Jets, Lions, and Browns Sack Head Coaches

Woeful Cleveland willing to give NBA star a shot

(NEWSER) - If LeBron James really wants to try football, Eric Mangini will find room on his roster. “I think he should come on down,” the Browns coach tells the Cleveland Plain Dealer . “The guy’s a freak athletically.” James may be an NBA star now, but he played wide receiver in high school. He opined on Monday Night Football that, if he dedicated himself to football, “I could be really good.” More»

NFL levies fines against team, GM and former coach for not reporting injury

(NEWSER) - The NFL hit the Jets, GM Mike Tannenbaum, and former coach Eric Mangini with $125,000 in fines for not reporting Brett Favre’s injured arm last season, Bloomberg reports. Favre, now with the Vikings, spilled the beans a week ago that he played hurt the final weeks of the season. The team owes $75,000, and Mangini and Tannenbaum $25,000 each for not reporting the injury as required. The fine's unusual, but the league is trying to beef up the credibility of its weekly injury reports, long treated as works of fiction by teams. More»

But hold your bets: Rankings show winning isn't everything

(NEWSER) - Great NFL organizations don’t always win Super Bowls, so Adam Schein separates the well oiled from the well Lombardi’d for Fox Sports, ranking franchises on everything from their coaching staffs to public-relations people. The top three:

• New England Patriots: “The model franchise in all of professional sports.”
• Pittsburgh Steelers: A penchant for toughness and even tougher fan base.

Former Steelers coach considered after Mangini firing

(NEWSER) - The New York Jets and former Steelers coach Bill Cowher have agreed to meet as early as this week to discuss the team's coaching vacancy, the Daily News reports. The Jets fired Eric Mangini following the team's late-season collapse and are prepared to offer big money and concessions to woo the Super Bowl winner away from his studio gig with CBS, the Post notes. One obstacle: Cowher may want to bring in his own personnel chief, a role now occupied by GM Mike Tannenbaum. More»

Mysterious knee injury initially denied by New York's defensive leader

(NEWSER) - Jets linebacker Jonathan Vilma may be out for the season with a knee injury, reports the New York Daily News; the extent and source of the injury are still shrouded in mystery. The signal-caller of the defense was uncharacteristically removed from several plays in New York's loss to Cincinnati over the weekend. More»