Since they came back into the NFL in 1999 after a four-year absence, the Cleveland Browns have made the postseason exactly once—in 2002—and have suffered through more bad free-agent transactions and draft picks than some franchises will endure in three or four decades. To try to right the ship, owner Jimmy Haslam made three moves in 2016: He hired head coach Hue Jackson, a known offensive mastermind and quarterback developer, and he handed former baseball executive Paul DePodesta the title of chief strategy officer, with Sashi Brown taking the more traditional general manager role.
The first year of the new regime was going to be a wash—everybody knew that.