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The Browns continue their flirtation with the walrus. From the Cleveland Plain Dealer:

The romancing of Mike Holmgren as head of Browns football operations continued in earnest on Tuesday when Holmgren completed a second day of visiting.
After dining with owner Randy Lerner and other operatives on Monday night, Holmgren met with Browns coaches and other personnel in the team’s facility on Tuesday. A Browns spokesman confirmed Holmgren’s visit during the day but said the team had no further comment.

The presence of agent Bob LaMonte strongly indicated that negotiations were taking place. Holmgren and LaMonte left the facility at about 5 p.m., however, apparently without a deal in hand.

Two NFL sources contacted on Tuesday said that Holmgren, 61, might command a price tag in the virgin territory of $10 million a year to oversee all aspects of the Browns’ football operations.

$10 million a year? Great googily moogily. If this goes down, Eric Mangini can go ahead and pack his bags. Hell, he should already have them packed regardless.

In Cleveland.

This was buried in the Turley article, but it merits another post.

Our pot-smokin’ buddy (he doesn’t smoke pot — it’s a slap at John Herrera) Michael Silver of Yahoo! Sports reports that the Browns have fined a player for not paying for a bottle of water that he drank in his hotel room during a preseason road trip.
The bottle of water cost $3.
With the fine, the player could have purchased 567 more of them.
Yes, Browns coach Eric Mangini fined the player $1,701 for not paying for the $3 bottle of water.
We’d heard about this one several days ago, but it sounded so ludicrous that we wanted to be 100 percent sure of it before mentioning it.  (We hope NBC’s legal department appreciates that.)

Just spectacular.

Brady Quinn: 7 for 11 for 68 yards and one interception

Derek Anderson: 0 for 2 for 0 yards and one interception

Brett Ratliff (acquired in draft day deal with Jets): 7 for 13 for 84 yards and two interceptions

So, Brady Quinn, then? Gracious.

Cleveland 191 total yards on offense in their exhibition opener at Green Bay.

Who? Shaun Smith. A little noticed and little known defensive tackle, whose illustrious career has taken him from Cincinnati, to Cleveland, and, after being cut, now to Detroit, is one entertaining pile of mediocrity. He talked his way out of Cincinnati, with a mouth that didn’t come close to matching his game, went to Cleveland, where his stay was highlighted by his punching Brady Quinn in the face (one for Smith, obviously), and then was cut this week, only to land in Detroit, had this to say upon arriving in Detroit about his ex-teammate fellow DT Shaun Rogers:

Smith, who was dumped by the Browns on Saturday and signed with Detroit on Monday, wasted no time stirring things up in his first interview sessions with Detroit media Tuesday.

“[Rogers] is my best friend and he wishes he could come back here now. He misses it,” Smith told Mlive.com after the Lions’ morning workout. “You’ve been somewhere your whole career and you have some good times and you see the talent they’re bringing in — [Larry] Foote, [Julian] Peterson and [Phillip] Buchanon — the defense is better now. They’ve got some quality veterans who can play and there are some young guys with potential.”

Smith — who will return to Cleveland for the preseason game vs. Detroit Aug. 22 — said Rogers gave him a good scouting report on the Lions. “He said the people in the building [in Detroit] were good and the people in the locker room were good,” said Smith. “Just happy to be in the NFC and play ball. It’s fun playing in the NFC.”

Nice flame-throwing on your way out of town, Shaun Smith. And, good people of Detroit, some kind words about the franchise to boot. Shaun Rogers, who had an initial dust-up with Eric Mangini back in February, was apparently unavailable for comment.

One of the disadvantages to my posting schedule (early, before work) is that if I miss something in my initial spin through the internets it’s pretty stale 24 hours later when the whole world has commented on it. That said, some things are hard to pass without comment. And the Eric Mangini “voluntary” bus-ride from Cleveland to Hartford, Connecticut that was forced on Browns rookies and undrafted free agents is one of those.

The good?

Mangini’s football camp, aimed at under-privileged kids ages 8-12. Nice camp. Nice idea.

The bad?

Making players with as little leverage as NFL rookies and undrafted free agents “volunteer” for it. And making them bus to it. While you yourself are flying to it (one way, Mangini rode back, although one wonders if that was the original plan). And they are pissed.

At any rate, the NFL is looking into it. The Plain Dealer with a relevant quote from an NFL source:

“It’s voluntary, but it’s not really voluntary,” said one source. “These players are fighting for starting jobs and playing time. What are they supposed to do, say ‘No, I’m not going?’ ”

Yeah. That. Duh.

The initial Plain Dealer story is here, the fun part is reading the comments from Browns zealots. As for the Browns players dealing with Mangini? Perhaps this will be a help. Or head here for a place to share your experience with others who suffer from bad bosses.

It remains the perception that Cleveland is willing and happy to jettison its former #1. If Michael Crabtree is sitting there at #5 on Saturday aftenoon, then Edwards may be Eli Manning’s newest target in New York:

Tuck, a Pro Bowl defensive end, became the second prominent Giants player to openly endorse Edwards, following Eli Manning’s unusually-candid remarks last week. Without Burress and Amani Toomer, Tuck says he likes that there’s now more pressure on the defense to dominate. But he sure sounded excited about adding Edwards to the mix.

“I think he definitely can lock down one side of the field when he’s playing his best football,” Tuck said of the 6-3, 215-pound Edwards. “He has the same kind of effect that Plaxico had, a big, tall receiver who can get down field in a hurry and stretch a defense.” Tuck said he and Edwards are “pretty good friends” and that he is the type of player and person who would fit into the Giants locker room. “I know Braylon is not the type of guy, a look-at-me-type player,” Tuck said.

No. I guess not. Course he IS a holy-crap-why-does-he-drop-so-many-passes type player, which may not be especially welcome to Giant fans and media…

Not everyone gets the pass Leonard Little did. In fact, few do. The long-rumored charge has been made: that Stallworth was DUI when he struck and killed a pedestrian last month in Miami. Pursuant to Florida law, that means manslaughter. And should mean jail time.

Like this fictional forerunner: