally blew it when he handed Mangini the reins of the franchise. But while it might be easier for an owner to fire everybody around an unsuccessful coach, who is owed a lot of money, that rarely works.

If Lerner isn't going to fire the guy who loaded the roster with former Jets, has alienated half of his players, has totally mishandled the quarterback situation and has his team off to a 1-7 start, then he at least needs to hire a competent football man and let him run the franchise. Unfortunately, Lerner has done nothing to indicate he's capable of finding and hiring a competent guy of any kind, so the chances of that happening at this point seem pretty remote.

Barring that kind of miracle, the next-best solution is to find the person who is responsible for this nuclear waste dump of an organization and at least get him out of there before he has a chance to add to the chaos.

I'm guessing the dog walker could be next.

Bob Hunter is a sports columnist for The Dispatch.

bhunter@dispatch.com

If this is true...Mangini needs to go within the hour.

True, but I tend to think Kok would have been doing something if not for Mangini.

I think your right Deep. It seems that everything I've heard about the guy is good. Both before we hired him and after. It's hard to keep a guy who isn't doing his job but if the real problem is the guy you kept than your really not fixing anything.


I think the next move has to be to get a strong GM or President in here and let him have all the power to fix the team. If that means firing EM then fire him and get on with the rebuild.

That said I have little faith that it will happen. For whatever reason Learner has yet to go that route. We will probably get a guy nobody has ever heard of and let EM continue to run things the same way he has. It looks like Kokinis is just a scap goat.

Mangini is as good as gone. We'll bring in a GM or President, and maybe it won't be a real well known guy, but that doesn't mean he isn't good. A lot of the best guys out there were unknown to fans like us until they got the big job.

The guy I'd want the most is Parcells, but I don't expect him to leave Miami. Haslett is high on my list, and the guy from the Giants who Accorsi recommended would be good.

Again your probably right. I guess I'm just to the point where I no longer get my hopes up that it will be done right. He has had a lot of chances to fix it but keeps doing the wrong thing.

Is there really anyone who thinks it will be done right this time.

I'm not one of the guys who thinks he doesn't care and I think he wants to win as bad as the rest of us. I'm just not sure he knows what to do.

Completely agree.

According to this Dawgpound Mike guy, Lerner specifically asked both fans that met with him yesterday about Mangini.

The response, which is linked below, was given by Randall, who said that Mangini should not stay because of the risk of losing key players or not having key players come in free agency.

Randall believes that if things don't improve this season, Mangini will be fired. He also says that Lerner made it clear that he will spend "any amount of money" to get this right and "takes full responsibility" of the current state of the team.

Fans Meet with Lerner

Quote:

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I like Kok more than Mangini.

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Just curious,, why?

j/c

My guess to what happened is that Kok made that agreement with the agent before even discussing the player with Mangini and Mangini had a fit and it probably happened a few more times until Kok said "Here you can just do my job too then." Kok was probably not consulting Mangini on moves and Mangini probably though he had a little more say on things then should have.

It is 12:03 in the afternoon and Mangini still isn't fired? WTF???

Everyone who'd ever worked with him had nothing but good things to say.

Spectre, the situation doesn't matter. The Raiders and Redskins always get their FA's. It's all about the money.

That's why it is very important we get the right guy to lead the office. A prominent and respected name will bring some respect back to the organization while they attempt to rebuild.

And if the players believe this is the person that can change the culture here, they will follow his lead.

And there are a few names that have that respect among the players and coaches.

Quote:

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Everyone who'd ever worked with him had nothing but good things to say.

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that's true,, never heard a bad word from anyone about him.. So where did he go wrong? Maybe he didn't go to randy and say something about manginis actions. Maybe Randy thought that was disloyal..

Or, maybe, as we are beginning to hear a little about, there was something else happening.. something not even football related... Dunno