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The Cleveland Browns are still searching for positional coaches at the WR and QB spots. Lane Adkins of the Orange and Brown Report shed some light on both of those searches yesterday via Twitter, @LaneAdkins.
First, an update on the WR search, which according to Lane, seems to be nearing a decision.
The Browns have spoken with Joker Phillips on more than one occasion, the discussions are leading toward Phillips joining the Browns.
— LA - theOBR (@LaneAdkins) January 26, 2015
Joker Phillips, 51, is a former head coach at (my alma mater) the University of Kentucky. He spent the 2012 and 2013 seasons as the WR coach for the University of Florida. He 'resigned for personal reasons' last summer from Florida when it was reported he may have some recruiting violations against him. Phillips was reportedly a candidate for the Florida A&M head coaching opening, but ultimately wasn't selected.
Having coached at UK, I've followed his career closely. His time in Lexington was sort of odd. This is a guy that spent the better part of two decades either as a player or coach with UK. He was loved as a player, and a person. As a coordinator under then head coach Rich Brooks, he lead some of the best offenses the school had seen in a while. When he was named HC there was a lot of optimism. Unfortunately, that quickly faded as the hope didn't translate to success.
A local UK blog had a great write-up on Joker's time at UK when he was fired, if you're interested I dug it up, and can be found, here.
Most of you probably don't care about my affinity towards Joker (met him once, nice guy!), so I'll try to cut to the chase.
Hiring Joker will likely get mixed reviews. Just go search Twitter for "Joker Phillips Browns," you'll see what I mean. Plus, you'll see all kinds of bad 'Joker' puns and jokes. He has, however, been a solid positional coach in college, and has experience at least playing in the NFL. He's never coached in the NFL, so that'll likely draw some questions, but it could be an intriguing hire for the Browns.
Lane also addressed the search for the QB coach yeterday.
The Browns talked with Steve Walsh for the vacant QB coach spot, at this time Walsh and the Browns are not quite a fit.
— LA - theOBR (@LaneAdkins) January 26, 2015
So, not much of an update, but at least it's something. Walsh is a former Miami (FL) standout QB, playing at Miami after Bernie Kosar and Vinny Testaverde. He bounced around the league as a QB in the 90's, and has been coaching high school football as of late. The Browns, however, have apparently decided to move on.
What do you make of these rumblings?