The Cleveland Browns entered the 2023 season in an (unfortunately) very familiar situation.
Their 2022 season was a disappointment and far cry from the success the team enjoyed in 2020 when they made the playoffs and won a playoff game for the first time in almost two decades. The sense that the Browns had FINALLY gotten their act together and could actually be a force to be reckoned with in January and February had all but eroded.
The Browns traded away Baker Mayfield, who many believed was the franchise savior at quarterback, and traded for Deshaun Watson fresh off of 26 sexual assault allegations while also doling out a fully guaranteed $230 million contract to make sure he chose to come to Cleveland. After Watson served his 11-game suspension, the six games he played afterward were inconsistent at best and concerning at worst. The Browns defense was also clearly the least productive it had been under Stefanski, and the team finished the season 7-10 after finishing 8-9 in 2021.
Stefanski entered the 2023 season at the top of almost every “First NFL head coach to get fired” list you could find on the internet. Many predicted the Browns to have another disappointing season and it felt like the franchise would, once again, be looking for another head coach to get this team to be consistently competitive and to get the most out of Deshaun Watson at quarterback.
Fast forward to today: The Cleveland Browns are 11-5, have clinched a playoff spot for the first time since that unforgettable 2020 season, and many of the same people who were predicting the team to have a disappointing season are calling the Browns Super Bowl contenders.
Yes. You read that right. People are calling THE CLEVELAND BROWNS Super Bowl CONTENDERS.
At the forefront of this incredible turnaround the team has undergone is none other than their head coach Kevin Stefanski. The job that he, and general manager Andrew Berry, have done transforming this football team into one of the most formidable in the entire NFL is remarkable.
This is the first Browns team since they returned to Cleveland in 1999 that absolutely refuses to ever give up no matter how much misfortune and adversity they encounter. It does not matter who is in or out of the lineup; this team is always prepared to kick their opponent’s teeth in and often does.
There is a swagger, a belief, a standard of excellence that quite frankly I have never seen a Browns team have in my lifetime. Not even the team in 2020 was doing what this current version of the Browns is doing every week. They are resilient, relentless, physical, confident and playing at an extremely high level.
There have been debates over who should win Coach of the Year this season, but the answer is obvious.
It’s Kevin Stefanski and it shouldn’t be close.
The Browns are 11-5 and they’ve accomplished this with Nick Chubb, Jack Conklin, Deshaun Watson, Jedrick Wills, Jakeem Grant, Dawand Jones, Jacob Phillips, Rodney McLeod, Maurice Hurst, Juan Thornhill and others missing multiple games, if not the majority of the entire season.
He’s won games with FOUR different starting quarterbacks this season. He’s the only head coach in NFL history to win at least one game with four different quarterbacks in the same season. From Deshaun Watson, to PJ Walker, to Dorian Thompson-Robinson and now to Joe Flacco, it hasn’t mattered. The Browns just keep winning no matter who is in the lineup, and Stefanski has the aforementioned Flacco playing so well that you would think he’s with the Ravens again.
No disrespect to Detriot Lions head coach Dan Campbell or Houston Texans head coach DeMeco Ryans, both of whom have done phenomenal jobs leading their football teams, but this is Stefanski’s award. No other head coach has overcome more adversity and still managed to put his team in a position to win every single week.
Whether or not Stefanski wins Coach of the Year is significantly less relevant to the health of this franchise than keeping him around for the long haul.
All of the questions people had coming into this season about whether or not Stefanski was the right coach to lead this team have been answered, and that answer is a resounding and undeniable HELL YES.
This is the guy Browns fans have been waiting for since 1999. Gone are the days of Hue Jackson and Freddie Kitchens. No longer do you have to stomach a seemingly unending cycle of head coaches who were clearly ill-equipped, unprepared and uninspiring. Head coaches who often overpromised and more often underdelivered. There is finally a light at the end of the tunnel and the Cleveland Browns should race towards it and never look back.
The one thing the Browns have lacked since the team returned more than two decades ago, which also happens to be the one thing their division rivals in the Steelers and Ravens have had over the same time, is stability. It is impossible for any franchise to build, or sustain, success when it is constantly cycling coaching staffs and front offices in and out every few years. Kevin Stefanski and Andrew Berry have proven that they are both great at what they do, and it’s time to reward both them and the fans who have stood by this franchise through all the ups and (mostly) downs.
It’s time for Jimmy Haslem to extend Kevin Stefanski for the next decade. Remove all doubt about who the leader of this team will be. Bring the stability that this franchise and fanbase have been longing for, so instead of constantly worrying about who’s going to be forced to leave Berea, Ohio, the guys in charge can just focus on building something special and sustainable in Cleveland.
Kevin Stefanski has shown everyone they aren’t the same old Browns anymore.
It’s time for the Browns to keep him around so they can show everyone it’s going to stay that way.