The Cleveland Browns have locked up head coach Kevin Stefanski and general manager Andrew Berry with multi-year contract extensions, the team announced on Wednesday.
Stefanski, 42, won his second AP Coach of the Year award with the team this past season after leading the Browns to only their second playoff appearance since the 2002 campaign, both coming on his watch. Berry, 37, arrived in Cleveland in 2020, and one of his first moves was hiring Stefanski.
“We are incredibly fortunate to have Kevin Stefanski and Andrew Berry leading the Cleveland Browns,” owners Dee and Jimmy Haslam said in a statement on Wednesday. “Since the day they were hired, each has worked tirelessly to help the Cleveland Browns win. We are proud of what they and the team have achieved, but Kevin and Andrew would be the first to say that Browns fans deserve even more. Their leadership, collaborative approach, and ability to overcome obstacles bode well for the future of this franchise."
Since Berry and Stefanski's arrival four years ago, the Browns have enjoyed their most sustained success as a franchise since the mid-to-late 1980s. Together, Stefanski and Berry have overseen a 37-30 regular-season mark and a 1-2 playoff record. Half of the Browns’ winning seasons since the franchise returned in 1999 have come during the Stefanski-Berry era, including two 11-win seasons.
Their extensions come as no surprise as the Browns enter this season as possible Super Bowl contenders.
"You have conversations with ownership after every season, sitting down with Jimmy and sitting down with [executive VP] JW (Johnson). Obviously, to entrust myself and Andrew, that their family is giving us that trust to be here is a big deal," Stefanski told reporters Wednesday. "With Dee and Jimmy, [managing partner] Whitney (Johnson) and JW, they've been ultra-supportive of us in a football way and a personal way. They've been great to our families. Really excited to continue to partner with Andrew, and we have work to do."
Success has long been elusive for the franchise. So has cohesion. A club long known for major changes every few years at head coach, GM and quarterback, the Browns now can enjoy rare organizational stability, even with QB Deshaun Watson entering a critical third season in Cleveland.
Stefanski is the 10th full-time head coach since the Browns returned to Cleveland, and he’s the first one in the Browns 2.0 era to have earned a fifth season as head coach; the previous long tenures had been Butch Davis, from 2001 to 2004, and Romeo Crennel, who lasted from 2005 to 2008. The last Browns head coach to last to a fifth season? Bill Belichick.
Not all of Berry’s maneuvering as GM has paid off, and his ultimate legacy could be determined with how Watson fares going forward -- and if the Browns can win their first-ever Super Bowl. But for now, he and Stefanski can enjoy security, which they’ve earned with the Browns’ franchise revival in the tough AFC North.