Browns hire Hue Jackson as coach, team’s 8th since 1999

The 50-year-old has prior head coaching experience in the National Football League and weakens AFC North rival Cincinnati by departing his post as offensive coordinator.

Jackson easily won the day at the press conference, which should be fairly easy to do as the first day is always the best one for a Browns head coach, but the real work starts now. The Browns fired Mike Pettine after a 3-13 season. “We as an organization have a lot of work to do to make sure that’s where we need to be or where we don’t need to be”.

Jackson had already interviewed with the five-time Super Bowl champion San Francisco 49ers, and was scheduled to board a plane for an interview with the four-time Super Bowl champion New York Giants, when the no-time Super Bowl participant Browns made him an offer he couldn’t refuse.

“I’m going to attract some good coaches and some great coaches”, Jackson said. Coaches are consistent in how they teach and how they do things that are always the most successful, even if that drives media people insane and even if that drives the people around them insane.

Although Haslam is very excited for Jackson to merge with the Browns, it is uncertain whether everyone will share that excitement.

It’s Jackson’s turn to make them happen. “We’ve got the guys that can handle it”.

The Browns were the second team to interview Jackson on Sunday in the hours after the Bengals suffered a shocking last-minute home loss to the Pittsburgh Steelers in the Wildcard round of the AFC Playoffs at Paul Brown Stadium, and they were the last to do so.

For Jackson, the Browns’ potential – with a redesigned front office, rabid fan base and resources to improve the roster – appealed to him most as he evaluated his future in the enviable position of a sought after coaching candidate.

The Raiders were a team in turmoil at the time and his struggles didn’t seem to follow him to Cincinnati, where Dalton developed a nice rapport with wide receiver A.J. Green under Jackson’s watchful eye. Could backup quarterback A.J. McCarron be one of them?

A source close to Jackson told cleveland.com that he won’t want to risk his job and reputation on Browns quarterback Johnny Manziel, who angered the club during the final weekend of the season by traveling to Las Vegas just days after being diagnosed with a concussion. The seed was sown in an off-season summit where Jackson not only challenged Dalton on the field but on his overall approach to the team and the game. Still without a general manager in place, DePodesta will seemingly have some level of influence over the players being brought in this offseason, possibly setting Jackson up for failure much in the same way Pettine had no chance of success.

Jackson explained why so many of his former players are so fond of him.

Jackson set big goals in an address to team employees.

Hue Jackson knows all about the Browns’ recent misery, the constant losing, the continuous change. We are chasing greatness. “We want to be innovative and cutting edge on everything that we do in this building because eventually, everyone is going to be doing what we are doing”.

The Browns ensured Jackson would only have to fly to Cleveland. My thing is to get us to the game ready to play, motivated, fired up, enthusiastically and to have an opportunity to win.