Mangini talks about Browns, Quinn and Belichick

[jmt57]

No ground-shaking revelations as the editor's title would lead you to believe, but something to pass along in the slowest part of the week. He seems to be holding on to his past as a reason for more time in the court of public opinion.

Q & A: Under fire, Mangini opens up about Browns, Quinn, Belichick by Clark Judge of CBS Sports

I'm not happy with the production that we've had, and I don't think anybody is. But I am happy with the way these guys have worked. Going through the experience in New England where the team was 8-8 [in 1999] and ended up 5-11 [in 2000, Belichick's first season there]; then where the start of the next year we were 1-2 and things didn't look good ... Anyway, we worked the same way, and people make good decisions. Then we beat San Diego [in 2001], and it was like the whole tide turned. And that wasn't a function of that game. It was a function of all the work that went in leading up to that game. People understood how to play as a team; what it meant to study, to work, to be selfless, to be part of something bigger and not to worry about who got credit. And when it hit, it hit big and it's continued to hit over time.

I like to think I was part of an organization that was built to last, but it doesn't happen overnight. And it doesn't take one decision or one person. It takes a ton of them. Our whole philosophy is based on things that I learned here [in Cleveland] as a ballboy and a young guy, and in New England as a young position coach. Here, we [the Browns] had gone to the playoffs and paid Andre Rison a $5 million signing bonus, which at that time was astronomical. I picked up Andre at the airport, and he made Bill sit and the owner sit and the media sit for an hour while in a limousine that I was in. And that was the start of it.

 

[363839]

"...And it doesn't take one decision or one person. It takes a ton of them." EM.

I don't know if he really wanted to put it like that.

 

[VrabelMayeWin]

You're tripping over Belichick's coattails, Eric. You, sir, are no Bill Belichick.

 

[MassPats38]

"He was cooperative. He was engaging. He was candid. He was thoughtful, secure and downright interesting. In short, he was not the Bill Belichick clone he has been made out to be, though I wondered when seeing a Darth Vader mask resting on a shelf behind the door to his second-floor office."

So much for objectivity. Claim you do not understand a man you have never met and open by casting aspersions at another individual you have likely never interviewed.

Given Belichick's early efforts to work with the media in Cleveland preceding his being drawn and quartered by the press, I am not surprised he does not have an open door policy with these clowns.

And Judge got one thing right - Mangini is no Belichick clone. Otherwise, it's just a PR piece designed to convince the world Mangini is not a bad guy and patently inept at running an organization. I am guessing Mangini has the equivalent life expectancy in that position of a turkey this time of year.