One of the true leaders on the Browns, cornerback Denzel Ward wants a coach to promote and demand 'complementary football' and hold players accountable for not doing their job.
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Editor's note: Tony Grossi is a Cleveland Browns and NFL analyst for TheLandOnDemand.com and 850 ESPN Cleveland. He has covered the Browns since 1984.
Myles Garrett gets all the media hype, but a truer leader on the Browns, in my opinion, has been Denzel Ward.
Which is why his words in the aftermath of the coaching change should be taken to heart.
Nobody on defense threw the offense or special teams under the bus during the 2025 season, even though there was every reason to. That’s a credit to head coach Kevin Stefanski, who preached “win as a team, lose as a team” to avoid the finger-pointing that can splinter a team.
But after Stefanski was fired on Monday, Ward couldn’t help but speak from the heart. And what he said spoke volumes.
The context of Ward’s comments was a question about what the Browns need in their next head coach.
“Ummmm … let’s see …,” Ward started, measuring his words. “Honestly, I think we need, like, assertiveness. Just holding people accountable, holding guys accountable. Nobody played great [all the time]. Defense didn’t play great all year. I mean, we played well, we just didn’t play complementary football.”
Back to the next head coach.
“Just holding the offensive guys to a higher standard,” Ward said. “Making sure guys are doing what they’re supposed to do, and just holding guys accountable when they’re not. So I think just someone who’s going to hold people accountable and hold people to a high standard.
“We have to play complementary football. We just didn’t do that. You can’t win a lot of football games when you’re not playing as a team and not playing together.”
Ward knows it’s impossible to win in the NFL on defense alone. The five wins posted by the Browns in 2025 were generated by the defense. In those Browns victories, Green Bay scored 10 points, Miami scored 6, Las Vegas 10, Pittsburgh 6, and Cincinnati 18.
But there were also uncommon contributions from the two other phases in each win – a Shelby Harris blocked field goal and an Andre Szmyt 55-yard game-winning field goal against the Packers; a special teams turnover against the Dolphins; productive games by Shedeur Sanders, Quinshon Judkins and Dylan Sampson against the Raiders; two Szmyt field goals against the Steelers; a final scoring drive by Sanders at the end and another game-winning Szmyt kick against the Bengals.
The point is there were 12 games in which the offense and special teams weighed down the defense, and nothing was done about it. Ward knows that never happened on defense. If you didn’t do your job, your play time was taken away.
Ward declined to mention Stefanski by name when delivering his opinions about the next head coach. So he was asked if Stefanski was lax in holding players, even coaches, accountable in the other phases of the team.
“I wouldn’t say he didn’t hold us accountable,” Ward said. “I’m just saying for a future coach to come in we need someone to hold us accountable and to a high standard.”
Enough said.