BEREA, Ohio — Talking about a personnel man's decisions is like talking about politics.
Everyone has an opinion.
In a sense, a personnel guy can't win. Two years ago, Bill Polian had the Colts perched on the edge of a Super Bowl. Now, they're coming off a 6-10 season. Does that make Polian a bad personnel guy? Absolutely not, he's one of the best, as his track record indicates. Randy Mueller was the Executive of the Year after the Saints went to the playoffs in 2000; now he's looking for a job.
Dwight Clark summed up his brief legacy with the Browns with typical candor and honesty.
"There were no great accomplishments," he said one day after his departure from the Browns was announced.
But nobody should have expected any immediate great accomplishment — not with Clark and former coach Chris Palmer working under a ludicrous time line set by the NFL that gave them almost no time to build a team.
Clark's legacy in personnel will be the proper use of the first-round picks the team had in 1999 and 2000 — think Tony Mandarich and Heath Shuler if it's a gimme to use high picks properly — and in putting together an organization on the fly.
He can gnash his teeth over the bad luck that plagued the offensive line that he tried to build in 1999 (Lomas Brown, Jim Pyne, Dave Wohlabaugh and Orlando Brown should have been a pretty good nucleus).
He can be proud of the fact that he took a shot at Jamir Miller late in free agency when nobody else wanted him, that he set up the special teams by signing Chris Gardocki and Phil Dawson, that he brought in Dave Wohlabaugh and Corey Fuller, that Daylon McCutcheon played so well at corner and that Tim Couch and Kevin Johnson turned into a talented tandem.
He will look back and question decisions (Rahim Abdullah, some of the ex-49ers), but that's the nature of the job.
Thirty teams, for example, had the chance to trade for Marshall Faulk, and only one took it. Thirty teams had the chance to pick up Tyrone Wheatley; only one took him. Ben Gay — a Pete Garcia find — looked like a brilliant pickup in July; less than a year later, he was released.
Clark approached his job with tireless energy, and he worked in a system that is not typical. In the Browns' system, everything the personnel department does supports the coach. Clark spent two years picking up players for Palmer's system, then saw them jettisoned when Butch Davis came in and gave Clark a new set of criteria for players.
He worked as hard for Davis as he did for Palmer. Clark cared deeply about the team and did all that he could to make it better. He had a passion to win, and the intensity of a guy who competed on the field and won championships.
His decisions can be questioned — but so will Davis and Garcia's over time.
The one thing nobody can question, though, is Clark's effort and dedication. And that's the kind of person a team needs in its front office.