Alec Scheiner-Goodbye

It's been a long time since I've been so happy to see someone move on that really didn't have a lot to do with the on-field product (that we know of) of a favorite team, but yesterday I was thrilled to see the resignation of Alec Scheiner as President of the Cleveland Browns.

Now these front office titles often blend together, but Scheiner wanted to be more involved in football matters and reportedly was the key figure in the total shift in the front office, only to apparently get aced out by the "analytic" guys.

Jimmy Haslam's press release stated that "the new structure would limit the opportunity for his leadership"-which basically means they didn't need him with Sashi Brown and Paul DePodesta in the one cook too many theory.

Scheiner's reign with the Browns will best be remembered for four things-some work on the stadium, his relentless branding of everything down to the garbage cans as "Dawg Pound", the laughable non-change of the team logo, and of course the controversial dog (pun intended) ugly uniforms that Scheiner pushed for and made final decisions on.

I suppose anyone that was put in those positions could have made similar decisions, but what I think happened to Scheiner was this-Scheiner came to the Browns from Dallas and working with Jerry Jones, you learn that everything is for sale and everything has a brand.

Scheiner never learned that Dallas isn't Cleveland and that Browns fans are a traditional bunch that like having a link to the past.
Considering the rotten product that the fans have received since 1999, that was really all that we had and this guy took some of that away!

The statement that Scheiner made was that he would be "Stunned if the fans didn't love these uniforms" would be the one that haunted him the most as they are so hated as the fans just need to wait until the mandated time period expires to get rid of them.

The uniform decision was going to backfire, no matter the look, but the decision of the various "garanimals" mix-and-match types made things worse.
Combine that with the much-ballyhooed logo change that basically just brightened the orange a bit and Scheiner overestimated his brilliance to sell what people didn't want to see changed (think new Coke for those of you that can remember that) which in the end may have written his own exit strategy.

Goodbye, Alec -I won't miss you, but there is one good thing that I can add- Looking at the off-field destruction that you left, Imagine the damage you could have done with the on-field influence that you desired?
There is a bright side to everything and I stretched to find it!!