The Cleveland Browns immediate future is bleak. It’s gotten so toxic that Brandon Weeden, their 31-year-old second year quarterback with a penchant for backbreaking interceptions is searching for an escape route.
In the next few months, new general manager Ray Farmer will likely draft either Johnny Manziel or Teddy Bridgewater, but another quarterback could be watching how they develop from afar over the next few years.
However, a rumor milling around the Internet involving Peyton Manning abandoning his post as Denver’s starting quarterback for a job in Cleveland is the topic of optimistic conversation.
Only thing more impressive than leading a pair of franchises to the Super Bowl and obliterating most of the NFL's career and single season passing records is rebuilding the Browns and lifting sports fans in the city of Cleveland out of despair.
It won’t happen in the near future because Manning is playing at such a high level right now and it won’t involve him throwing any passes either. Instead, he’d likely be taking on a leadership role much like the one Elway has with the Broncos.
Cleveland Plain-Dealer writer Mary Kay Cabot, who is a veteran on the Browns beat, thinks the team is saving the CEO job for Peyton Manning.
— Tom James (@TribStarTJames) February 11, 2014
The theory sounds like something copied straight out of a Cleveland Browns fan fiction novel. It's a fantasy that only has some validity behind it because of the Tennessee connection between Browns owner Jimmy Haslam and Manning.. Manning couldn’t assume that role with Indianapolis unless Jim Irsay relinquishes his CEO title and duties to give Manning as much control in the front office as he was given at the line of scrimmage
Haslam, whose brother is the Governor of Tennessee, was a major Vols football booster while Manning was the starting quarterback in Knoxville. That’s all I got, and all there really is. Losing has become so pervasive to the culture in Cleveland that they’re beginning to hallucinate.
Throw that one on the grill alongside those LeBron to the Cleveland Cavaliers/Browns free agency rumors. However, Manning doesn’t need Tennessee connections to get an executive job in his retirement and if he has his pick, I doubt Cleveland is his choice.
