Cleveland Browns Get Right Guy; Baltimore Looking at Wrong Guys

The Cleveland Browns hired Phil Savage away from Baltimore to be their GM. Most people seem to agree that this is a great move by the Browns. It also happened quickly enough that Cleveland can now jump into finding the right coach.

Baltimore is looking for an Offensive Coordinator, and is looking in all the wrong places.
NFL.com reports that the Ravens are looking at Rick Neuheisel and the Vikings' Scott Linehan, among others. Having lived in Colorado until 1998 and in Minnesota since then, I am very familiar with both names. And not in a positive way.

Rick Neuheisel spent time as the CU Buffaloes coach. He had some early success, but the program quickly declined and Neuheisel left under a cloud of NCAA violation suspicions. He even broke a few rules tampering with CU players as he slinked out of town to Washington. The U of W had to compensate CU for Rick's indiscretions.

Neuheisel then had a lot of early success in Washington before getting embroiled in another scandal involving high-stakes basketball pools. He left Washington under a cloud of suspicion also.

"I'm thankful for Coach Billick providing me the opportunity to have a conversation, especially after what's happened to me over the past couple of years. Opportunities have been few and far between," he said. "I long to get back into the game, so it's a thrill to be here."

Tough finding a job when you keep leaving places under ethically-challenged circumstances.

Baltimore is also looking at Scott Linehan of the Vikings. Take our offensive coordinator, please! The Ravens would be doing the Vikes a huge favor. Scoring production is down under Linehan and the running game has all but disappeared. The game plans under Linehan have produced two straight late-season collapses.

"I plan on moving along quickly," said Billick, adding that the process could be completed as soon as next week.

Yeah, no sense wasting too much time searching for someone you only expect to drag your offense out of the ashes. If Baltimore chooses one of these guys, we can expect a lot more 8-8 and 9-7 seasons out of them. The good news for other AFC teams is, it leaves a playoff spot open for the rest of them.