CLEVELAND, Ohio — Kevin Stefanski plans to play to Baker Mayfield’s strengths even more in 2021, his second year in the same system for the first time in his career.
“I hope [his understanding] is significantly better,’’ Stefanski said during a Zoom call Tuesday to kick off the voluntary offseason program, which will be virtual in the wake of Browns players announcing they’ll skip it amid the pandemic. “I hope as he starts to listen to the installs with [offensive coordinator Alex Van Pelt] and you’re hearing it for not the second time – he’s heard these plays over and over again.
“We’ve streamlined concepts, and we’ve tried to adjust what we do based on his strengths and our players’ strengths. I’d hope he’s much more comfortable from that perspective. That’s what time allows you to do – time together.”
Mayfield will meet with Van Pelt this week to get his marching orders for the offseason, otherwise known as his “player improvement plan.’’
“Baker is no different than the rest of the guys,’’ he said. “They’ll have a list of things they need to work on, and as coaches, we’re giving them the resources, the tools and the things they need to do to improve those. Some are watching more tape, some are drills and really all of the above. Baker, as we’ve talked about, is somebody who constantly wants to get better.’’
Last offseason, Van Pelt overhauled Mayfield’s footwork, so at least he’s not changing much mechanically this offseason.
“Alex Van Pelt has a really, really strong plan in how we are going to attack that with Baker in particular, but I can also tell you I have 70-plus improvement plans on my desk for each player,’’ Stefanski said. “We just think it’s important everybody understands we have to improve and then it’s our job to give the avenues to improve.”
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Mayfield will also be discouraged by the NFLPA from hosting another passing camp in his hometown of Austin, Tex. He got one in last year with teammates such as Austin Hooper, Rashard Higgins and Donovan Peoples-Jones before the NFLPA, upon the recommendation of medical director Dr. Thom Mayer, advised players against such small group workouts during the pandemic.
But Stefanski isn’t concerned about few opportunities to develop timing and chemistry this offseason. In addition to skipping the voluntary workouts, players hope to eliminate the mandatory minicamp currently for Phase III of the offseason program, which runs from May 24th to June 18th.
“I can only focus on the voluntary offseason program that the NFL puts forth,’’ Stefanski said. “It’s hard for me to think about anything the guys may do outside of that. That is not really my jurisdiction, if you will.”
Stefanski is confident that Mayfield and the rest of the Browns players can get better despite not reconvening potentially until late July or early August.
“We’ve had many meetings on the best way to teach, and the truth is we have to teach and reteach our systems right now on Zoom,’’ Stefanski said. “That is part of what we are doing. It is a challenge, if you will, but it is a challenge I think everybody has – I do not know if we are getting good at it, but it is something over the last calendar year that we have definitely gotten a lot of reps on Zoom. Hopefully, we’re getting better.”
He re-iterated that the Browns can’t pick up where they left off last season.
“We lost our last game like 31 other teams or at least the teams in the playoffs,’’ he said. “We look back at last year and try to put that into perspective. We and I need to understand that we have to get way better. As it pertains to last year and how we did last year, I don’t think it’s just apples to apples. This is going to be a different offseason – we have different players, and we have some players in and some players out. The 2021 season is definitely going to stand on its own there.”
Stefanski left the door open for Sheldon Richardson
Stefanski sang the praises of Sheldon Richardson, who was released in a salary cap move last week that cleared $12 million in cap space.
“As a coach, I want to keep everybody, [but] there are some salary cap constraints that I think everybody understands and they are hard decisions,’’ he said. “Sheldon in particular played really productive football for us. He played through injuries, and he took great pride in getting to the playoffs for the first time in his career. He was a big part of that. I hope there’s a scenario [where he can come back], but those are the hard decisions that are made. I really want to point out that Sheldon was such a big part of what we did last year.”
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