Browns fire head of personnel Sashi Brown; coach Hue Jackson to stay

The Cleveland Browns fired Sashi Brown, their executive vice president of football operations, on Thursday. Brown headed the personnel department for the past two years.

"Hue Jackson will remain our coach and will return for the 2018 season," owner Jimmy Haslam said in a statement, "but we feel it is necessary to take significant steps to strengthen our personnel department."

"I appreciate Jimmy saying that. My focus of coming here to the Cleveland Browns is to coach the football team and help get this organization turned around and I haven't been able to do that yet," Jackson said Thursday.

The Browns, 0-12 this season, are 1-27 with Brown in control of personnel and Jackson as coach.

"You look at it and I'm just as big a part of it as Sashi is," Jackson said.

Brown said in a statement: "I want this to be real and clear, the way I know Cleveland and Browns fans can appreciate: Our win-loss record since I became executive vice president isn't going to cut it."

Other front-office members also are expected to be let go as the team reshapes its front office again, sources told ESPN.

Cleveland immediately will begin its official search for a new general manager, its ninth since the franchise returned to the city in 1999, though it quietly has been inquiring about others around the league for weeks now, per sources.

Former Kansas City Chiefs general manager John Dorsey is expected to emerge as a leading contender, sources told ESPN.

"We have great appreciation and gratitude for Sashi's commitment and leadership to our organization but believe transitioning to someone with strong experience and success in drafting and building consistently winning football teams is critical to the future of the Cleveland Browns," Haslam said in the statement.

Jackson said he doesn't want control of personnel but would like to be kept in the loop by whoever replaces Brown.

"I would like to know and be in concert with the person that will do those things," he said. "I think that's too much of a role to be the head coach and do all those particular things. Whoever that person is is somebody that I would work very closely with and feel very comfortable with going forward."

This season, the Browns failed to execute a trade for Cincinnati Bengals quarterback AJ McCarron seconds before the NFL's Oct. 31 deadline, when the proper paperwork did not get processed. The trade, which looked like it was going through, abruptly fell apart.

Brown leaves a Cleveland team that traded away the picks that became quarterbacks Carson Wentz (Philadelphia) and Deshaun Watson (Houston), but also has stockpiled picks for future drafts and created more salary-cap space than any team in the league.

Cleveland actually is well-positioned for future years, many NFL executives have noted recently. Whoever takes over inherits some of the riches that Brown helped to acquire.

"We embarked on a mission to rebuild the Browns for long-term, sustainable success," Brown said in his statement. "We were committed and aggressive in our approach, even if unorthodox at times. We made dramatic changes and put in place a foundation on which championships can be built."

The Browns have six extra picks in April's draft -- a first-round pick, two seconds, a fourth and a fifth. The Browns also have $59.25 million in cap space that they can roll over into next year, when they already are scheduled to have another $38.6 million of room, giving them almost $100 million in salary-cap space.

"The 2018 draft and offseason is pivotal for our franchise, we need to ensure that we maximize our opportunity for success; with our picks, free agency and building our roster," Haslam said in the statement.

Haslam and his wife, Dee, are expected to interview GM candidates as early as this week, per sources. They already could have spoken with former NFL general managers Dorsey, Dave Gettleman and Scot McCloughan without any permission or any restrictions.

Thursday's shakeup continues a run that has made Cleveland the NFL's most unstable franchise. Since returning to Cleveland, the Browns have had eight different general managers -- Brown, Ray Farmer, Michael Lombardi, Tom Heckert, George Kokinis, Phil Savage, Butch Davis and Dwight Clark. It also has employed longtime executives Paul DePodesta, Joe Banner, Mike Holmgren and Mike Keenan.

The Browns also have had nine head coaches since 1999, tied for fourth-most in the NFL. The Bills, Dolphins and Raiders have all had 10.

ESPN's Pat McManamon contributed to this report.