The Cleveland Browns decided to fire executive vice president Sashi Brown on Thursday, but their head coach is not going to meet the same fate.
Shortly after Brown was shown the door, Browns owner Jimmy Haslam released a statement confirming that Hue Jackson will return to the team in 2018.
Statement from Owner Jimmy Haslam: pic.twitter.com/xi571AaajE
— Cleveland Browns (@Browns) December 7, 2017
ESPN’s Adam Schefter and Dianna Russini reported that Cleveland’s next general manager will have a say in determining whether Jackson keeps his job, but it sounds like ownership has already made the call.
It is no secret that Jackson and his coaching staff have not been seeing eye-to-eye with Cleveland’s personnel department, and that appeared to come to a head when the front office bungled a trade that would have landed the Browns quarterback A.J. McCarron at the trade deadline. One report claimed that Brown sabotaged the trade intentionally.
By firing Brown, owner Jimmy Haslam was clearly sending a message that he is choosing his team’s coaching staff over his personnel people. Jackson has been frustrated that the Browns had chances to get potential franchise quarterbacks on numerous occasions and failed. Cleveland’s decision to trade away picks that were eventually used to draft Carson Wentz and Deshaun Watson are the most obvious mistakes, but Jackson has also reportedly had his eye on QBs via trade and not gotten his wish.
With the Browns almost certain to land the No. 1 overall pick in next year’s draft, Jackson may be given more control to decide which player to select. Although he has had high praise for rookie DeShone Kizer, it would be a surprise if Cleveland passed on Josh Rosen or Sam Darnold.
