The attempt that he's making is to get rid of a culture of losing that rests on top of a hallowed past which is overglorified and makes the present endeavors of the team seem small and petty. It's a sound concept from a transformational point of view, but one that is very risky since it narrows his window to succeed by antagonizing the fan base. I'd have done it a little bit differently, covering up the murals and telling the fanbase that they'd be uncovered when there were current players worthy of adding to the display. That way the past has just been buried momentarily in the attempt to create a better future and there is a huge incentive for the current players to get their faces up on that wall by the time the tarpaulins come down in a few years. I'm not fond of Eric Mangini because I think he blends Bill Belichik's people skills with Bill Parcells ego and doesn't have the goods on the sidelines to justify either. That said, he has a chance to change the Browns culture and he's obviously going all in on that. Maybe he'll succeed.
Actually, that is untrue. When the Ravens left Cleveland it was later agreed that they left behind the Browns legacy. They (Ravens) in fact are the expansion team. The records and trophies earned by the Cleveland Browns remain Browns accomplishments associated with the Browns team, not the Ravens.
The notion that a team's poor performance has anything to do with it honoring its past strikes me as more than a little ridiculous. The exact opposite argument is used constantly by teams that are consistently successful - the Steelers, for example, constantly evoke the Steel Curtain as being the origination of the way they view football. Further, the idea that the existence of a mural depicting Jim Brown and Otto Graham somehow makes players think they can rest on the laurels of the past is too absurd to contemplate, since the current players probably have no idea who those people were, and didn't give the mural a second thought whenever they passed it. The only people this affects are the fans. They are the only people with institutional memory here, especially since the current Cleveland Browns have nothing to do with the successful teams of the past from the point of view of ownership (Modell took that with him to Baltimore). By doing this Mangini is saying to the fans that their memories are worthless and irrelevant, a remarkably foolish thing for a new head coach to do, since it pretty much guarantees that unless he is successful right away they will turn on him with a vengeance. Further, what is the point of making this your first public action as a coach? What Mangini should be doing is tearing down all reference to the recent past, which has been uniformly horrible, and telling the current players that it is only performance on the level of the people on that wall that will be acceptable from now on. By doing things this way, he is marginalizing the only thing about the organization that is actually good - the fanbase. Is the lesson Mangini took from the Jets that the reason the team has failed for 40 years is because the fans still idolize Joe Willie? If so, someone should explain to him the difference between cause and effect.
Maybe what he's trying to do is convey the message not to rest on your past successes. That what the franchise did in the past does not carry you today, that they have to create their own successes. As for the blank wall, maybe he intends to redo the mural based on the teams success down the road when they (providing that they) improve.
There are teams that develope a culture of losing on a generational basis. Looking back on a storied past in that situation is usually self-defeating because it minimizes the ability of the players to see themselves as successful in relation to their achievements vs the storied achievements of the past dynasty. Yes, I think the Jets would be better off if Joe Namath's name wasn't mentioned for a few years at this point. You think Kellen Clemens chances to succeed are enhanced when his performance is held up against a hall of fame QB on a regular basis? Do you think any of the 49ers QB's chances to succeed are enhanced when the comparisons that are made are to Joe Montana and Steve Young? Winning teams that maintain a strong tradition are one thing. If they maintain the level of play of their storied predecessors then there is a net positive involved in having that continuity of myth and legend. Losing teams really do not benefit from being reminded constantly that they suck and people much better than them used to waer the uniform back in the day. You need to remove that shadow before the sprouts are going to have much chance to grow in my opinion.
There are teams that develope a culture of losing on a generational basis. Looking back on a storied past in that situation is usually self-defeating because it minimizes the ability of the players to see themselves as successful in relation to their achievements vs the storied achievements of the past dynasty. Yes, I think the Jets would be better off if Joe Namath's name wasn't mentioned for a few years at this point. You think Kellen Clemens chances to succeed are enhanced when his performance is held up against a hall of fame QB on a regular basis? Do you think any of the 49ers QB's chances to succeed are enhanced when the comparisons that are made are to Joe Montana and Steve Young? Winning teams that maintain a strong tradition are one thing. If they maintain the level of play of their storied predecessors then there is a net positive involved in having that continuity of myth and legend. Losing teams really do not benefit from being reminded constantly that they suck and people much better than them used to waer the uniform back in the day. You need to remove that shadow before the sprouts are going to have much chance to grow in my opinion. And BTW, every time the fans in Cleveland start booing because they're not watching the team of the 50's and 60's heyday they negatively reinforce the team's performance, so the argument that the fans benefit from having a storied pat to relate to is somewhat facetious. That storied past causes them to tear down the team in front of them because it's not as good.
Romeo Crennel did when he took over in Cleveland, although he didn't paint over any murals. What is it with football coaches all turning into interior decorators when they take new positions?
The lettering on that sign is like a weird metaphor, especially the words "Training Camp". It looks like he got a pretty good start with the first three letters, and then got nervous in the middle, thinking that he run out of room and screw it up. Then it looks like he thought he'd back into it by writing the "AMP" from the right side inward and meeting in the middle, but he ended up with an awkward space, which he corrected with a big-ass "C". Then he forgot that he still needed a "G" and crammed-in a "6". Poor space management, but he ended up with an okay sign. Not great, but okay. Not his fault that they only make posterboard 28 inches wide. Any time you finish a word it's a successful sign. Back in the. . . mumblegrumblemumble. . . We didn't back into nuthin'.
Fans like success, and don't like failure. The Cleveland fans have been far more loyal than the team has deserved, so I don't agree at all that they have anything to do with the team's failures. They loved Bernie Kosar because he had success for them, even though it didn't reach the Graham/Brown level of success. Somehow he managed to succeed even being a lot more in the shadow of those teams (since it was much more recent history then), because he was talented. Steve Young actually makes the opposite point that you're trying to make - he absolutely did suffer from the immediate comparison with Montana, but his ability won the fans over. Brett Favre had no trouble becoming an icon in Green Bay even with the shadow of Lombardi, despite the fact that the team had been absolutely awful for 25 years - he was good, and the team won, so the fans loved him. And no, I don't think the success or failure of Kellen Clemens is even remotely related to Joe Namath's name being mentioned.
This is the wrong comparison. It was Mike Holmgren who could not get out of Lombardi's shadow and who ultimately fled for Seattle as a result, despite reviving the Packers and turning them into a very good team he could not compete with Lombardi's ghost and he took the money from Paul Allen and ran without giving the Packers a chance to retain him. It was easier to work somewhere where he could make history without constantly being reminded of somebody else's past successes. Mike Sherman also got run out of town because he wasn't Vince Lombardi and he was also staring at the one Super Bowl win Holmgren had. The Packers are a perfect example of why the past should be allowed to lie quietly and not linger over the present.
I remember Joe Klecko in a radio interview in December complained about how Mangini ignored former Jets players.
my favorite lines: "The mural was located at the team's practice facility in Berea, Ohio, and in its place is a spectacularly bland, plain white wall. Exciting. I'm guessing this is to represent what the Browns have accomplished since the players mentioned above hung up their cleats. "
I think the Browns only like Kosar because he laid down when Gastineau brushed against him and that caused the Jets to miss the SB and the Brownies to go. Other than that one play he was useless cannon fodder.
