Cleveland Browns: Have you heard the one about Drew Brees? by Christopher Markoch

The Cleveland Browns are smitten with their new offensive coordinator and the Pittsburgh Steelers will start to get jealous when he makes this offense over

If the AFC North was a high school, right now the Pittsburgh Steelers would be the popular guy and the Cleveland Browns the last place nerd.

But the nerd just scored big time.

See, the popular guy had been going out with a really hot offensive coordinator (OC) for the last six years. Over time, though, he got bored with the relationship (as popular folks tend to do) and broke up with the hot OC at the end of last year. The OC wasn’t happy about being rejected, though – hot commodities rarely are – so he did the one thing that was certain to get the popular guy to question his choice:

Started going out with the last place nerd.

By most standards, Todd Haley is a super hot OC. Watch his no nonsense introductory Press conference on ClevelandBrowns.com if you have any doubts. Seems that all he did for the Steelers was turn them back into one of the NFL’s premier offenses while developing:

“arguably the best receiver in the league (Antonio Brown), arguably the best back in the league (Le’Veon Bell), one of the top quarterbacks in the league (Ben Roethlisberger) and scoring a lot of points.” — Haley said via Patrick Maks from the team’s official website

Now that’s hot.

But not hot enough for the Steelers, apparently, because they declined to renew Haley’s contract last month after yet another prolific year and another AFC North championship. It must be true what they say about hotties – as good as they look, there’s always at least one ex who’s bored with their magic.

But the last place nerd Browns were very interested.

Whatever sweet words Browns head nerd Hue Jackson whispered into Haley’s ear after the breakup must have worked because the hot OC decided a new NFL nerd makeover challenge would be just the thing to make the ex jealous.

And it can work, too. Just like in high school, all it takes for the dork to look better is for one super hottie to pay attention, to believe in their potential, to help them put a stop to their losing ways and to explain what it takes to look and act (and win) like a winner.

That’s exactly what Todd Haley does for the Browns.

“I know you all that have been here are looking at it one way, but that’s not the way I’m looking at it.” — Haley said again via Maks

In other words, the hot OC sees what long time Browns fans have been finding extremely difficult to see themselves – the potential beauty that’s somewhere deep inside of this 0-16 loser.

And his key to turning okay players into superstars?

“You have to develop players in this league. I brought up Antonio Brown. When I got [to Pittsburgh], Antonio Brown wasn’t the Antonio Brown everyone knows. There was great development there.” — Haley via Maks

So, does that mean he can do the same for Josh Gordon and Corey Coleman? Or Duke Johnson and David Njoku? Can he turn them from being kind of average performing into league superstars, too?

Now that would be hot.

Haley goes on to explain the developmental philosophy he’s evolved during his 20-plus years of NFL coaching:

“In this league, if you don’t develop players, you’re probably going to fail. I told all of the [Browns] coaches when we sat down for the first time that our job is to take the players we have and put them in the best possible chance to succeed and to not worry about a lot else. So that’s what the focus will be. We’ll be working our tails off to develop the players we have and to do the same with the players we acquire.” — Haley via Maks

Even hotter, since that hasn’t been a Browns priority in a long while.

As far as Haley’s overall offensive philosophy goes, he understands that in the AFC North you definitely have to run the ball.

“And the key is, you have to run the ball when the other team knows you’re going to run it.” — Haley via Maks

So very hot.

But that doesn’t mean Haley favors the run game over the passing game or vice versa.

Instead, he says:

“I’ll do whatever gives us the best chance to win. And I think you saw that over the past six years [with the Steelers]. There were games we threw it 45 times to win, and there were games we ran it 35 times to win.” — Haley via Maks

But win they did, and then they dumped him.

So now Haley’s going to “work his tail off” to develop the Browns (his new ‘significant other’) into a proficient team he can proudly take to the Dance next fall when the 2018 season begins. There’s nothing that will please him more than to turn the Browns into the gorgeous winners he knows they’re capable of being.

And then, when the Browns are the popular guy in first place, the Steelers will have to admit to the entire world that they never should have let their sweet OC go.

Hot hot hot.