In a wide-ranging interview with Ken Carman and Jason Lloyd on 92.3 The Fan on Thursday, former Browns defensive coordinator and interim coach Gregg Williams detailed what transpired during a turbulent 2018 season and the coaching search that followed.
Williams took over as interim head coach in late October 2018 after the Browns fired Hue Jackson amid a 2-5-1 start. Cleveland finished strong under Williams’ guidance by going 5-3 the rest of the season, but Williams was passed over by then-general manager John Dorsey and ownership for the full-time job in the ensuing offseason.
Not that it surprised Williams, given how the Browns operated at the time. Cleveland instead hired offensive coordinator Freddie Kitchens to be its head coach.
“I’ll tell you this – not surprise,” Williams said of Kitchens getting the job. “There were things going on behind the scenes when I was here about that with him. Again, listen to me when I say this – I think the world of Freddie. But people that are in charge of you, that are above you that aren’t as good as you or are intimated by you want to hire people that are going to say ‘yes sir’ and say whatever they say.”
You’re talking about Dorsey?
“Yeah, John and Jim (Haslam), the owner,” Williams said. “And he’s involved in all kinds of things. He’s a good man too, but understand, neither one of them can coach Little League. So they have to do what they want to do. What happens is you hire people that will say, ‘OK, let’s do it that way.’ I’ve been through this enough that I said, ‘No, that’s not what it’s going to do.’ John was going to answer to me with I had it set up. And he and I work together, and I’ll have the final say and final decision. They didn’t want to do it that way. That’s just how it is. That’s OK. When you take a look at the established coaches that have been places for a long time and been successful for a long time, what would take the decisions away from the coach and the general manager who’s never stepped on the field and coached at any level to have him have final say? Nope, I’m not going to do that. If I’m going to do that any more the rest of my career, I’m going to do it at the position I’m at right now. I’ll be a coordinator, I’ll be a position coach, but I’m not going to be a head coach. The reason we turned it around was, as I talked with them the final eight games, is that all the decisions come to me. Don’t come down and ask me about why we’re doing this, why we’re doing that, how we’re doing this or whatever. OK, this is what we’re going to do and this is how we’re going to do it. And it was pretty good on how we did it.”
Williams’ interview for the full-time job came on New Year’s Day in 2019, and he had a feeling pretty quickly that he wasn’t going to get the job.
“My interview was coaching for two years anyway, right?” Williams said. “So why do I need to take another interview? You’re around me every single second of every day and you’re going to ask me stupid questions about what I’ve already answered before and you’re going to ask me stupid questions from theory – and theory is one thing, but application is another.
And you’ve had a chance to see application. So that’s just it what it is.”
And you told Dorsey that in the interview?
“Yup, I did.”
Williams moved on to be the Jets’ defensive coordinator. He’s currently the defensive coordinator for the DC Defenders of the XFL.
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