DawgTalkers.net Forums DawgTalk Pure Football Forum Tony Grossi Upset w/ Browns in FA

I didn't want to detract from the FA threads highlighting FA transactions and discussions, so thought I'd post the article as a separate thread.

Enjoy!

Amid a whirlwind of wild transactions, overmatched Browns stand in place and fall further behind

By Tony Grossi | ESPNCleveland.com

The Morning Kickoff …

The day that was: For 16 years, the Browns for the most part have been in a different league than the best NFL teams. You see it every Sunday if you have the luxury of watching NFL Red Zone.

The way the good offenses glide effortlessly down the field v. the Browns’ feeble stabs at first downs, their inept offense inevitably undermining the best efforts of their defense. It’s almost a different sport.

And that was the feeling I had on Tuesday watching the league pass by the Browns on the first day of the 2015 league season.

It was a gut-wrenching display of a flawed organization incapable of keeping up with the big boys. In only their second season together, the inexperienced tandem of GM Ray Farmer and coach Mike Pettine took on the appearance of lost baby dinosaurs.

The NFL entered a new warp speed on Tuesday, leaving the Browns sputtering in place like the same, worn-down treadmill they have personified for 16 years.

Nothing hit home harder than the news that the Eagles and Rams had been talking for weeks about exchanging high-profile quarterbacks Nick Foles and Sam Bradford.

The mega-deal was the headline of an unprecedented spate of dizzying, unforeseen, fantasy-like transactions.

The fact that the Browns could be content signing Josh McCown while knowing Foles and Bradford were available signifies the misdirected football acumen and leadership that plagues the franchise.

Their disdain for Brian Hoyer is one thing. Their infatuation with Johnny Manziel is another. Their stated belief that they can compete with the 36-year-old McCown tossing passes to Brian Hartline and handing off to Terrance West and Isaiah Crowell is, quite frankly, an insult to the collective intelligence of a suffering football populace steeped in the genius of Paul Brown.

Days like Tuesday cause me to wonder if the rest of us care more than them.

Not that the Browns’ inactivity should come as a surprise. It was expected. For they are either paralyzed by the colossal twin whiffs of Justin Gilbert and Manziel a year ago or are certifiably tanking the season in an elaborate Hail Mary pass play to land quarterback Cardale Jones in 2016. At this point, sign me up for that.

Honestly, I have no other explanation for their offseason moves thus far.

And the preposterous reported dalliance with hired-gun cornerback Darrelle Revis merely underscores the depth of the problem.

Let’s suppose, for one moment, that the Browns seriously entertained the notion of adding Revis, who ultimately signed with the Jets for $70 million -- $39 million of which is guaranteed. To think the Browns would invest anything close to that in a cornerback after a year ago making Joe Haden the sport’s highest paid cornerback – at the time -- at $67.5 million and then forsaking a much-needed receiver in the draft to select yet another cornerback with the eighth overall draft selection, Gilbert, is insane, given the team’s myriad deficiencies on offense.

The Patriots made a similar covenant with Revis a year ago. But even for them, blessed with the best coach and quarterback of their time, it took a heroic defensive play by a role player at the goal line against the worst play-call of all time for the Patriots to achieve their goal of a Super Bowl championship.

Maybe the agents of Revis led the Browns to believe there was a chance he would take his services to Cleveland. If so, shame on the Browns for going along with such a scam. Whatever energy was exerted on chasing the ghost of Revis could have been better used on pursuing a quarterback to restore faith in the locker room, much less the fan base.

To comprehend how behind the pack the Browns have fallen, consider the meteoric strides of the Buffalo Bills, whose playoff drought exceeds that of even the Browns.

Derided nationwide for stupidly giving the Browns their 2015 first-round draft choice a year ago in the trade to move up and take Sammy Watkins, who turned out to be the fourth-best receiver in the epic rookie class ignored by Farmer, the Bills have since:

* Changed owners.

* Seen their head coach exercise a $4 million option to walk away.

* Hired an excitable and proven coach in Rex Ryan.

* Acquired through trade a two-time All-Pro running back, LeSean McCoy, and laid the ground work to sign one of the premier blocking fullbacks, Jerome Felton.

* Traded for a quarterback, Matt Cassel, who has won 10 games in a season with two different teams.

* Re-signed double-digit sacker Jerry Hughes to an already loaded defensive line.

* Laid the ground work to sign one of the most versatile, young tight ends on the free agent market, Charles Clay.

The Browns? They signed two released players, McCown and Hartline, and permitted five prominent players from their 7-9 season enter free agency. Two of them have left – cornerback Buster Skrine to the Jets and Hoyer expectedly to the Texans – and the three others are not expected to return.

On the day of so many eclectic transactions that transformed many teams, the Browns issued a press release detailing their plans to unveil their new uniforms in an “orange carpet” media event on April 14.

Such is the state of the Browns.

Article

Hey Tony...Go root for Buffalo

Lets wait and see what we do in the draft

Let's get back to the days of making a big FA splash on the first day ala GM Phil Savage. That always worked out well didn't it?

To me, this a an all-time low for Grossi.

Tony Grossi, while he makes some good points, is an idiot.

Ray Farmer WARNED the fans that the Browns would not be buyers in free agency.

Ray Farmer PROVED he can draft/sign good rookies; Bitonio, West, Crowell, K'Williams, Desir, Gabriel, Kirksey. Even though he under performed, Justin Gilbert DID improve on the field as the year went on (even if he was a bum off the field). That's 8 rookies who contributed last year.

Why go out and pay a player $15 million to come to a city they don't have any interest in playing for??

It takes BOTH SIDES to make a deal...

For all we know, Farmer/Haslam made big pushes at Skrine and Revis, would YOU pick the city of Cleveland over New York? Probably not...

Everybody needs to relax. Free agency didn't pick up and move. It's not over. Their are still dozens of veteran players we can sign that would help this team.

Let's see how big of a "splash" the Bills, Jets, Eagles and Dolphins make in the playoffs next year...

The winners yesterday were the Rams and the Seahawks, but they're two teams that are already in pretty good shape.

We have work to do at a lot of positions...

It was known they wouldn't be making big FA splashes, they have not hidden that from the media. Besides, big FA signings haven't usually worked out all that well for us.

I dislike most of this article by Grossi. Must have had a bad night or something.

Don't be down on Tony. He is just frustrated like some fans. I agree with him. The Browns seem to be a flawed oganization, but I will still root for them.

Most..FA's are out for the money.. imo it's hard to hit on a guy who takes the money and then wants to play his heart out.

This is just standard par for the course for Grossi.

Let me repeat this. At one point I didn't understand the disdain for Grossi. However, I never really listed to him or read him consistently until this past year. I listen to him every morning on the RBS, and read every one of his articles. I have concluded this much: a) he has no inside knowledge at all of what goes on with the Browns (Rizzo has more sources inside Berea) and b) he is little more than any of us on this board ... a fan who easily gets his panties in a bunch when the Browns don't do what he thinks they should do. I should add a third point...he's actually worse than many on here ... he will flip flop his position on a topic to ride the wave of public opinion ... he absolutely loves the attention.

He is actually saying Matt Cassell is a good QB and that the Bills made a terrific move to acquire him because he won 10 games 4 years ago under Belichek ... he makes this point all in an effort to make the Browns look bad. Think about that for a second.

I mostly read and listen to him now for the comedic value of it all.

I'd assume Grossi is pretty upset (on an annual basis) with the FA activity of the Steelers and Ravens too.

Where he's right

- Signing McCown. I mean seriously....wtf. The only way this makes sense is that they are effectively green lighting Manziel as the starter this year.

- Not being a player in trades. There were bargains to be had. The Lions got Ngata for a song. Either Foles or Bradford could have been had for a respectable offer it seems.

Where he's wrong

- It's not like the Browns haven't been after people. We have to be realistic. If a player has the option between two teams for similar money and one is far better than the other, where ya gonna go? Our attractiveness will improve as our record does.

- Using Cassel as a "plus" point for Buffalo. Dude is horrible. Maybe not as horrible as McCown, but pretty bad.

- Acting like the players we let test free agency were crucial. Fact is, none of them were. We did the right thing and put a good tender on Gipson. All of our long term pillars (Thomas, Mack, Haden)are locked up and we've got a good crop of rising talent (Bitonio, Gabriel, Williams, Kirksey, Crowell) at the start of their contracts plus a decent base of talent.

As a team, we still make our fair share of headscratchers but we are at a better place today than we were a couple of years ago. I mean, gad, who remembers the days when we had such all-stars like Fred Stokes and the immortal Ralph Brown as starters on this team?

It seems like a flawed org because you have Tony writing articles like this..

Why couldn't he write something like this..

The Browns didn't do much in FA , which was expected. The draft is right around the corner . The excitement is building. Lets hope to see a good draft.

That takes away the org sounding so bad.. It may be a great draft or it may not..

But why sit around being negative as hell until it happens. That was meant for Tony.

Can we get Grossi traded for something? Anything? If the extent of your journalism is a beatdown for your beat, you aren't loyal at all much and I wonder who the audience is for your blowhard abuse and a diet of hyperbolic negativity complementing your myopic mindset.

Checks cash the same it seems. Some like this drivel. Certainly not as much as those who crank it out.

"The sky is falling!" ...... in the 1st few days of free agency.

How long does it take for the sky to fall?

It's been falling since 1999

I think if we ever find ourselves winners, divisional and in the playoffs, then I'll believe the sky is falling.

lol hope it starts falling soon then

I cannot believe that a responsible journalist would write (and perhaps even believe) this. Irresponsible "reporting"...or should I say merely editorialing.

He's right though.

Even JAX and the Raiders land very good talents. Dan Williams, Odrick, House, Julius Thomas

Whereas the Browns can't even convince their own guys to stay for more money (Skrine, Cameron). They even managed to mob their QB out of town, who IS (was?) a Browns fan. The OC wanted out. The caricature of a GM textgates the org into a new level of evident incompetency after wasting two 1st round picks in an incredibly strong draft.

Mack will leave after next season too and I'm not sure how long Joe T wants to endure this and call it a career or asks for a trade.

This is heading towards a monumental blowup 10 months from now. FO, coaches, players, everything. Guess who stays...

Be prepared and stay strong

I didn't want Bradford, not sure which QB Foles really is, and I wanted to keep Hoyer to at least have some consistency on offense, (if he's good enough for the Texans.... and I still think his abysmal second half had a lot to do with "burnout" from his rehab and excessive preparation). McCown is just a stop-gap vet who could range anywhere from decent to god-aweful. To me, (by possibly resigning Hoyer,) the QB situation was at best going to move laterally until we get to the draft. I believe Manziel is a bust and I hope we either go up to get Mariota, draft Petty or fail for Cardale. The QB of the future is clearly (at least to me) not on the roster.

Revis was never going to happen, even the FO had to realize that. I'm certainly glad we didn't sign him. Skrine clearly didn't want to be here, so sayonara. I'm not convinced that Gilbert can't turn it around and Skrine would have commanded a large salary for a slot guy, (though I would have kept him to put him in the slot if Gilbert steps up). As it is, we go with KW and I'm good with that.

If Cameron goes away, so be it. IMHO he's brittle, useless half the season, and wants to get paid like the #1 TE in the league. Yeah... good luck with that.

Hartline was a good signing. He'll make a fine #2. In fact the most impressive news as a Browns fan coming out of this FA period is Hartline's comment that he came here because of Pettine and Pettine's plan, even though he had other options.

We need to draft a #1 WR, I hope Farmer's ego will allow him to do it. Hopefully White or Cooper will be there at 12 if we don't move up to grab Mariota. If we don't get a WR in the first round, (because and only because we took Mariota), we need to get one in the second. Fortunately it's a deep draft. Again, I hope Farmer's ego will allow him to draft a #1 WR.

I see nothing wrong with West & Crowell running the rock.

I don't know why we would let Sheard walk, especially since we need decent DE's badly. I hope that doesn't happen. If it does, I will see that as a stupid move.

Screw the Bills. They don't look like a playoff team so far, and we'll see what dysfunction Ryan eventually rains on their asses a year or two from now. IMHO, he gets way too much credit as (again in IMHO) I simply see him as a big mouth, press hungry, half-assed coach ala Chumley.

Over-all, I'm not impressed by the "mega-deals", the "unprecedented trades" or the "high profile acquisitions". Personally, I don't expect us to do well this year, and it has nothing to do with our lack of activity in free agency. IMHO we are still building in Pettine's image, have a ridiculous QB situation, and a very tough schedule. Having said that, I understand Grossi's frustration, but don't give two craps about his opinion.

Y+The last time it happened, it took a solid 6 months for the whole darn thing to fall completely down.

And history shows teams like these will be restructuring or outright dumping these players in short order. Or they won't be able to sign guys who are more valuable already on their roster.

The only thing I will give the names you listed above credit for is their age. All are young guys heading into their second contract. But, by in large, this overpaying for multiple players never really works out in the long run. Teams like JAX and OAK are being forced to overpay for multiple players because of lack of spending in past years. Players/agents know this and it's "even THOSE teams" are being visited first...."it's where the money HAS to be spent, so why not my client?" Cleveland is not in that situation, although if they don't spend all the much this year, they most certainly will be in 2016.

Would have loved to have Williams, though. I cannot lie.

If we can find another serviceable wide receiver, and a solid defensive tackle somewhere in free agency, that will allow us to tackle the rest of our needs in the draft.

Coming into this offseason we realistically needed a WR, TE, RT, and then on defense we needed DL help. With 10 draft picks, Farmer and Pettine must feel pretty confident that they can address those needs in the draft.

A lot of names coming off the free agent board though, I would hope for SOMEONE of decent value today or tomorrow....Cecil Shorts, Charles Clay, Jermaine Gresham, and most importantly a defensive tackle (Terrance Knighton?). Do we now need a new CB since we've lost Skrine, or does the F/O feel good about Desir, Williams and Gilbert?

Um those teams can draft. Besides this year, the Ravens have been known to go after some GOOD big name FA.

Hoyer was leaving, we had to sign somebody. I don't get the 100000 times I've seen dismay that we didn't go after Foles or Bradford. Bradford is an injury waiting to happen so lets bring him to a team that never seems to able to keep their QB healthy. Foles is average, he had a nice run in 2013, then got figured out. If you want somebody better than what we have so we can win 9 games for the next 4 years, Foles might be your guy. If you want to actually compete, he's not. He was a 3rd round pick, we could take Grayson in the 3rd probably and he has every chance to be as good or better in the long run.


There were some bargains.. and I doubt we inquired but do you think Ozzie would have let Ngata go in the division for the same compensation? I doubt it.

Funny story... I was leaving work yesterday and got on the elevator checking my phone for any more deals, another guy got on a floor or so below. I saw all of the trades and made an audible noise. It was kind of awkward so I told the guy I was just checking the NFL trades and there were a lot of deals. He told me he was a BIG fan of the Steelers and they weren't usually active in FA... I told him the big news out of the AFC North was that Haloti Ngata was traded. To which he replied, "Who, who is that?".... Yea, BIG Steelers fan.

Rex - 6 years 46 wins 50 losses

the last 3 years:
2012: 6-10
2013: 8-8
2014: 4-12

I would say "excitable and proven" are a little over exaggerated

I would trade grossi for rodger brown after reading that.

Boo Hoo, Grossi. Way to try to rile up the mob even more.

I'd agree with most of this. The Ngata trade may not have been an option for us at all if the Ravens didn't want to face him twice a year.

And I'm not going to be too upset over the McCown signing until we know what the QB depth chart looks in training camp.

1. I assume Manziel will be the starter, but who knows right now.
2. We may make another move.
3. We may take a QB high'ish in the draft
4. That Bucs team was quite bad. The last I saw McCown in Chicago, he was ok.
5. I wanted Hoyer gone.

As for Grossi, he sounds like one of the "Factory of Sadness" dorks around here. Blah blah blah, we're terrible, we are the worst, we should have done this, we shouldn't have done that, if we signed player X we'd be better (never understanding the player needed to WANT to come here), I can't believe we let player Y go (Actually, Bill Polian didn't even have Skrine on his top 15 CBs in free agency list on ESPN - I know ESPN analysts are mostly idiots, but Polian is no joke). Grossi sounds like a crybaby.

Like who? I can't remember BIG names and BIG contracts.

Sam Adams, Mike McCrary, Shannon Sharp, Rod Woodson, Willis McGahee (when he was still good), Elvis Dumervil, Chris Canty, Steve Smith...

That's right. You have to wait and see what other moves are going to be made. It's only just started and we still have the draft. Everyone needs to be patient and calm down. Give our FO a chance.

Should we just blow it up now?

Sam Adams played for one year on cheap contract.
Shannon Sharp played for one year.
Rod Woodson contract was not big
Elvis Dumervil- You're right, big contract
Steve Smith- $4M/yr not a big contract and old.
Chris Canty made $800,000 and $2M w/ Baltimore. That's nothing.

I'll give you Dumervil. None of the others get close to what BIG contracts were signed, and have been signed in other years, by teams in FA.

Thanks goodness I feel a lot better about the path Farmer is taking now Grossi isn't feeling it!!!

I left out McCreary. For the sake of argument, let's say that was a big deal. Two huge, lucrative FA deals since 1997. You win.

I just don't understand the attack mode on Grossi.

Sure it's a negative article. But not everyone feels like Mr. Happy when we haven't signed one single player we had going into the FA market and so far haven't signed anyone who wasn't cut by their respective teams.

I'm not saying I agree with Grossi, but the fact that so many of you dismiss what he's saying because you wear orange tinted glasses I find pretty strange.

At least in previous years we have signed at least a couple of impact players early and the team is sitting on tons of cap space. I don't find it so unreasonable that many in the fan base are disappointed. Maybe they should be?

For me, and I wouldn't call it 'attack mode' for me, I get some of his points, but it's more about hypocrisy. Here is his article from just 24 hours ago:

http://espncleveland.com/common/more.php?m=49&action=blog&r=17&post_id=42931

For me, it has little to do with his content (at least in the article today) and more the pattern of behavior and the way he chooses to slant his articles depending on which direction will serve one of two purposes (and sometimes both): a) he is a fan of the team and like most fans complaining comes easy and naturally and b) he likes the attention when he rides the wave of public opinion.

He really is nothing more than a Dawgtalker poster ... he just gets paid for it.

Where can I sign up for that gig?