Realistic Browns pessimism vs. overblown Indians pessimism – WFNY Podcast No. 470
March 15, 2016Home is where the heart is: LeBron James picks Akron over Ohio State in NIT matchup
March 15, 2016At the recently held Sloan Analytics Conference at MIT, recently hired Head of Smart Things, Paul DePodesta, stated that he heard rumblings of the Cleveland Browns getting skewered by folks at the recently completed NFL Combine. If all of this recency sounds redundant, it’s because so much has happened in such a short time that the Browns have seemingly been caught in a whirlwind with their pants collectively around their ankles. Free agents are leaving faster than they arrived, draft picks are being released, and widely read publications are wondering if the 2016 team could somehow be worse than the one that’s been the laughingstock of the league for the last 15-plus years.
But while others in the NFL are laughing at what the Browns are—or aren’t—doing, DePodesta took to the stage in Boston making sure people knew he’s hearing the murmurs, but also that he’s proven the naysayers wrong his entire career.
From Baseball America:
“I was standing right in front of them in line and I could hear them in back of me and they were talking trash about me and the Cleveland Browns,” DePodesta said on Friday at MIT’s Sloan Sports Analytics Conference. “I said, ‘All right, this is like 17 years ago in Oakland all over again.’ That’s part of the fun. …
“I’ve been really surprised at just how many things transfer over,” DePodesta said. “Fundamentally, all these organizations are really about people and about teams and about culture. And those things transfer over from one sport to another, for sure. …
“There’s a challenge for me personally, which is trying to catch up to where I was in baseball,” DePodesta said. “In baseball, I had a 20-year library of players and transactions and all that sort of thing that I don’t have right now, very admittedly. As we were going through free agency this week, I was talking to some of the guys in the room and I was asking a lot of questions, but I said, I literally am not trying to lead the witness here, I truly don’t know and don’t have an opinion one way or the other. So that’s a real challenge for me, and just trying to take our mindset and bring it into football and create processes and systems around that is challenging. As an organization though, and probably even more importantly, we have big challenges in front of us. We have a super competitive league, we haven’t been very successful on the field and we have a big mountain to climb, but I think we have the right team of people in place to do it. …
“I have a little experience in doing things that are unpopular.”
DePodesta, whose technical title is Chief of Strategy, has built himself one hell of a resume—one that’s been praised at this very site. The Browns front office, however, is more than one man, and it’s led by Sashi Brown who is forced to pick up the pieces of regimes past. Without much in the way of talent, both veteran and recently drafted, the Browns have an uphill battle in every form of the word, but public relations may be chief among them. Like DePodesta said, it is all eerily similar to Oakland roughly 20 years earlier.
The difference, however, is that Oakland showed willingness to stick to the plan. the Browns, however, have a first-year head coach, no quarterback and an owner who has shown nothing in the way of patience when it comes to the demands of on-field success. Factor in that Brown and DePodesta are entering entirely foreign territory by bringing a “Moneyball” approach to the NFL, and things get that much more tenuous. According to DePodesta, however, the Haslam family has bought in to the analytics-based approach—”There are going to be parts of the roller coaster that are going to be scary, that are going to be uncomfortable, but hopefully at the end of the ride when we get off, you’re going to want to say, let’s do that again.”
While the naysayers will continue to doubt the process, and the fans will grow even more impatient with each additional loss, it does sound like the team still has faith in it’s long-term plan. If this is in fact the case, and all of teh pieces eventually fall into place, it’ll be the first truly executed plan in Berea since 1999.
20 Comments
http://i.imgur.com/D0EWECd.gif
BRING IT ON!
http://37.media.tumblr.com/908f718ec4591df0aa52876124602809/tumblr_nan8iw3uzu1rve2pqo1_500.gif
I’m still firmly of the opinion that we ought to take a look at everything we’ve done for the last 15 years and then do the opposite. The results can’t possibly be worse . . . can they?
With all due respect, and remember I’m sayin’ with all due respect, that idea ain’t worth a velvet painting of a whale and a dolphin gettin’ it on.
“Guys, this may shock you, but Sashi and I weren’t what you might consider ‘popular’ kids in school. Perhaps that was due to my focus on Numismatics (I still love my coin collection if truth be told), although I suspect it was my complexion that was the most problematic for my popularity metrics. I’ll have to dig out the popularity charts I had at the time…”
Exactly. I have no idea why anyone wants them to try to beat other front offices at the same game. That hasn’t worked. Try to be different. What’s the worst that can happen, win two games instead of three? The horror.
You ain’t seen nothing yet Paul!
Whether he can or can’t successfully apply his concepts translate to the NFL, DePodesta won’t lose his nerve. He’s famous and admired and can get paid handsomely again in baseball. This is more about the Haslams, and how much more heat they can take. I won’t be surprised if they trade not only Joe Thomas – that seems like a given – but anyone who won’t be in their prime when the anticipated rebuild is ready to roll. Haden might also go for a decent pick.
Let’s see how long Jimmy can stomach surfacing in public only to apologize and reassure a fed up fanbase. It’s not like he has a bit of political capital to start with. But I know I’ll feel better if there’s some sense that these guys have more than a philosophy, that they actually know how to execute this. In the end, they still have to competently identify and obtain college players who can excel in the NFL. If they can’t – if the young draftees we see next year are meh – their efforts will be worthless even if the philosophy is sound.
“I have a little experience in doing things that are unpopular.”
Well you’ve come to the right place.
I admire how Jacksonville tore it down and have been building it back up. I think they lost course this year with free agency. And now that Jacksonville is close to being a respectable franchise again, I think they are on the verge of imploding by falling into old NFL losing habits. As long as DePodesta is working within the Browns he wont let that happen.
The Browns will need to be creative this year selling tickets because that drum that is being beat is they are a joke. I am on board with DePodesta’s values and believe that they can be on the verge of changing old values in the NFL. This is the first year as a fan I feel we won free agency. Overpaying for cast off players has never built a team. More than anything else right now I fear the reaction to the draft.
That is pretty much exactly what Depo said:
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Cdm32I7W0AAIx6O.jpg:large
And the Browns have a lot of experience firing people that do things that are unpopular.
Well. There it is.
The good news is you literally cannot win fewer games than zero. Amazing how it’s gotten to this point.
When I saw the draft of 5436 dollars, I accept that my friend’s brother was like really generating cash in his free time with his PC. …vr His aunt’s neighbor has done this for only 10 months and by now repaid the loan on their home and bought a new Car .
To Know More Click Here
ttg….
except DePodesta was a star football and baseball player…
As well as firing people who were incompetent.
we’ll see who has the last laugh …
the Ricardo Rincon trade lol.
We’re in lose/lose mode w/ the media because of being historically terrible. We lose if we didn’t pay those guys, we lose if we pay them the contracts they got.
I agree w/ you. They were good, but they weren’t a. worth those contracts, or b. the lifeblood of the team (save, maybe a discussion re: Mack’s importance to team in 2014).