BEREA, Ohio -- The Cleveland Browns are in the market for a head coach again.
They probably have some phone numbers from last year's search, but it's unclear if there's a favorite or a timetable.
The Browns fired Rob Chudzinski on Sunday night after just one season on the job. On Monday, team owner Jimmy Haslam and CEO Joe Banner addressed the media and vowed they'd begin immediately searching for the "right guy."
"I don't know if it will take a week or a month," Haslam said. "The important (thing) is to get it right. There will be all kinds of rumors out there. We understand that. We're not going to respond to any of them."
BROWNS NEED WORK, NOT WORDS TO TURN CORNER
The Cleveland Browns hired Rob Chudzinski last January and team owner Jimmy Haslam and CEO Joe Banner are looking for his replacement less than a year later. READ MORE
Banner said the team is intent on "finding a coach that we're confident can win, can take this group...see it as a group that has a strong nucleus (and) figure out how to utilize the assets we have going into the offseason to take us to the next level. I think that' the focus of what we're going to try to find."
Later Monday, Denver Broncos coach John Fox said the Browns had been granted permission to interview Broncos offensive coordinator Adam Gase. According to the Denver Post, Gase will wait until after the playoffs to interview for the Browns' vacant coaching position.
Various media reports stated the Browns also will seek to interview Seattle Seahawks defensive coordinator Dan Quinn and New England Patriots offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels.
By rule, interviews with assistants of teams with byes in the first weekend of the NFL playoffs must be completed by the end of the weekend.
McDaniels is a Northeast Ohio native and a graduate of John Carroll University in Cleveland. He declined to interview with the Browns or any other team last offseason.
McDaniels was the head coach of the Broncos in 2009 and the first 12 games of 2010. He's since been the offensive coordinator in St. Louis and back with the Patriots, with whom he started his NFL career in 2000.
Neither Gase nor Quinn has head coaching experience.
Banner said he and Haslam addressed Browns players on Monday, telling them that making a change after just one season under Chudzinski "is justifiably frustrating and it creates some skepticism. Our job as the leaders of the organization, the job of the new head coach, is to kind of work through that. We have a highly competitive group of core players that I think are very anxious to find the right person to follow and try to get the franchise where they so badly want it to be."
