CLEVELAND, Ohio – Wow!
That’s what I thought when I heard Browns owner Jimmy Haslam talking about the feedback he received from some of the players after coach Kevin Stefanski was fired.
“JW (Browns managing partner JW Johnson) and myself interviewed 30 or 40 players in the postseason … We got really good feedback offensively and defensively about what was needed,” Haslam said.
So far, nothing extraordinary there. But then Haslam added:
“I think all of us who have run organizations understand you have to have accountability. And as I mentioned when JW and I interviewed or spent time with 30 or 40 of our players. If you said, ‘Give me one common word,’ it’s that we need more accountability. So that stuck with us.”
I believe Haslam mentioned this more as an endorsement of new coach Todd Monken. Yes, Monken is being hired to revive the almost comatose offense. But he also is in Cleveland to … well … hold players more accountable.
“You have to hold the players accountable for what they say their dreams and aspirations are,” Monken said at his press conference. “You have to find out what you really want, individually with your career, and then what you want collectively as a team.”
It’s an interesting approach. All coaches talk about winning. So do the players. But players also have personal concerns. Part of coaching is lining up the aspirations of the individual players with the team goal of winning. It’s convincing players that winning will pay off for them individually.
“All you’re doing is holding them to what their goals and aspirations are – as people did for me,” said Monken. “I am who I am because my parents did that for me. They didn’t do that to me … They did that for me.”
Browns Owner Jimmy Haslam said many players told him the team needed more “accountability.”John Kuntz, cleveland.comAccountability needed
Most Browns fans would agree the team sometimes lacked discipline. Pre-snap penalties were a problem during the Stefanski regime.
I’m dwelling on the pre-snap penalties because those are violations such as false starts, illegal formations, too many players on the field and too much time before snapping the ball. It’s a lack of concentration and attention to detail:
Here’s where the Browns ranked in pre-snap penalties under Stefanski.
2020: Second.
2021: Third.
2022: 19th.
2023: First.
2024: First.
2025: Ninth.
The Browns were in the top three of pre-snap penalties in four of Kevin’s six seasons.
We’ll see if Monken and his coaching staff can address this problem.
I looked at where Baltimore ranked in pre-snap penalties during Monken’s 3-year tenure as offensive coordinator. In his three seasons, they ranked 17-22-20 in pre-snap penalties. That’s below average, which is good.
Not all of that was due to Monken, because he was only in charge of the offense. But it is good to know the Ravens weren’t at the top of the list.
I’ve seen two Browns coaches immediately improve the team in these areas.
The first was Eric Mangini in 2009-10 after he took over from Romeo Crennel.
The other is Gregg Williams, who was the interim coach in the middle of the 2018 season after Hue Jackson was fired. Williams and Mangini were both tough and demanding on the little things such as pre-snap penalties.
“I think everybody likes honesty till they don’t like what’s said to them honestly,” said Monken. “I’m no different. I like being stroked in a good way. … I don’t like the other side of it, but that’s how I’ve gotten a lot better. And the people who love you the most are going to be honest with you.”
It was difficult to know how Stefanski dealt with problems because his goal in the press conferences was to say absolutely nothing in a nice way. The man took the Browns to the playoffs twice (2020, 2023) and was NFL Coach of the Year in both of those seasons.
When Stefanski was fired, several NFL teams looking for coaches connected with his agent. He interviewed with five different teams. There were 10 openings. John Harbaugh (New York) was the first new coach hired. Stefanski became the second as he went to Atlanta.
That said, in the last two years, the Browns were 8-26. My personal opinion was Stefanski was worn down by dealing Deshaun Watson and other problems surrounding the Browns in his six seasons. When that happens to a leader, accountability sometimes slips.
We’ll see if Monken can change that.
Can new Browns coach Todd Monken make the Browns “watchable”?John Kuntz, cleveland.comCan they be watchable?
A year ago, Haslam was asked how many games the Browns would win in 2025. He paused, then said, “More than three.”
The Browns were 3-14 in 2024. It was “more than three,” as the Browns were 5-13 in 2025. Haslam knows that ineptitude is crushing the fan base. GM Andrew Berry talked about how the Browns were likely to have “one of the youngest teams” in the NFL. At another point, he said they could be “the youngest.”
Rarely do young teams win a lot, but things have to improve.
“Do I expect we’ll win more games? I do,” Haslam said. “And I think we’ll have a better football team. We’re not going to be ugly to watch, OK? And I actually take that seriously. We want it to be a fun team to watch, a team that plays hard, plays smart and most of all, wins.”
Haslam also mentioned my name as he said, “What does Terry say? They’re ugly to watch sometimes.”
I actually called them “unwatchable” at times, but the point is the same. The Browns have scored the fewest points in the NFL over the last two seasons.
Part of hiring Monken is to improve the offense. And yes, to make the Browns more watchable.
Part of that will also mean being more accountable in terms of eliminating mental errors on the field. That will be a challenge with a young roster. That’s why Monken was hired, to bring more discipline to the Browns.