See ya, Freddie

Well that didn’t take long. Freddie Kitchens was relieved of his duties as head coach of the Browns just a few hours after his club lost the season finale to the Bengals in Cincinnati Sunday afternoon.

He joins Rob Chudzinski as the only Cleveland head coach since the resurrection in 1999 to be fired after just one season

The move became inevitable in the last month of the season when the club lost four of its last five games. Kitchens needed a strong second half to survive a 2-6 start and failed.

His 6-10 team was plagued with discipline problems on the field and personality problems off it. It was a situation he never got a handle on and paid the ultimate price.

Dorsey elevated the former interim offensive coordinator to the top spot a little less than a year ago to the surprise of many who questioned Kitchens’ relative inexperience. He was a career position coach and served as a coordinator for only eight games following the firing of Hue Jackson.

Dorsey, in a prepared statement, said, “I would like to thank Freddie for his dedication and efforts this past season. We are disappointed in our results and feel a change is necessary. Freddie is a good man and good football coach. We wish him and his family nothing but success.”

Right out of the standard form for firing coaches. Only the name changes. Same with the following prepared statement from owners Dee and Jimmy Haslam III:

“We thank Freddie for his hard work and commitment to this organization, but did not see the success or opportunities for improvement to move forward with him as our head coach. Our focus is on hiring an exceptional leader for this football team and we will take a comprehensive approach to this process. We are excited about the core players we have to build around and develop and look forward to bringing in a strong head coach who will put this group of players in the best position to succeed.”

Until the Haslams (and Dorsey) actually mean what they say and follow through with these announced plans, those statements are nothing more than words. Fans want deeds, not words. 

The owners say they want an exceptional leader, a strong head coach. All well and good. They had a chance to do that least season and failed. What will be different this time? Your guess is as good as mine.

This ownership has been one major fail after another since purchasing the team seven years ago from the Lerner family.

The next Browns head coach will be No. 6 (not including Gregg Williams, who served as interim after the Jackson firing) to serve under the Haslam roof following Pat Shurmur, Chudzinski, Mike Pettine, Jackson and Kitchens. That’s six head coaches in seven years. Enough said.

This gives a whole new meaning to the word instability. Is it any wonder the Browns remain one of the most hopeless franchises in sports? The more things change, the more they stay the same.

If you’re looking for candidates to replace Kitchens, start with NFL former head coaches Mike McCarthy, Ron Rivera and Josh McDaniels; college football head coaches Lincoln Riley, Matt Campbell, Urban Meyer, Matt Ruhle and Jim Harbaugh, who has coached at the college and NFL levels; and NFL coordinators Greg Roman, Kevin Stefanski, Dan Campbell and Dave Toub.