Browns Hire GM

The Cleveland Browns have hired former Baltimore pro personnel director George Kokinis as their General Manager, reuniting him with new Browns head coach and close friend and former roommate Eric Mangini.
Mangini and Kokinis shared an apartment together in 1991 when the two worked, ironically, for the Cleveland Browns. Owner Randy Lerner decided to hire friends this time around as the Head Coach/GM team after seeing the dysfunctional relationship between Romeo Crenell and Phil Savage.

"The Browns are excited to bring George back to Cleveland where he began his NFL career," Lerner said in a team release. "He is a tireless worker that has spent his entire career evaluating talent and knows the type of player it takes to be successful in this league and in our division."

One of the first evaluations of talent facing the Mangini-Kokinis team will be what do with quarterback Derek Anderson, who was benched midway through the season for Brady Quinn. Anderson is owed a $5 million roster bonus in March. If he is deemed expendable, the Browns could trade him for draft picks. Savage dealt several 2009 picks, leaving the Browns with only four selections in this April's draft.