Maybe this time . . .

The 2020 National Football League season for the Browns is loaded with question marks, most of them stemming from a virtually brand new coaching staff.

For the umpteenth time in the last two decades, the Browns enter a season not knowing what to expect because philosophies are different, coaching styles are different and talent evaluation is different.

Pre-season interviews by the new staff with the existing roster go just so far. It’s what follows when the pads go on that eventually ferrets out the direction in which the club heads. It’s a feeling-out process that takes time.

The Cleveland media received a taste of what to except this season when the Browns trotted out the club’s three coordinators – two newbies and one returnee – a few days ago.

Joe Woods brings Ohio-based coaching chops and a terrific job last season with the San Francisco 49ers to a Cleveland defense badly in need of a personality.

Alex Van Pelt brings a steady hand and valuable teaching experience to an offense and a quarterback, in particular, badly in need of a sense of stability and order that was AWOL last season.

Mike Priefer, who improved the special teams’ performance immeasurably last season, looks for more consistency from his sophomore-season kicking tandem in addition to finding a return specialist who can give the offense better field position.

Woods, who coached at Muskingum College and Kent State University on his way to the NFL, is coming off a season where he was a major contributor to the 49ers’ march to the Super Bowl.

While Niners defensive coordinator Robert Saleh gained most of the credit for the club’s resurgence on that side of the football last season, it was Woods’ efforts as secondary coach that stuck out in his only season with them.

The Niners picked off only two passes and created just seven overall turnovers in the entire 2018 season. Last season, they pilfered 12 passes and recovered 15 fumbles, improving a -25 turnover ratio in 2018 to +4 a year later. That, in addition to an offense that rarely turned the ball over, is why they went to the Super Bowl.

The key positions on defense, Woods pointed out, are “rushers and cover guys.” Not exactly new, but he said he likes to add wrinkles to what he shows opposing offenses.

“I want to make sure I give offenses a lot of the same looks, but play different coverages and make them figure it out at the line of scrimmage,” he said. In other words, show one thing and morph into something entirely different at the snap.

In order to properly pull off the disguised looks, Woods needs the proper personnel. There is no guarantee, though, the front office will be able to provide that kind of personnel.

It will be interesting to see how he adapts to the personnel he is given. A lot of coaches fail when attempting to cater to the talents of their players, choosing instead to force-feed something at which they don’t excel.

One thing Woods will emphasize is ownership of the football. “It’s all about the ball,” he said. “What we do, what they do on offense, what we do on defense, it’s all about the ball. We have to find ways to take it away.

“We will show (the players) the tape so they know how to do it and then it is drilled into practice and getting the guys to run to the ball. You can’t create turnovers if you’re not running to the ball.”

Last season, the Browns under defensive chief Steve Wilks produced just 20 takeaways (14 interceptions). The year before under Gregg Williams, that defense got the ball back 32 times (17 picks).

It appears the aggression fans wanted last season is on its way back with Woods. Every indication also points to him being in total control of that side of the football.

That cannot be said of Van Pelt, who was hired as the offensive coordinator after a two-year stint as the quarterbacks coach in Cincinnati. He is also the Browns’ quarterbacks coach although the club’s Web site does not indicate it. None of the other nine members of the offensive staff is listed as quarterbacks coach.

Most likely, Van Pelt will be the coordinator in name only for a couple of reasons, the most important being new head coach Kevin Stefanski probably will call plays this season, although that has not been officially decided.

“I could easily call plays,” said Van Pelt, who served as offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach with Buffalo in 2009.  “I work for Kevin and am expected to do whatever role he wants me to do. Right now, I’m the coordinator and helping set up this offense with some good coaches.”

In addition to crafting game plans, Stefanski is also counting on him to straighten out Baker Mayfield, whose disastrous and mistake-laden sophomore season all but wiped out the memory of his record-setting rookie season.

“My plan is to be the voice in the (quarterbacks) room,” Van Pelt said. “That’s very important. One of my strengths as a coach is coaching the quarterback, so I definitely want to make that part of my responsibilities.”

Getting Mayfield untracked is seemingly job one. “It’s our job as an offensive staff to help him and make him successful,” he said. “. . . We have to put him in the best position to have success.” And that position involves the feet.

“It all starts with the feet,” Van Pelt said. “The feet never lie. They get you through your progressions. Just some of the ways we will have him drop from under center and in the (shot)gun will change slightly to help him.”

The new coaching setup on offense can’t be any worse than last season when Todd Monken was the titular – and often ignored by head coach Freddie Kitchens – offensive coordinator and Ryan Lindley was the quarterbacks coach under whom Mayfield regressed.

Overall, it appears the defense will be much more hostile under Woods and the offense theoretically should flourish with all that skill-player talent and an offensive coaching staff that works harmoniously.

Stefanski’s clean slate

After a flurry of announcements in the last 10 days or so, it appears as though the Browns’ coaching staff is finally in place and ready to go.

Head coach Kevin Stefanski runs a 20-person coaching staff that consists of 10 assistants on offense, eight on defense and two masterminding the various special teams.

Only two members of the coaching staff from the disaster that was the 2019 National Football League season survived the purge.

Back for their second season are running backs coach Stump Mitchell, who has added run-game coordinator to his title, and Mike Priefer, who helped bring back respectability to that phase of the game last season.

One thing is certain: This staff was put together by Stefanski with little outside help, unlike last season when then General Manager John Dorsey imported many of his favorites to help shepherd Freddie Kitchens through his rookie season as head coach.

It is a staff of new faces culled from all around the NFL landscape with only a couple of names that mean anything to the fans. Perhaps the most prominent is offensive line coach Bill Callahan, who has prior head coaching experience in the NFL.

It is difficult to evaluate just what fans can expect from this crew, some of whom just might turn out eventually to be solid selections. But no one knows that right now and if they say they do, they are making it up.

It’s once again going to be get acquainted time for this team with a new cadre of coaches for the third straight year. First, it was Hue Jackson. Then it was Kitchens’ turn last season. And now Stefanski. 

All of which means change. Different personalities, different systems on both sides of the football and different nomenclature. Three seasons, three different head coaches – four if you include interim Gregg Williams in 2018.

Anyone expecting this team to burst forth and take the NFL by storm this season, much like it was anticipated to do last season, is dreaming. Very little will fall in place right away with a virtual clean sweep of the coaching staff.

The players have to learn first how to walk before they can run with this new crew. Smooth operating football does not emerge just like that with a whole new coaching staff. It takes time to adjust.

Stefanski also has the luxury, unlike his predecessors, of a guaranteed five-year contract. So no matter how the Browns fare in 2020 and likely well beyond that, it’s safe to say he will be back next season, owners Dee and Jimmy Haslam III’s mercurial front-office decisions notwithstanding.

One of the most important aspects of his job is making certain every member of this unwieldy coaching staff is of the same mind as the head coach at all times. Easier said than done if he decides to call plays on offense.

Doing so would rob him of the opportunity to literally be the head coach of the Browns, devoting a vast majority of his time on just one side of the football. That’s what triggered Kitchens’ departure.

So let’s see how this all unfolds between now and training camp this summer before making any rash judgments on how this season commences. Until further notice, the new head coach has a clean slate.

A different look

Observations, curmudgeonly or otherwise, after watching the Browns trot 

Andrew Berry, the new general manager and executive VP/football operations, in front of the Cleveland media the other day, along with new head coach Kevin Stefanski and Chief Strategy Officer Paul DePodesta . . .

Berry sure is smooth, extremely poised, self-assured and more than ready for the next step of his life. The only question is can he handle it because his predecessors surely could not.

For the last two decades, 76 Lou Groza Blvd. in Berea has proven to be a wasteland for ambitious football executives who have proven the only constant for the Browns is failure.

Whether it’s players, coaches or front-office types, failure is generally the outcome. Without fail.

Until Berry, Stefanski and sometimes-there DePodesta prove otherwise in the coming seasons (assuming they last that long), that will not change.

The cupboard at the top of the football food chain has been emptied as owners Dee and Jimmy Haslam III and their daughter and son-in-law try for the umpteenth time to get it right with their billion-dollar investment.

“It will be distinctly different than before,” said Jimmy Haslam. Hmmmm, where have I heard that before? Rhetorical question.

So what can the perennially starved fans of Browns Nation expect from the new threesome, whose only alignment appears to be an analytical approach to the game of football?

“We will be a scouting-central front office,” Berry said, “because I have always believed and continue to believe scouting to be the lifeblood of roster building in the National Football League.”

Good start, but that falls in line with the philosophy of most of the general managers around the NFL. Nothing new there.

He needs now to prove it and maximize the human factor, not analytics, when it comes to crafting the 53-man roster for the 2020 season, which will be the most important aspect of his new job.

But when it came to discussing his control of that roster, the new GM dodged. “Listen,” he said, “every big decision is going to be collaborative.” Okay. But he was hired because he was given complete control of the roster and his word ostensibly is final.

He makes the ultimate decisions. Or does he? Not based on that reply. He’ll get help from Stefanski and, hold your breath, DePodesta, but Berry should make the final call on all matters football.

He breaks ties, or should, when disagreements arise. He’s the big boss when it comes to everything related to football, whether it’s trades and/or free agency. Anything related to personnel. The buck stops at his desk.

The worst thinker in the Ivory Tower – three guesses who that is and the first two don’t count – must take several giant steps back and let those he hired succeed or fail. Sadly, he won’t.

Stefanski had a different slant. “Andrew is the general manager and I am the head coach,” he said, “but I can promise you on decisions as they pertain to personnel, I will be involved.

“We have had dialogue about that. . . . We have to make sure it is going to be Andrew and me along with a bunch of really good people in there making those decisions.” There does not appear to be a clear division of authority.

What will be interesting is discovering just how much power DePodesta wields from a player personnel standpoint. After all, Stefanski and Berry are working together because of the CSO.

Stefanski pronounced himself “excited” about his new boss even though he lobbied for Minnesota Assistant General Manager George Paton, who ultimately took his name out of the running to succeed John Dorsey.

“What was important was getting the right man for the job and the Cleveland Browns,” he said diplomatically. “I could not be more excited to work on a day-to-day basis with him.” Let’s see how long that holds up when disagreements bubble to the surface.

With regard to who will be in charge of the offense on game days, Stefanski acknowledged it was a very popular topic. “We’ll work through it,” he said. “I don’t know. That’s the God’s honest truth. We’ll work though it like I said before and do what’s best for the offense.”

He called it “a very fluid situation . . . Putting a staff together is a puzzle, You have to find the right pieces and the big pieces are the coordinators. . . . I want to get the right people in here as we fit the puzzle together.”

That’s a wordy way of dodging the question and might very well mean he’ll be the play caller when the Browns own the football this season and rely on new offensive coordinator Alex Van Pelt, run coordinator Stump Mitchell and pass coordinator Chad O’Shea to develop game plans.

That’s asking for trouble. Stefanski instead should learn first how to be a head coach before taking on added duties and allow Van Pelt to call plays. Numerous coordinators make that mistake and don’t last long. Just ask Freddie Kitchens.

Being a head coach is an entirely different animal than concentrating on one side of the football or one specific area. The enormity and complexities of running a team, especially on game days, require a different kind of concentration.

He needs to look at a much bigger picture than just one aspect of the team. If he becomes the 2020 version of Freddie Kitchens, Stefanski and his new boss will not enjoy their first year together.