Last year the new regime in Cleveland took over and promised to build from the ground up, prioritizing future draft picks over winning immediately, with the idea that the Browns might stink in the short term, but in the future those picks would turn into good players who could build a championship team.
They’ve got the “stink in the short term” part down, anyway.
The Browns are 1-19 after 20 games with Hue Jackson as coach, Sashi Brown as G.M. and Paul DePodesta running the front office strategy, and if some fans in Cleveland are getting frustrated, it’s hard to blame them. Sunday’s blowout loss to the previously winless Bengals raises the question of when this team will be good again.
But Jackson said today that he remains confident in the Browns’ front office process, and he said Browns owner Jimmy Haslam is on board with the way they’re building the team.
“Jimmy has been supportive. People think he’s going to throw me over in river,” Jackson said. “There’s pain in this process.”
The Browns have two first-round picks and three second-round picks in the 2018 NFL draft, so they’re going to keep adding talent to the roster. At some point, however, that talent has to turn into winning football if the Browns want people to keep trusting the process.