Last year, former Browns coach Hue Jackson won a power struggle with former V.P. of football operations Sashi Brown, presumably by appealing directly to owner Jimmy Haslam. This year, Jackson tried to win a power struggle with G.M. John Dorsey, definitely by appealing directly to Haslam.
In an post-termination interview with Mary Kay Cabot of Cleveland.com, Jackson admitted that he went to Haslam to try to take back control of the offense from now-former offensive coordinator Todd Haley.
Asked whether Jackson took his case for taking back the offense to ownership, Jackson said this: “I had a very candid conversation with Jimmy Haslam as I’ve known Jimmy longer than I’ve know John, and I think Jimmy knows what I’ve expressed and how I felt and how I would have liked to have gone out.”
Regardless of how long Jackson has known Jimmy vs. John, cutting John out of the process when it comes to reversing the decision to insert an offensive coordinator in 2018 -- a decision that had John’s fingerprints all over it -- was destined to be perceived as an attempt to undermine the G.M. With a 3-36-1 record in two-plus seasons, Jackson simply didn’t have the juice to win a power struggle with Dorsey, who has received nothing but praise for what he has done so far in Cleveland.
Regardless, it’s clear that Jackson believed he could have done better with the offense than Haley had been doing.
“You look at our numbers with me calling the offense with less talent,” Jackson said. “Our numbers this year were the same or worse than our numbers last year with better players on offense. So it was already tough for me to give up play calling when I knew more talent was on the way with John Dorsey on board. Of course I wanted to remind everybody what a Hue Jackson-led offense looks like, but I felt they wanted me to focus on coaching the whole team and let someone else call the plays.’'
Although Jackson insisted that he hired Haley, Jackson acknowledged that the hiring of a coordinator came at the suggestion of Dorsey. Which possibly went something like this: “Well, Hue, either you’ll be hiring an offensive coordinator, or I’ll be hiring a coach.”
Now, Dorsey will be hiring a coach. Hue’s comments in the aftermath of his firing serve only to underscore the reality that Dorsey should have been hiring a coach 10 months ago.
