The Cleveland Browns have been one of those franchises that have only a fleeting knowledge of what it is like to appear in the playoffs.
Since returning to the NFL in 1999, the Browns have made just three appearances in the postseason, but have racked up 19 seasons with double-digit losses.
That poor record has led to a bevy of high draft selections over the years, which has made the NFL Draft something that Browns fans can get excited about in lieu of watching the team in the playoffs.
Those high draft
picks were on hold for three years, of course, thanks to the ill-conceived trade for quarterback Deshaun Watson, which resulted in the Browns sending their first-round draft picks in 2022, 2023, and 2024 to the Houston Texans.
If you are a Browns fan who enjoyed having a peaceful first night of the draft during those years, then you may be in for a treat if the latest reports about a rule change are to be believed.
According to Mike Florio at Pro Football Talk (not always the most in-tune person), representatives from the Browns have formally proposed changing NFL rules to allow teams to trade draft picks up to five years into the future, as opposed to the current limit of three years.
For the proposal to pass, Jimmy and Dee Haslam need to convince 23 of their fellow owners that mortgaging the future is a good idea. According to Pro Football Talk, the idea will be “discussed and possibly voted on in March. It also could be tabled until the May meetings.” (Unspoken is the possibility that none of this will actually happen.)
It is not clear what the endgame would be in all this for the Browns. The idea of giving up five years of future draft picks in a single trade seems daft. Of course, the idea of giving up three first-round selections and $230 million in guaranteed money to Watson was not the brightest in league history, so anything is possible.
The idea calls to mind the NBA’s so-called “Stepien Rule,” which requires that teams have at least one future first-round draft selection in every other draft. Named after Ted Stepien, who owned the Cleveland Cavaliers from 1980 to 1983 and is behind only Art Modell on the list of the worst owners in Cleveland history, the rule was put in place after Stepien traded five consecutive first-round selections in a misguided attempt to improve the team. (Spoiler: he did not improve the team.)
On the one hand, the owners are in charge of their teams, so they should be allowed to do what they want. But there are already more than enough ways for an over-enthusiastic owner to ruin a franchise and torture their loyal fanbase, so keeping some form of control over them sounds like a solid plan that the NFL Office should get behind.
If this does reach the point of coming to a vote, there will hopefully be enough sane heads around the table to ensure that it does not receive the required number of votes to pass.
