I finally found out after all these years you have to have a scout . . . a football guy, as your general manager. Hes got to go out and see the player, talk to the player, talk to his family, see how interested he is in the game. Thats what Buddy [Nix] does.

Any chance Mikey reads PFT?

I wonder if Mickey even knows there is strong sentiment in Cincy for him to do that. He doesn't seem the type to listen to media or read opinions on the internet. He is surrounded by yesmen, is it possible he thinks he is still adored because of his name?

The local opinions really shouldn't mean anything. That is the problem up here in Cleveland Brown land...no franchise listens to or reacts to fan sentiment more so than the Randy Lerner Cleveland Browns. As a result they have made some bad coaching hires/changes, bad QB decisions, and weak personnel moves (i.e. Josh Cribbs may be their best skill guy but the life of a return man is short...the Steelers or Patriots would have been much more shrewd with the likes of Cribbs in terms of his contract negotiations, or they would have traded him and got something for a guy who will be too slow to return kicks in the next year or two). Some owners like an Arthur Blank do have a businessman mentality and while they may listen to fans they have good front offices around them that make sure that they make the right moves.

The difference is that some of these franchises that completely ignore their fanbase (the two aforementioned teams and I would add the Chargers and Eagles to that) have a goal of winning and in the end those four teams are in the hunt annually because they make the right moves popular or unpopular because all of those teams have strong front offices.

MB's problem is that he is the worst of all worlds...he doesn't listen to the fans because he doesn't care, and he doesn't have a front office shrewd enough to make the correct unpopular moves (a'la trading 85 to Washington for two first rounders...Belichik would have made that trade and would have coerced something else out of them!)

There's two sides to every story and the one I think Mike Brown doesn't get is you want players to want to play for you. The moment a player doesn't want to play for you, you start to make plans to get rid of them. It shows no player is bigger than the team. While holding the ones in the locker room accoutable. You can't have a player in the locker room constantly fighting ownership and coaches.

I grew up right outside Philadelphia and witnessed first hand the toughest fans around. It doesn't matter who you are, Philadelphia will eventually learn to hate you.

They booed Mike Schmidt, turned on Eric Lindros, started to complain about Allen Iverson, and were never happy with Donovon McNabb. Its also why their teams never win anything up until the Phillies the last couple of years. Being a star athlete in Philadelphia is like being a lead singer in a punk band, once you achieve a certain amount of success they hate you for it.

You want fans to shut up provide a couple of playoff runs and demonstrate you know what you're doing. Mike Brown hasn't been able to do it for over 20 years now, why would he be able to do it now?



"I will torture him, I will crucify him,...REAL BAd!" - Clubber Lang