Front Office – Page 38 – Syndication Server

Larry Ogunjobi: Projecting the Browns defensive tackle’s next contract

Larry Ogunjobi is entering the final season of his four-year rookie deal. Every indication is the Cleveland Browns intend to keep the young defensive tackle.

It will require GM Andrew Berry making an investment in Ogunjobi that might seem higher than expected for a player of his relatively low national profile. Ogunjobi doesn’t figure to come cheap.

He posted 50 tackles and 5.5 sacks in 2019 one year after notching 52 tackles and the same 5.5 sacks in his second season. Ogunjobi accomplished those near mirror numbers in different defensive schemes. Consistency across scheme is something the NFL will value highly.

What will Ogunjobi get in his next contract? Here are a few similar players and the contracts they’ve earned recently to provide a baseline for negotiations between the Browns and Ogunjobi.

Matt Ioannidis, Redskins

Ioannidis signed a 3-year extension in April of 2019 valued at $21.75 million. Just over $11 million was fully guaranteed. His deal also includes per-game roster bonuses that tally $300,000 per season.

Ioannidis, who plays both tackle and end in Washington’s well-stocked defensive front, tallied 12 sacks and 58 total tackles in the two seasons prior to earning his new payday. He’s the figurative floor for Ogunjobi in his negotiations with Cleveland.

Javon Hargrave, Eagles

Hargrave moved across Pennsylvania from the Steelers to the Eagles this offseason. The Eagles gave him $39 million over three years to make the free agency jump, with $25.5 million guaranteed.

Hargrave, like Ogunjobi, was a 3rd-round pick who stepped up after a rookie season of learning to play in the NFL. In his last two seasons with the Steelers, Hargrave posted 109 total tackles and 10.5 sacks. He’s more of a nose tackle than Ogunjobi, but the statistical similarities are more pertinent than the positional designation.

Jordan Phillips, Cardinals

Phillips earned a 3-year, $30 million contract in free agency this offseason to join Arizona. He cashed in on a breakout 2019 with Buffalo, notching 9.5 sacks and 31 tackles for the Bills. Prior to that standout season, Phillips had been an underwhelming journeyman-type player, bouncing from Miami to Buffalo and functioning as more of a role player than a prime free agent.

Phillips is guaranteed just $14.5 million at signing, a lower percentage than Ioannidis or Hargrave. That is perhaps a reflection on his one-year-wonder status, but it could also be a gateway for him to ask for more money down the line if he repeats his 2019.

Ogunjobi should command at least the same deal as the one Phillips signed with the Cardinals. He very well could match Hargrave’s new contract, and that’s a deal that could price him out of Cleveland if the Browns wait for him to post another 5-sack, 50-tackle season.

The Hurry Up Podcast: Matt Waldman talks Nick Chubb, Browns Rushing Attack

The Hurry Up Podcast: Matt Waldman talks Nick Chubb, Browns run game and more

Host Mac Robinson talks to Matt Waldman of the Rookie Scouting Portfolio about the Cleveland Browns’ new offense under head coach Kevin Stefanski, and how Nick Chubb could burst onto the scene and put himself in some pretty elite company.

Listen as Robinson and Waldman discuss the impact of the running game on the wide receiver group, and some of their favorite draft picks and each’s fit on the roster.

Be sure to follow Mac (@MacRobinson95) and the podcast (@HurryUpPodcast) on Twitter for all of the latest news and notes surrounding the podcast, the Browns, and all things football! Feel free to support the podcast today by becoming a patron!

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Report: Browns hiring Packers scout Charles Walls as national scout

Reports from various Green Bay sources, including one from Jim Owczarski of Packers News, indicate the Cleveland Browns are poaching away Charles Walls from the Green Bay Packers’ scouting department. Walls will serve as a national scout for the Browns.

The move is a promotion for Walls, putting him in charge of a broader set of players than an area scout.

Walls has covered the Southwest region as an area scout since 2017. He has worked with the Packers since 2013, serving as a scouting intern and the team’s NFL Scouting Combine scout before heading out on the road. He also has some college coaching experience following the end of his playing career at Old Dominion, where Walls was part of the school’s first-ever football team in the late 2000s.

He joins the new front office staff under GM Andrew Berry. It’s fairly common for new regimes to make changes to the scouting department. Interestingly, Walls had strong ties to the former Browns regime headed by GM John Dorsey and VPs Eliot Wolf and Alonzo Highsmith, all of whom had extensive Packers backgrounds.

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Browns have been well ahead of the curve in hiring minorities

The Browns have had 3 men of color as head coaches and 3 other African-Americans running the team

The NFL continues to try and promote minority hiring among its 32 member clubs. The latest attempt at expanding upon the “Rooney Rule” is a proposal that will provide draft incentives for teams to hire and retain minorities in coaching and front office positions.

Voting on this proposal will come soon, and it’s a divisive issue that creates many unpleasant conversation tentacles and debates. Hiring people of color in positions of power in a league where people of color make up over two-thirds of the players seems like a natural concept, but it hasn’t worked out that way in most places.

Cleveland has largely been one of the few exceptions. The Browns have been one of the most aggressively progressive organizations in hiring African-American men to prominent decision-making roles.

Take new GM Andrew Berry. He’s the third African-American hired to run the Browns front office (in one title or another) in the last decade, following Sashi Brown and Ray Farmer. Cleveland’s longest-tenured head coach 1999 is Romeo Crennel, hired in 2005 and lasting four full seasons. Hue Jackson — hired by Brown — got 2.5 seasons as the head coach. Terry Robiskie even had a brief run as an interim coach. The Browns are one of the very few NFL organizations that have had multiple people of color as both head coaches and general managers.

Browns hire Kwesi Adofo-Mensah as Vice President of Football Operations

The Cleveland Browns have hired Kwesi Adofo-Mensah as Vice President of Football Operations

The Cleveland Browns have hired Kwesi Adofo-Mensah as the new Vice President of Football Operations. Adofo-Mensah joins the Browns after spending the last seven years working in the front office of the San Francisco 49ers, most recently as Director of Football Research.

He brings an analytical background to the Browns, a natural fit under GM Andrew Berry and chief strategy officer Paul DePodesta. Adofo-Mensah worked closely with GM John Lynch to build the reigning NFC champions.

Prior to embarking on his career in football analytics, Adofo-Mensah worked as a commodities broker and portfolio manager for several large financial investment firms.

The Hurry Up Podcast: National Perspective w/ NFL Network’s Marc Sessler

Marc Sessler, NFL Network and Around the NFL Podcast, stops by to give his thoughts on the Cleveland Browns offseason, the difference between the national perspective and local perspective on the team, and choosing to be a Browns fan growing up.

Host Mac Robinson also breaks down the Browns later round draft picks, his favorite pick of the Browns draft, and even goes into some of the Browns’ recent roster moves!

Bob Quinn on draft smokescreens: ‘much easier said than done’

Bob Quinn on draft smokescreens: ‘much easier said than done’ in the modern NFL

Count Lions GM Bob Quinn among those who don’t believe in the concept of the NFL draft smokescreen. He dispelled the notion that they work in the modern NFL during a radio interview on Monday.

Quinn was asked why he didn’t try to create more of an illusion that the Lions were interested in drafting Alabama QB Tua Tagovailoa to generate possible trade interest in the pick. The GM quickly dismissed the popular fan notion o the smokescreen.

“Much easier said than done,” Quinn told 97.1 The Ticket in Detroit. “Much, much. How do I know that Tua was their guy? How do I know that they didn’t really want an offensive tackle, which they had talked a lot about. There’s so many maybe’s in that conversation, that is why it doesn’t happen in the NFL.”

Quinn also brought up his close relationship with Miami GM Chris Grier, a Detroit native who cut his management teeth with the New England Patriots like Quinn did.

“We all trust each other as GM’s. I worked with Chris Grier for a year my first year in the league,” Quinn stated. “Chris was in New England in 2000. Ultimately, this is a game of poker. On draft weekend, I take no one’s word. I couldn’t sit there and truthfully for the Lions organization consider something like that because you never know what could happen.”

There were no trades in the first 12 picks of the 2020 NFL Draft, which reinforces that the lack of smokescreen effectiveness extends far beyond Detroit. Nobody was really interested in trading, period.

Andrew Berry, Kevin Stefanski prove men of their words on David Njoku

Andrew Berry, Kevin Stefanski prove men of their words on David Njoku by exercising the Browns TE’s fifth-year option

The Cleveland Browns have been a difficult team to trust in the last few years. The ever-changing front office and coaching staffs have often operated with just one hand clapping.

It’s early, but thus far the new regime of GM Andrew Berry and head coach Kevin Stefanski are joined in hand. Even better, they have proven that their words mean something.

Unlike when Freddie Kitchens would gruffly state he’s not answering any questions on a topic and subsequently spend the next 10 minutes discussing said topic, or when Sashi Brown would tell players they were more than numbers before treating them exactly like a faceless number, the new Browns regime is backing up its words with actions. Picking up the fifth-year option on tight end David Njoku’s contract is a great example.

The Browns exercised the option on Njoku’s contract on Monday. Even after the first reports of the action started to leak out, skeptical fans and media wondered if it was legit. The team signed Austin Hooper in free agency to the richest deal ever signed by a tight end, then drafted promising young Harrison Bryant over the weekend.

Would they really keep three prominent tight ends? Are they still confident in Njoku, who has occasionally flashed greatness but largely underwhelmed in his first three seasons?

Berry and Stefanski both insisted to the skeptical masses that they did highly value Njoku. It wasn’t just diplomatic speak. They proved it by exercising Njoku’s option that will keep him in Cleveland through the end of the 2021 season.

Think of what that means to a player like Njoku, still precocious at just 23 years old. Think of what it means to the locker room, telling players that they’ll get the chance to prove themselves and won’t get thrown away hastily.

Men of their word. That’s a refreshing way for the Browns to conduct business.

The Hurry Up Podcast: NFL Draft recap with Stephen Thomas

Host Mac Robinson wraps up Draft Week with Mock-Draft-aholic Stephen Thomas (@BrownsMockDraft on Twitter) as they breakdown all seven members of the Cleveland Browns 2020 Draft Class, as well as look at some of the undrafted free agent signings! They also look across the division and the league to give some of their favorite draft picks and who could be the stars of tomorrow!

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POLL: Grade the full Browns 2020 NFL Draft weekend

Now that you’ve had a little time to let the last three days settle in and process, we’re looking for your thoughts on how well Browns GM Andrew Berry and his staff did in their first NFL Draft.

The picks:

Rd. 1 Pick 10: Jedrick Wills, OT, Alabama

Rd. 2 Pick 44: Grant Delpit, S, LSU

Rd. 3 Pick 88: Jordan Elliott, DT, Missouri

Rd. 3 Pick 97: Jacob Phillips, LB, LSU

Rd. 4 Pick 115: Harrison Bryant, TE, FAU

Rd. 5 Pick 160: Nick Harris, OC, Washington

Rd. 6 Pick 187: Donovan Peoples-Jones, WR, Michigan

How’s that look, Dawg Pound nation?

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