The Browns decided today that offensive coordinator Freddie Kitchens will be the team’s next head coach. He will be tasked with leading the Browns into what appears to be a promising future, and he will not be joined on that journey by defensive coordinator Gregg Williams.
Williams, one of the truest maniacs to ever walk an NFL sideline, started the season as Cleveland’s defensive coordinator and was one piece of the Browns’ deeply dysfunctional set of coaches, which included head coach Hue Jackson and offensive coordinator Todd Haley. Jackson and Haley were fired midseason, and Williams seemingly won the trio’s long-simmering power struggle when he was named interim head coach. Williams certainly believed that he deserved the job, and made clear during his first press conference as the man in charge that just about every NFL team has spent years begging him to be their head coach. At the time he said:
“Since I left Buffalo, I had 11 letters to interview for HC jobs,” Williams proclaimed. “Four of them didn’t even have to interview, just show up and sign the contract.”
This is a great day for Williams, then. He’s going back into the job market with more employment opportunities than he knows what to do with. That sucks for all the current head coaches who are going to get fired just so their teams can take a shot at hiring this suddenly available genius, though.