Browns Expected to Hire Bubba Ventrone per Report
In this story:
The Cleveland Browns are reportedly going to hire Bubba Ventrone to be the team's special teams coordinator according to Jonathan Jones of CBS Sports. The move comes a day after the team announced they were firing the previous special teams coordinator Mike Priefer.
When the Browns decided to go ahead and relieve Priefer of his duties, the expectation was that the team already knew who they wanted to hire and were reasonably sure they could get it done. Though the team interviewed two other options for the job including Anthony Blevins of the New York Giants and Leon Washington of the New York Jets, the expectation was that Ventrone was their guy.
Ventrone played for the Browns from 2009 to 2012. He's been a highly regarded special teams coach for the Indianapolis Colts for the past five seasons. However, when the Colts made the move to hire Shane Steichen as their head coach, the Browns saw an opportunity to lure Ventrone to coach their special teams unit, a move they view as an upgrade from Priefer.
Priefer coached the Browns special teams the previous four seasons, including the only year Freddie Kitchens was the team's head coach and the past three under Kevin Stefanski. 2022 was the team's best performance, though much of that came in the second half of the season. The previous two seasons, the Browns were rated in the bottom five of the league.
With this move, the Browns will have swapped their defensive coordinator from Joe Woods to Jim Schwartz and Priefer to Ventrone. The Browns still have coaching staff hires to make including quarterbacks, corners and defensive line.
