I am going to tell you two things today, both of which come from guys I like and respect, neither of whom would have any reason to feed me bullcrap and laugh while I make a fool out of myself. They don’t need to get involved, really, if that’s all they want to do.

Here’s the first item I’ll share with you today. It’s not a necessarily inspiring thought to ponder, as it indicates that the Browns process of interviewing head coaching candidates sort of stumbled accidentally to its conclusion.

Here’s what the email said:

The *ONLY* reason Mangini was even interviewed was because his agent is Mark Shapiro’s father and the interview was done as a favor to Shapiro.  Mangini was *NEVER* on the teams original interview list.   But he absolutely blew Lerner away in the interview and the owner became completely enamored by Mangini to what appears to be the team’s detriment.

Apparently, Mangini did NOT leave the Jets on good terms.   There was plenty of lying and non communication to some of his players and he was not liked in that locker room…. period.

When I read this, I recalled a conversation I had a with a long-time NFL front office exec (not with the Browns) a few weeks ago. While I was talking to him, he told me that Mangini “only got the interview as a favor to his father-in-law”. His father-in-law is Ron Shapiro, who is also Mangini’s agent.

Because my news instincts stink, I originally brushed this off as idle NFL buzz and not strong enough to really consider chasing as an OBR story.

But now that two people I have a high regard for have told me the same thing, it goes from “Huh” to “Hmmmm…”.

The major reason I have some doubt about this is that I’ve been told by several people that Lerner seemed excited when he heard about Mangini’s availability when talking to the media. Plus, the Browns were familiar with Mangini from chasing him as their DC a few years ago.

If it’s true, it doesn’t exactly fill me with confidence about the process. But if Mangini revives the Browns, none of us will care how he got his foot in the door.

Here’s an interesting article from Ron Shapiro’s website, from which I lifted the attached photo of Mangini, Ron Shapiro, and Mark Shapiro.