Breaking News: owners of Cleveland Browns Dee, Jimmy and the Haslam family in Danger after….
WHITE SULPHUR SPRINGS, W.Va. (AP) — The pressure to win is intense and the expectations are heightened for the Cleveland Browns.
Failure is not an option. They’re in win-now mode.
With a talented roster and quarterback Deshaun Watson available for his first full season with the team following an 11-game NFL suspension in 2022, the Browns have run out of excuses — and maybe time — to contend in the AFC.
From the outside, a playoff appearance would seem to be the minimum standard of success for the Browns, who went 7-10 last season.
However, owner Jimmy Haslam isn’t making any ultimatums, projections or predictions.
“I’m not saying the expectations aren’t high. I’m just not going to draw a line for you guys what they are,” Haslam said Monday at the Greenbrier Resort, Cleveland’s home for the first eight days of training camp.
“They’re high. All of us have high expectations. Everybody that works for the Browns that’s here has high expectations today.”
Haslam and his wife, Dee, have been in the league long enough to know anything can happen during a season. In the Browns’ case, anything has usually meant something bad.
Cleveland is 60-119-1 since the Haslams’ 2012 takeover.
The Browns have only made the postseason once in the owners’ tenure, and the organization has suffered countless setbacks — many of them self-inflicted — over the past decade.
This season could be different, though.
The Haslams have invested heavily in players (Watson was guaranteed $230 million and Cleveland has a league-high $302 million cash spend this season, according to spotrac.com ), allowing chief strategist Paul DePodesta and general manager Andrew Berry to give fourth-year coach Kevin Stefanski a team that on paper can stack up against any in the league.
