Paul DePodesta is headed back to Major League Baseball.
The Browns’ longtime Chief Strategy Officer is expected to join the Colorado Rockies as their next head of baseball operations, per Ken Rosenthal, Zac Jackson, and Brittany Ghiroli of The Athletic.
DePodesta, 52, was hired by the Browns in 2016. He spent the previous two decades in a variety of front office roles around the MLB, starting with the Cleveland Indians in 1996. DePodesta is perhaps best known for his stint as the assistant general manager of the Oakland Athletics from 1999 to 2004. During that time, he was a pioneer of sabermetrics and helped bring data analytics into the sports mainstream. He was one of the main individuals featured in Michael Lewis’ bestselling book, “Moneyball,” and Jonah Hill earned an Oscar nomination for playing DePodesta in the film adapatation. DePodesta was hired in 2004 to be the general manager of the Los Angeles Dodgers, but was fired after just two seasons. He then spent five years each with the San Diego Padres and the New York Mets in top front office positions before making the leap to the NFL with the Browns.
The Browns went 3-13 in 2015, their worst record since 2000. They fired general manager Ray Farmer and hired DePodesta as CSO and future general manager Andrew Berry as the vice president of player personnel. General counsel Sashi Brown became the vice president of football operations and de facto general manager. The team then went 1-31 over the next two seasons; Brown was fired and John Dorsey took over as general manager in December 2017. Having amassed a lot of draft capital, including back-to-back No. 1 picks that they used on Myles Garrett and Baker Mayfield, the Browns dug themselves out of the AFC North cellar to finish third in the division in 2018 and 2019, albeit with losing records. Dorsey was replaced with Berry, and new head coach Kevin Stefanski led the 2020 squad to an 11-5 record, the best finish since the team was re-established in 1999.
A step back in 2021 inspired the Browns to move on from Mayfield and trade three first-round picks to the Texans for Deshaun Watson. Watson was then handed a fully-guaranteed five-year, $230MM extension. The move, driven in part by DePodesta, drew criticism at the time and has not aged well. Watson was suspended for the first 11 games of his Browns tenure, and the team went 7-10 that year. An 11-6 finish and playoff berth in 2023 offered a glimmer of hope, but Cleveland has won just five games since. Watson suffered back-to-back season-ending injuries in 2023 (shoulder fracture) and 2024 (Achilles tear) and now appears to be out of the team’s future plans, though his contract will still be on the books for a few more years.
An 11-6 record and a playoff berth in 2023 offered a glimmer of hope in Cleveland, but the team has won just five games since. They now appear to be looking for their next franchise quarterbacks in the next two drafts, for which they should have ample draft capital. The Browns will now continue their seemingly-endless rebuild without DePodesta guiding the team’s high-level roster strategy.
More to come.
It’s like they don’t want to win.
I get he was kind of a genius with baseball years ago and that’s why the Browns tried to see if he had magic with football…
It clearly didn’t translate to football though. I guess it makes sense to go back to baseball.
Yikes, though. Paul goes from the Browns to the best version of the Browns in baseball.
Guess he likes a challenge!!!
“It clearly didn’t translate to football though”
Consider the owner, though. Haslem pushed for Watson, which has torpedoed the Browns.
He must have convinced them he worked for the Indians/ Guardians…no way they knew he was a member of the Browns’ brainstrust
Exactly the sort of move we could have expected from this dumpster fire of a franchise. Monfort, Nutting, & Fisher need to be replaced for their teams to have any hope.
One garbage organization following in another garbage organization’s footsteps.
This is actually a good move for the Rockies.
He was one of the lone voices that was against the Watson trade privately.
It won’t hurt the Browns, but his baseball knowledge is far above anything the Rockies have had in awhile. Certainly beats promoting from within.
nothing else has worked .. why not give this a shot ?
Presumably the Browns will now poach the White Sox for a replacement 🙂
In a side note that has nothing to do with this and since when the article comes out It’ll be comments closed I had January 2026 as the month Antonio Brown would end up in jail in the pool. So close.
Failing upwards. But it’s a good move for the Browns.
The Rockies are the Browns of MLB.
just now? this is what did it?
Honestly, from what I’ve read, the Rockies barely even have an analytics department. If he’s basically getting a blank slate to build the foundation, the GM he hires will need to be strong in trades and free agency. It’s not a bad hire, just not a very exciting one. Maybe Adam Ottavino ends up becoming the GM 🤷🏻♂️
We’ll see his philosophy from he a quarter century ago in Oakland translates today.
He and Beane were pioneers. Others in big and small markets have tweaked and improved on what they did.
It’s definitely a 180 for Monfort. Whether DePodesta’s approach is applicable now, and for this owner, are unknown.
lol