The Haslams are expected to break their silence about their new options for an alternative stadium site at annual NFL meetings this week.
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Editor's note: Tony Grossi is a Cleveland Browns analyst for TheLandOnDemand.com and 850 ESPN Cleveland. He has covered the Browns since 1984.
ORLANDO, FL
NFL owners and league executives hold meetings on a quarterly basis every year to discuss and vote on league issues.
The ultra-important, or really sensitive, issues involving revenue, ownership transfers, future Super Bowl sites, and potential controversial changes are discussed more often at the quarterly meetings, away from the watch of a large media contingent.
The so-called annual owners meeting, being held here this week at the Ritz-Carlton Grande Lakes, attracts a lot of attention because coaches and general managers, and their families, join their bosses in a mostly casual gathering, and media are invited.
There is business discussed, too.
Commissioner Roger Goodell presents a state-of-the-league address to owners behind closed doors. GMs and salary cap specialists are apprised of future revenue projections and how they might affect roster-building. Coaches have some meetings, but essentially socialize and play golf.
New rules proposals are presented to owners for vote. But rules or bylaws that are particularly controversial or don’t receive enough support to pass often are tabled for further discussion at the next quarterly meeting.
Here is what to expect from Browns and NFL matters this week.
Kevin Stefanski
The coach of the Browns joins other AFC coaches at a media breakfast on Monday morning. NFC coaches have theirs on Tuesday.
Each coach has his own table. Media swarm to it and pummel the coach with a barrage of questions for about an hour. If a coach’s table is particularly crowded, it’s difficult to dig into a topic beyond one or two follow-up questions.
Stefanski hasn’t been available to media since the NFL Combine a month ago. In that time, the Browns have signed 10 veteran free agents, made a big trade, and re-signed five of their own players eligible for free agency.
They have reshaped their quarterback room with the addition of veteran backups Jameis Winston and Tyler Huntley, who take the places of Joe Flacco and P.J. Walker, traded for receiver Jerry Jeudy, and added running backs D’Onta Foreman and Nyheim Hines.
Those additions came after Stefanski overhauled his offensive coaching staff by replacing the coordinator, running backs coach, tight ends coach, two offensive line coaches and naming a pass game specialist with no NFL experience. Another hire is expected to be named run game specialist, but the Browns haven’t confirmed it.
All of that after the Browns finished 10th in points per game and 16th in yards per game despite having to start four different quarterbacks to secure the AFC’s No. 4 playoff seed.
The Browns also added former Tennessee Titans head coach and Akron native Mike Vrabel as a personnel and coach consultant.
Further, Stefanski visited Watson in Los Angeles immediately after the Combine to introduce him to new coordinator Ken Dorsey and to get an up-close look at his progress from November shoulder surgery.
So, there’s a lot to cover here.
Dee and Jimmy Haslam
The principal owners of the Browns are scheduled to meet with a gaggle of Northeast Ohio media in a semi-secluded location at the Ritz on Monday afternoon.
They have not spoken to media since their annual training camp address on July 24 at The Greenbrier Resort in West Virginia.
Since that time, Watson experienced his second consecutive interrupted season and underwent shoulder surgery, Stefanski steered the Browns to their second post-season berth in four years and earned his second coach-of-the-year award, and the calendar year proceeded without any discernible progress on the future of Cleveland Browns Stadium.
In February, NEOTrans blog reported the Haslams were in discussions to purchase 176 acres of land in Brook Park close to Cleveland Hopkins Airport and a few miles from their ever-enlarging headquarters complex in Berea.
Amid speculation the Haslams could be considering the Brook Park location as a future stadium site, the Browns issued a written statement in which spokesman Peter John-Baptiste acknowledged – for the first time in five years of conversations about a refurbished Cleveland Browns Stadium -- that “we are also studying other potential stadium options in Northeast Ohio at various additional sites.”
The Haslams consistently have expressed the desire to keep the Browns on the lakefront in a massive renovation of the existing open-air stadium (estimated cost: $1 billion). John-Baptiste’s carefully worded statement suggests the Haslams could be re-examining the possibility of a new stadium with a roof at another location.
Andrew Berry
The Browns GM will meet privately with NE Ohio media on Tuesday morning.
He has not spoken to media since the Combine a month ago. In addition to the aforementioned player transactions, Berry also has done a salary-to-bonus conversion on the last year of Jedrick Wills’ contract and has extended the contract of Jeudy less than a week after acquiring him.
Berry was the driving force behind not making a contract offer to Flacco and replacing him with Winston and Huntley.
Berry also will be asked about the state of possible new contracts or restructurings for Amari Cooper and Nick Chubb and persistent media speculation about a trade of Greg Newsome. Berry must decide by May 2 whether or not to pick up Newsome’s fifth-year contract option for 2025, which would come at the price of a guaranteed $13.37 million.
NFL matters
Brazil: A league senior VP said on a Zoom media call on Friday that he didn’t know if the road opponent of the Eagles for their game in Brazil will be announced at the meetings. The Browns are considered the front-runner to join the Eagles in the first-ever NFL game in Sao Paulo, Brazil on the night of September 6.
Trade deadline: Owners will be presented with a proposal written and championed by Berry to extend the trade deadline two weeks forward to the Tuesday after Week 10 games. The Steelers made a separate proposal to move the deadline to the Tuesday after Week 9 games.
Hybrid kickoff: The most radical and interesting rule change of 10 on the docket creates what the league is calling the hybrid kickoff. It is borrowed from the defunct XFL and designed to encourage kick returns and reduce injuries, and virtually eliminate touchbacks, which have soared in the last decade.
The new format would have the kicking team line up on the receiving team’s 40-yard line and land the kickoff between the goal line and 20-yard line. The receiving team lines up five yards beyond the kicking team. No players can move until the ball hits the ground or is caught by a returner.
There is a whole page of “what-ifs” to explain where the ball is placed if the kickoff goes out of bounds, fails to reach the landing zone, or bounces into the end zone.
One provision of the rule – which may cost the overall concept a yes vote – specifies that an onside kick can only be attempted by the team trailing on the scoreboard in the fourth quarter, and it must be declared to officials before lining up.