ESPN's Mel Kiper revisited the 2006 NFL Draft and made the picks for every team in the first round based on what we know now (insider article). If you recall, that is the year that Cleveland drafted linebacker Kamerion Wimbley with the 13th overall pick in the draft. Kiper doesn't have the Browns taking Wimbley in his redraft; instead, he has them taking...Devin Hester?

Don't get me wrong -- Hester has proven to be an outstanding commodity as a punt returner, and it is really no surprise to see him get pushed up into the first round (he was originally a second round pick, but was taken as a cornerback that year). My issue is this: with all of the problems the Browns have, why pick a position where they already have Joshua Cribbs, who is arguably pretty darn close on a comparison scale. Here is what Kiper said about Hester:

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The Cleveland Browns hired Brad Childress as their new offensive coordinator on Friday, something that doesn't come as a surprise. The only rumored candidates for the position over the past month were Childress and Mike Sherman, the latter of whom was hired by the Miami Dolphins as their offensive coordinator earlier in the day (Brian Daboll is out of a job again).

Childress was previously the head coach of the Minnesota Vikings for five years (from 2006-2010), compiling a 39-35 record. Before that, Childress was the offensive coordinator for the Philadelphia Eagles for three years. One thing to note is that even though he was the coordinator, Andy Reid still called the plays for the offense. Childress did call plays for his first year in Minnesota, but he handed those duties to a coordinator the following three years. Based on why Pat Shurmur was hired as head coach, this seems like the type of hire that would indicate he will continue calling plays in 2012. Mary Kay Cabot of the Plain Dealer is hearing the same thing from a source:

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Hello again!

The first thing I’d like to do is thank all of you. It’s always been my opinion that the best aspect of SB Nation blogs is that comment section, and the resulting communities. It essentially takes the blog platform from a 1-way line of communication (blogger to audience), and makes the entire thing interactive. Now, the blogger can directly engage with his audience as well as vice versa, especially with things like FanPosts and FanShots.

Regular readers stick around to comment, the community grows, and discussion flourishes. That’s how I was pulled in way back in the summer of 2009. I was commenting on how adding Brandon Marshall, who was on the trading block at the time, would be in vain as we didn’t have a good enough QB to throw to him. I went on to describe my firm stance on Brady Quinn without any actual legitimate evidence. Long story short, I lost the argument, actually to quote what I said at the time, "‘lost’ is putting it lightly, I got ripped to shreds." However, I came out of that Quinn debate a better Browns fan. Two and a half years later, I can honestly say that Dawgs By Nature, the whole community, has made me a much smarter Browns fan, and a smarter football fan. I think a lot of regulars, new and old, can relate to that, as we all know where strong opinions based on no evidence will get you. It’s sort of like a DBN christening, or being baptized by fire.

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First off, I would like to thank everyone who applied to our "help wanted" advertisement a couple of days ago. I received a lot of responses from qualified individuals, but Simmsinns had the type of qualifications that made him impossible to pass up. He has been a member of Dawgs By Nature for close to three years, has been one of the site's most active non-staff contributors, has operated an alternative fantasy football league, and more. His history of creative posts and his pursuit of a degree in journalism will make him a great fit for our staff. (Side note: Simmsinns will be posting under another screen name, Jon @ DBN, and officially begins on February 1)

To everyone else who applied: I might still contact a few of you to see if you would be interested in writing a weekly feature, or something along those lines. No compensation would be associated with these positions.

ANOTHER ANNOUNCEMENT: Now that we have a new staff member aboard, we are looking for a few other people who would be interested in helping grow the site in terms of social media (note: this is a volunteer job only). To this point, our Facebook and Twitter pages have been nothing more than a link dump of every post that is made on the site. What I need is to have a team of maybe three-four people who can really engage users through those platforms, whether it be asking random questions, answering mailbags (like a Q&A), or doing anything you can to increase the number of "fans" for each platform. As long as you don't call Randy Lerner an irrelevant billionaire, you should be good!

Current and non-current staff members can apply for this 'position.' Qualified individuals would include anyone who is kind of obsessed with social media. If you are interested, please contact me at pokorny@pfcritics.com and briefly explain which tool you would use (Twitter, Facebook, or both), and if it is the type of thing you could see yourself using daily.

Several reports are saying that the Tampa Bay Buccaneers are hiring Rutgers head coach Greg Schiano to be their next head coach, replacing Raheem Morris after the Buccaneers were lifeless the second half of this past season. It is said that Schiano was considered early in the process for Tampa Bay and that a lot of research was done on him before the hire was made. Nonetheless, the news came as a stunner for Rutgers fans and former players.

The hiring of Schiano in Tampa Bay has a slight potential effect on the Browns. As most of us know, there really have not been any rumors about potential offensive coordinators for the Browns. The only two names that have popped up are Brad Childress and Mike Sherman, but there was never a confirmation that they were candidates for the job. Sherman had been a candidate for the Buccaneers' head coaching job, but since he didn't get it, he is now available to seek an offensive coordinator position.

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Someone suggested in another thread that the DBN Glossary was due for an update. SB also thinks it's time to update the Joe Thomas's House of Pancakes menu. Since it's the off-season now, and the draft talk is already being beaten into the ground, it seems like as good a time as any to go ahead with something fun and unrelated to the draft, Pat Shurmur's playcalling, Colt McCoy's height, etc.

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Pro Football Focus' latest review of the 2011 season takes a look at how well the safeties in the league tackled. Thankfully, none of the members of the Browns were ranked among the worst in tackle efficiency. In fact, it was quite the contrary -- both current and former Browns were among the league's best in this regard.

Let's start with this category covered by PFF: the top 20 tackling safeties in coverage, and how many tackles they missed. Coming in first place on the list was former Browns safety Abram Elam. There were 37 times in which he had an opportunity to make a tackle in coverage, and he didn't miss a single one. Eight other safeties shared this same achievement (not allowing a missed tackle in coverage), including Mike Adams. Adams had 20 attempts and made the tackle every time. Not too far behind was Usama Young, placing at No. 10 overall. He was the only player who missed just 1 tackle in coverage (on 27 attempts).

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