By Bud Shaw, cleveland.com
CLEVELAND, Ohio - Did we say we'd seen this all before in Berea?
Check that.
We haven't seen this.
The AJ McCarron non-deal was an unmatched combination of panic, contradiction and incompetence.
Pursuing McCarron was questionable enough for various reasons, one being he does not solve your franchise quarterback search.
They say some of the best trades are ones that are never made. This would qualify as that. But reaching that conclusion should feel better than it does for Browns fans looking for reason to believe this regime has a clue.
The sense was that pursuing McCarrron, a fifth-round pick and backup to Andy Dalton was done - almost done - to placate a head coach who has one of the owner's ears and was angry about his front office's failure to make a play for Jimmy Garoppolo.
Reports of a coaching staff enraged to see the execs leave the office early the night before the trade deadline is, if true, evidence of a serious fracture in Berea.
It means coaches are now making people outside the building privy to the dynamics inside. That's never good.
Best case, the Browns would've given up too much for McCarron. A second and third rounder is a higher price tag than the 49ers paid to extricate Garoppolo from the Patriots.
And it makes so little sense you now have to wonder if the front office lost a power struggle to Hue Jackson, or panicked and threw him a bone.
Either way this is bad business.
If a front office can lose a power struggle to a head coach who's 1-23, whatever that says about its standing with ownership cannot be good.
In a 24-hour period, the Browns were not involved with Garoppolo, then suddenly overly enthusiastic in chasing McCarron, then a non-player again because of a failure to get the paper work in on time?
The take from Cincinnati is the Browns didn't seem to be on the same page -- imagine that -- and that disagreement over the cost of the deal figured into the delay.
The Bengals got their paperwork signed and into the league office at 3:55. The Browns paperwork didn't arrive before the 4 p.m. deadline.
The Browns front office is relatively green by NFL definition, but that falls well short of a satisfactory explanation for what happened.
At the same time, you wonder how upset the front office is that such a questionable deal didn't go through.
A coaching staff that already doubted everyone was pulling in the same direction was given more reason to be suspicious.
In one simple non-transaction, the Browns covered all the bases of dysfunction.
The front office showed panic in placating the coaching staff. As for contradiction, take your pick.
Valuing McCarron higher on the trade market than what the Niners paid for Garoppolo.
Or being willing to bring in a quarterback who might win a few games but compromise the 2018 draft and chances of landing a franchise quarterback there.
If the Browns end up parting ways with kicker Zane Gonzalez this week as rumored, no one would blame him if his first thought was, "Oh, so I'm the problem here?"
We were once again left wondering by day's end if anyone - front office or coaching staff - knows what a franchise quarterback looks like.
And how long it will take the owner who put this marriage together to seek yet another annulment.