Remembering Bill Belichick’s days as head coach of the Cleveland Browns harkens back to a time most Browns fans would rather to forget. Symbolic of Art Modell’s decision to move the team out of Cleveland to Baltimore, the Belichick years were the worst of times for a coach regarded as one of the best of his generation.
On the surface, Belichick seems to have escaped the failures of his time in Cleveland whereas Browns fans tend to mark his tenure as the beginning of the Cleveland Browns fall from among the NFL’s storied and respected franchises. In David Halberstam’s “Education of a Coach”, the most profound statement of Belichick’s failures with the Browns were succinctly summarized by another writer’s, Peter Richmond, comments:
“He is what he is. There is no pretense, and he is utterly authentic in a world where because of television there is more and more which is inauthentic. What is troubling about all this is that a lot of people are more comfortable with the inauthentic, if it reassuring, than they are with the truth, if it is not reassuring. He doesn’t play the role of the coach. He is the coach.”
It is the reason Browns fans should read this book. Not so much because it celebrates Belichick’s accomplishments or chronicles his failures in Cleveland. Rather it outlines what fans should expect in a head coach and how expectations – legitimate or not – interfere with the overall objective of winning championships.
This is not an easy read when Belichick talks about the departure of Bernie Kosar and his assessment of the Browns teams in the early 1990s. But also, in a way, it is a bit of an apology. Belichick recognizes mistakes were made along the way – notably the unceremonious dismissal of the Browns quarterback and leader. In the end, he viewed Kosar’s actions as a challenge to his authority – a necessary absolute authority requisite in creating a football team capable of playing together as a team and achieving unparalleled success. In his mind the end justified the means. But in retrospect, he admitted the entire situation could have been handled better.
Browns fans demand an aura of infallibility in their coaches – an infallibility often not present in the fan’s own behavior or assessment of the situation. We’ve begged for both Kelly Holcomb and Charlie Frye, and in both instances, received our just desserts. We’re critical until we are blue in the face, wanting nothing more than the championship teams we deserve. However, to some degree, we are also naïve to the sacrifice and commitments made by those entrusted with our teams. May this book serve as a painful reminder regardless of our desire to endure any more football-related hardship.
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