It’s been a bad week for Browns coach Eric Mangini.
Apart from the storm swirling around him in Cleveland, Mangini now finds himself the target of blame for the Jets’ decision in April 2008 to select linebacker Vernon Gholston with the sixth overall pick in the draft.
Citing multiple unnamed sources, Rich Cimini of the New York Daily News reports that Mangini “lobbied hard” for the team to take Gholston.
“That one’s on Eric,” one source told Cimini.
Some were infatuated by a big game Gholston, a former Buckeye, had against Michigan’s Jake Long, the first overall choice in 2008. But there was -- and still is -- talk that Gholston disappeared too many times in the film on too many other occasions.
And so it’s no surprise that, 24 games into his NFL career (actually, 23; he was a healthy scratch for one game in 2008), Gholston doesn’t have a single career sack.
As one player recently told Cimini regarding Gholston, “He’s kind of reverting back. There’s no spark, no fire. He’s stiff, not too athletic, limited. I think the scouts might have been wrong.”
In fairness to Mangini, it’s not all his fault. By all appearances, the Patriots managed to dupe Mangini and G.M. Mike Tannenbaum into thinking that they would have picked Gholston at No. 7 if the Jets hadn’t taken him at No. 6. New England’s decision to trade down three spots after Gholston was off the board helped reinforce the ruse.
And so at No. 10 the Pats got linebacker Jerod Mayo, the 2008 NFL defensive rookie of the year and the new cornerstone of the team’s defense.
