Browns name Rob Chudzinski new coach

CLEVELAND (AP) — The Browns hauled their coaching search to Arizona and back. They talked to high-profile college coaches, NFL assistants and a fired pro coach who took a team to a Super Bowl.
None of them was hired.
Instead, Rob Chudzinski became their pick.
With no experience as a head coach at any level, Chudzinski was hired Thursday night by the Cleveland Browns, the team he cheered for as a kid. This is Chudzinski's third stint with the team, but this time around he's the guy in charge.
Chudzinski, who spent the past two seasons calling plays as Carolina's offensive coordinator, is the Browns' sixth full-time coach since 1999 and 14th in team history.
Just as it appeared the Browns might be going in another direction, the team selected the 44-year-old Chudzinski to revive a team that has made the playoffs just once in the past 14 years.
Chudzinski will be introduced Friday at an 11 a.m. news conference, where owner Jimmy Haslam and CEO Joe Banner likely will be asked how they selected Banner after speaking to at least seven other candidates and flirting with Chip Kelly before he returned to Oregon.
"Chud," as he's known to players and friends, Chudzinski worked as the Browns' tight ends coach in 2004 and was their offensive coordinator in 2007, when the team won 10 games — their most since an expansion rebirth in 1999.
A lifelong Browns fan who grew up in Toledo, Ohio, Chudzinski replaces Pat Shurmur, another first-time coach when he was hired, who was fired on Dec. 31 after a 5-11 season. For the past two years, Chudzinski has worked with talented Panthers quarterback Cam Newton and resuscitated Carolina's offense, which was one of the league's worst before he arrived.
When Haslam and Banner embarked on their coaching search as 2013 began, the pair vowed they would wait as long as necessary to find "the right coach" for Cleveland. They promised to give their new coach final say over the roster and planned to pair him with an executive to help pick players.
Chudzinski wasn't seen by many as an option.
And then he became the choice.
Chudzinski interviewed with the team on Wednesday, when the club also visited with Cincinnati defensive coordinator Mike Zimmer. Chudzinski appeared to be a long shot for the job, not because he wasn't qualified, but because it was thought Haslam wanted to make a big splash with his first coaching hire.
However, Chudzinski wowed Haslam and Banner during his meeting and the team decided it was time to end its search in its second week.
It's not yet known whom Chudzinski will bring in as coordinators. There are reports he may hire former San Diego coach Norv Turner to run his offense. Chudzinski worked for Turner with the Chargers.
In his first season in Carolina, Chudzinski turned Newton, the No. 1 overall draft pick, loose and the Panthers set club records for total yards (6,237) and first downs (345). Carolina also scored 48 touchdowns after getting just 17 in the season before Chudzinski arrived. The Panthers jumped from last in the league in total yardage to seventh, the biggest improvement since 1999.
Following the season, Chudzinski interviewed for head coaching jobs with St. Louis, Jacksonville and Tampa Bay before returning to Carolina.
In getting the Browns' job, Chudzinski was picked over Zimmer, Montreal Alouettes coach Marc Trestman, fired Arizona coach Ken Whisenhunt and Cardinals defensive coordinator Ray Horton. Whisenhunt was in Cleveland for a second interview on Thursday, and appeared to be the front-runner. The Browns also were expected to interview Indianapolis offensive coordinator Bruce Arians.
Newton continued to develop in his second season with Chudzinski, and the QB's development may have helped his case since the Browns are hoping Brandon Weeden will improve this year after his uneven rookie season.
After his first stint on Cleveland's staff, Chudzinski spent two seasons as San Diego's tight ends coach, working with perennial Pro Bowl standout Antonio Gates.
Taking over the Browns' offense in 2007, Chudzinski helped the Browns go 10-6. They barely missed the playoffs, but four players, including quarterback Derek Anderson, made the Pro Bowl. However, in 2008, the Browns struggled on offense and a six-game losing streak led to a 4-12 finish and Romeo Crennel's firing.
Chudzinski's hiring may not be popular with Cleveland fans, many of whom at fantasies about Nick Saban or Jon Gruden or Kelly brining his supersonic offense to the NFL.
But his selection is in keeping with at least one of Banner's past moves. When he was in Philadelphia's front office, Banner went outside the box and hired Green Bay assistant Andy Reid, a relative unknown who spent 14 seasons with the Eagles.
Now that they've got their coach, the Browns can focus on finding a GM to replace Tom Heckert, fired after three seasons.

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Swiss lab chief disputes USADA claim on Armstrong

LAUSANNE, Switzerland (AP) — The head of Switzerland's anti-doping laboratory described as "nonsense" claims by U.S. Anti-Doping Agency CEO Travis Tygart that he helped Lance Armstrong avoid being caught for doping.
Lab director Martial Saugy called a news conference Friday to answer accusations by Tygart that he provided Armstrong with information on how to avoid detection for use of the blood-boosting drug EPO.
Tygart told the U.S. television program "60 Minutes Sports" on Wednesday that Saugy acknowledged to him that he gave Armstrong and his team manager, Johan Bruyneel, "the keys to beating EPO tests" before the 2002 Tour de France.
"The answer is clear: It's 'No,'" Saugy said Friday, adding he was "surprised" by the claim. "I would like to ask him (Tygart), really personally, why did he say that, because personally it was not the case."
Saugy suggested that Tygart had "deficiencies" in his recollection of their discussion in Moscow in 2010 soon after U.S. federal investigators opened a probe into Armstrong and doping in cycling.
"I don't really understand the interpretation on that part of the discussion," Saugy later told The Associated Press in an interview. "For me, it is a nonsense."
In the TV program, Tygart said he asked Saugy: "Did you give Lance Armstrong and Johan Bruyneel the keys to beating EPO tests?"
"And he nodded to say 'Yes,'" Tygart said. "He explained to them, just the two of them. As far as I know, it's unprecedented. It's completely wrong to meet an athlete with a suspect result and explain to him how the test works."
Saugy acknowledged his respect for Tygart, with whom he worked on a previous case involving Armstrong's former teammate Tyler Hamilton. Tygart's determination to build a case against Armstrong for using EPO and other performance-enhancing drugs was crucial after the federal case was dropped early last year.
Armstrong was stripped of his seven Tour de France titles and banned from the sport for life after USADA released a report last year detailing widespread doping by the American rider and his teams.
"Travis Tygart is a key person in the fight against doping," Saugy said. "He knows the rules. He knows we must be transparent in order to respect the right of the defense. We need also to respect all the other athletes."
Saugy said he followed the International Cycling Union's request to meet with Armstrong in Luxembourg before the 2002 Tour started.
The Swiss official denied suggestions he had made an error or was naive in meeting the rider to discuss anti-doping strategy — a decision now being criticized by Tygart and World Anti-Doping Agency officials as a clear conflict of interest.
"I have absolutely no regret. I would repeat it," Saugy told the AP, explaining that Armstrong and other riders at that time had a right to information about false positive results in the relatively new EPO test. "They wanted to know what is the basis of the fight against doping."
He denied that meeting Armstrong was connected to the Texan's sample with suspicious levels of EPO taken at the 2001 Tour of Switzerland.
"For us, it was a closed affair," said Saugy, insisting that the EPO test was the sole reason. "No. 1 in the peloton is very influential, so we need to meet him to explain that we are not doing a bad job."
The UCI has said other riders and teams were given the same information from Saugy's lab in 2002 that Armstrong and Bruyneel received.
"This was clearly part of my job," Saugy said. "I do not interpret or understand the way I was producing this information as a key to escape from doping controls."
Saugy dismissed a suggestion that the dispute hinted at a rift with Tygart over how his lab, which manages the UCI's biological passport program, worked with USADA on the Armstrong case.
"I don't know what is behind it," Saugy told the AP. "Of course, (there) was some discussion between USADA and our laboratory because we were one of the laboratories working for UCI analyzing some of the samples, but no real difficulty."
Armstrong will give his first television interview since the sanctions were imposed when he speaks with Oprah Winfrey on Thursday.

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Browns introduce Rob Chudzinski as new coach

CLEVELAND (AP) — Rob Chudzinski is back for his third tour with the Cleveland Browns, and this time he's calling the shots.
Chudzinski, who spent the past two seasons as Carolina's offensive coordinator, was introduced as the club's sixth fulltime coach on Friday. He'll inherit a young roster he'll try to develop into a contender with the Browns, who have lost at least 11 games in each of the past five seasons.
The 44-year-old previously worked as an assistant with the Browns, most recently as offensive coordinator in 2008. Chudzinski has no previous head coaching experience, but he's familiar with the Browns and their history. He rooted for the Browns while growing up in Toledo, Ohio.
"I would not miss the chance for the world." Chudzinski said. "We're going to win here.

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How Steve Jobs Tried to Save a Fellow Rebel CEO

When Hewlett Packard ousted CEO Mark Hurd in 2010, another once-ousted CEO named Steve Jobs tried to help him get his job back. As soon as Jobs heard the news of Hurd's resignation in August 2010, he sent an email to Hurd, report Bloomberg Businessweek's Ashley Vance and Aaron Ricadela in their cover story about the legacy that current HP CEO Meg Whitman inherited. Beyond sympathy over a fellow Silicon Valley being forced out, Jobs felt concern over how the fate of HP might affect companies like his own. "It's the founding company of the Valley," Apple Board Bill Campbell explained to Vance and Ricadela. "You don't want to see it go away." At the time, HP's meltdown had yet to unfold, and the company's sales in the quarter before Hurd's departure actually totaled $126 billion. "Mr. Hurd pulled off one of the great rescue missions in American corporate history," wrote The New York Times's James B. Stewart in a 2011 article. Jobs wanted HP to maintain that.
RELATED: Who's Really to Blame in HP's $8.8-Billion Meltdown?
Hurd left not because of his inability to run the company but because of his "detractors," Stewart reported, which might help explain why Jobs felt for him. Jobs had plenty of those on his first run at Apple, and Hurd's ruthless style — he wanted the lowest 10 percent of performers fired each year, for example — created a lot of infighting. (Hurd was also accused of sexual harassment.)
RELATED: HP Has the Perfect Funny Last Man Standing
Jobs's attempt at reconciliation at HP, which came in the form of a two-hour walk around his neighborhood and offers to write letters to the HP board, didn't work. But in November 2010, Léo Apotheker took over, much to Jobs's chagrin: "Hewlett and Packard built a great company, and they thought they left it in good hands," Jobs told Walter Isaacson for his biography. "But now it’s being dismembered and destroyed. It's tragic." That dismemberment continues. Last quarter HP reported a meagre $30 billion. And the infighting continues as well: Remember that $8.8 billion meltdown the company underwent because Whitman couldn't get along with a little company it had acquired? Looks like Jobs might have been right, as usual.

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Apple’s Schiller says cheap smartphones will ‘never be the future of Apple products’

Apple (AAPL) may sell a cheaper iPhone, but don’t expect it to sell for the bargin bin prices that we’ve heard about through rumors so far. In an interview with the Shanghai Evening News this week, Apple senior vice president of worldwide marketing Phil Schiller said that cheap smartphones will “never be the future of Apple products,” although he never explicitly ruled out selling a cheaper version of the iPhone. Apple’s reluctance to fight companies such as LG (066570) and Nokia (NOK) by flooding emerging markets with low-cost smartphones all boils down to one thing: Margins. As Schiller explains, Apple isn’t too concerned about its relatively low market share in emerging markets because “although Apple’s market share of smartphones is just about 20%, we own the 75% of the profit.

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The FDA Wants Women to Take Less Ambien

Women who take sleeping pills have been inadvertently double-dosing, according to a new announcement from the the Federal Drug Administration. Today FDA regulators told the makers of sleep-aid prescriptions such as Ambien, Zolpimist, and Edluar to cut recommended doses for women in half. The order comes after new findings about the different ways men and women respond to zolpidem, the active ingredient in most sleeping pills.
RELATED: FDA: Your Toothbrush May Be Out to Destroy You
Women eliminate zolpidem from their bodies more slowly than men. By studying people eight hours after they took sleeping pills, FDA researchers found that 10 to 15 percent of women still had   enough zolpidem coursing through their bloodstream to impair driving. Only three percent of men exhibited the same prolonged wooziness. That's why recommended doses of Ambien will go from 10 milligrams to 5 milligrams for women. FDA Center for Drug Evaluation and Research deputy director Robert Temple told The New York Times's Sabrina Tavernise:
Most people thought that by the morning it is gone. What we’re reminding people is that is sort of true, but that in some women who take a full 10 milligram dose, and in a lot of people who take the control release dose, it is not entirely true. Some people will be impaired in the morning.
The news that women may have been taking too much sleeping medication without even knowing it is kind of freaky, since too much Ambien can make people do things in their sleep they won't remember later—things like "driving, or preparing and eating food," according to Mayo Clinic sleep specialist Eric Olson.

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Decent jobs report despite slowdown in hiring pace

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The pace of U.S. job growth slowed a bit in December, keeping the unemployment rate steady at 7.8 percent, but details of the Labor Department's U.S. employment report were fairly encouraging.
* Nonfarm payrolls increased 155,000, but job gains for the previous month were revised up to show 15,0000 more positions created than previously reported.
* Construction employment rebounded strongly, gaining 30,000 jobs after sagging 10,000 in November, reflecting increased residential construction activity as the housing market recovery gains traction.
* Manufacturing payrolls gained 25,000 after rising 5,000 in November. Manufacturing working hours increased, a positive sign for a sector that has been cooling in recent months. That helped to lift the overall average workweek to 34.5 hours from 34.4 hours in November.
* With workers putting in more time, the average hourly earnings increased 0.3 percent after rising by the same margin in November.
* More people entered the labor force, a sign of confidence in the jobs market, keeping the unemployment rate elevated. The household survey also showed a modest increase in employment, but more people reported they did not have jobs.
* The bad news is that government shed 13,000 jobs in December after a loss of 10,000 the prior month.
* Temporary help jobs, often seen as a harbinger for permanent hiring, fell in December and retail employment declined by 11,300 jobs after a hiring spree the previous months.

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Bank of America, other banks move closer to ending mortgage mess

CHARLOTTE/WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Bank of America Corp announced more than $14 billion of legal settlements over bad mortgages it sold to investors and flaws in its foreclosure process, taking the bank a step closer to ending the home loan problems that have dogged it for years.
About $3 billion of Bank of America's Monday's settlements were part of a larger $8.5 billion deal between 10 big mortgage lenders and regulators to end a loan-by-loan review of foreclosures mandated by the government.
Bank of America shares touched their highest level in nearly two years as investors called it a good step toward ending the company's multiple legal woes. The shares later retreated to close down 0.2 percent at $12.09.
Analysts have estimated that Bank of America has paid out some $40 billion for mortgage settlements since the crisis began. Most of those losses stem from its 2008 purchase of Countrywide Financial, once the largest subprime lender in the United States.
But the bank is moving closer to the day when it can stop worrying about mortgages and start focusing on growth, analysts and investors said.
"It's a step in the right direction in terms of trying to put these issues behind the company," said Jonathan Finger of Finger Interests Ltd, a Houston, Texas-based investment firm that owns 1.1 million of the bank's shares.
Besides the multibank foreclosure settlement, the second largest U.S. bank also announced about $11.6 billion of settlements with government mortgage finance company Fannie Mae to end allegations the bank improperly sold mortgages that later soured, and to resolve questions about foreclosure delays.
Bank of America had already set aside money to cover most of those settlements. The deal with Fannie wipes out 44 percent of the buy-back requests the bank faced as of the end of the third quarter. It also eliminates possible future repurchase requests on about $300 billion in loans.
Bank of America's home loan problems are far from over, though. It still needs court approval for an $8.5 billion settlement with private investors and it is locked in litigation with insurer MBIA Inc over mortgage-related claims.
The agreement also does not end a lawsuit the U.S. Justice Department brought against the bank last year over Countrywide and Bank of America loans sold to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the agency said. The suit accuses Countrywide and Bank of America of causing losses to taxpayers of more than $1 billion.
"I think there is still quite a lot of litigation to go, and I don't think we'll see the end of this for some time," said Thomas Perrelli, a former top Justice Department official, speaking of industry wide legal issues stemming from the financial crisis.
BANKS SETTLE
The settlement Bank of America, Citigroup Inc, JPMorgan Chase & Co, Wells Fargo & Co and five other banks entered with regulators pays out up to $125,000 in cash to homeowners whose homes were being foreclosed when the paperwork problems emerged.
About $3.3 billion of the $8.5 billion settlement with the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency will be in cash, with the rest in changes to the terms of loans or mortgage forgiveness.
In April 2011, the government required banks that collect payments on mortgages, known as servicers, to review whether errors in the foreclosure process had harmed borrowers.
The review focused on foreclosures from 2009 and 2010 and looked at processes, including "robo-signing," where servicer employees or contractors signed documents without first reviewing them.
That loan-by-loan review proved slow and expensive, the OCC said.
The reviews had already cost more than $1.5 billion. They turned up evidence that around 6.5 percent of the loan files contained some error requiring compensation, but most of those errors involved potential payouts much less than $125,000, OCC officials said.
Other banks involved in the settlement include MetLife Bank, Aurora Bank FSB, PNC Financial Services Group Inc, Sovereign Bank NA, SunTrust Banks Inc and U.S. Bancorp.
Wells Fargo said its portion of the cash settlement will be $766 million, which will result in a $644 million charge when it reports fourth-quarter earnings on Friday. The bank said it will spend another $1.2 billion on foreclosure prevention actions, which will not result in additional charges.
Citigroup, which reports earnings next week, said it will take a $305 million charge for its cash payment portion of the settlement, while existing reserves would cover $500 million in loan forgiveness and other actions.
Housing advocates said they viewed the settlement as a positive move as it ends a flawed review process and provides some money, if limited, to consumers. But some advocates and lawmakers expressed dissatisfaction with the pact and suggested hearings could follow.
"I remain concerned that banks continue to avoid full accountability, and I believe that borrowers deserve more answers and transparency than the Federal Reserve and the OCC are currently willing to provide," said Elijah Cummings, the top Democrat on the House Oversight committee.
BOFA SELLS SERVICING RIGHTS
For Bank of America, the Fannie Mae deal was the much larger of Monday's agreements.
Fannie Mae and sibling Freddie Mac essentially buy mortgages from banks and package them into bonds for investors. But during the mortgage boom, banks sold loans to the two companies that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac say should never have been sold because, for example, borrowers had misstated their income. The two mortgage finance companies are pushing banks to buy back the loans.
On Monday, Bank of America also said it was selling the rights to collect payments on about $306 billion of loans to Nationstar Mortgage Holdings and Walter Investment Management Corp. Reuters first reported on Friday that Bank of America was talking to Nationstar and Walter Investment.
Investors appear to have decided the bank is on the right track as its shares hit their highest level since May 2011 on Monday. When Warren Buffett came to the bank's rescue in August 2011 with a $5 billion investment, he received warrants for 700 million shares of stock at $7.14 per share.

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Nasdaq CEO says would definitely consider Euronext

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Nasdaq OMX Group would definitely consider bidding for Euronext, the operator of the Paris, Amsterdam, Brussels and Lisbon stock exchanges, if it were put up for sale, Nasdaq's Chief Executive Robert Greifeld said in an interview.
"We would have to take a look at it," he said. "I'm not saying we would bid on it, but we would have to take a look."
Chatter that Euronext could be spun off from NYSE Euronext quickly surfaced after IntercontinentalExchange (ICE) made an $8.2 billion bid for the New York Stock Exchange operator in December.
Greifeld said if Euronext were to become available, it would not likely be until sometime in 2014, as it would take several months for the ICE-NYSE deal to close and then the two companies would have to begin an integration process. That scenario would be positive as at that point there may be more clarity on where the macro-economic environment in Europe is headed, he added.
"It would be a harder decision now to decide whether to bid on it than it would be 15 months from now," he said.
Germany's Deutsche Boerse has lost its appetite for buying Euronext, because regulatory and technological changes have made it harder to earn big profits from stock trading, three people familiar with the Frankfurt-based company's thinking told Reuters.
Deutsche Boerse has made three attempts at combining with Euronext since 2003. The final attempt, made in 2011, was shot down by antitrust concerns over creating a dominant player in European derivatives.
When the ICE-NYSE deal was announced, the two companies said they had told regulators in Europe that they would spin Euronext off through an IPO process if that would help the deal pass regulatory muster. But a source familiar with the situation said European regulators still had not indicated if they would prefer Euronext to be separated from a combined ICE-NYSE.
NOT AN AFTERTHOUGHT
ICE's interests are in combining its derivatives business with NYSE's Liffe, Europe's second-largest futures exchange. Doing so would make it the top challenger to Deutsche Boerse's European dominance in derivatives.
While the spotlight has been on Liffe, Euronext, with its four markets, does more trading than the London Stock Exchange, Greifeld pointed out. "It's not an afterthought," he added.
ICE CEO Jeff Sprecher and Nasdaq's Greifeld have a strong relationship going back to their hostile $11.3 billion joint bid for NYSE Euronext in 2011. That bid, which came during Deutsche Boerse and NYSE's merger talks, was dropped due to opposition from U.S. anti-trust regulators.
Combining Nasdaq and NYSE would have brought together the top two U.S. stock exchanges, creating a virtual monopoly on listings and dominance in trading U.S. cash equities and options.
Greifeld said that he is not concerned about going toe-to-toe against a combined ICE-NYSE, because while his trans-Atlantic exchange has fierce rivalries with NYSE across a range of businesses, it does not really compete against ICE.
Still, he said Sprecher would bring a new element to NYSE.
"Jeff is probably the right person to bring the organization forward into modern times," he said, taking a jab at the Big Board operator.
Greifeld said he does not feel the need to go out and do an acquisition just because ICE and NYSE are combining, and that Nasdaq would be opportunistic in its acquisition strategy.
Nasdaq has diversified its revenue stream away from equity trading through a number of small- to mid-sized acquisitions, the latest being a binding offer for Thomson Reuters Corp's investor relations, public relations and multimedia services units for $390 million in December.

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Gadget Watch: Electronic fork nags you on eating

LAS VEGAS (AP) — If you've always wanted a fork that spies on your eating habits, you're in luck: A company has developed a utensil that records when you lift it to the mouth.
The electronic fork is one of the gadgets getting attention this week at the International CES in Las Vegas, an annual showcase of the latest TVs, computers and other consumer-electronic devices.
WHAT IT IS: The HAPIfork is a fork with a fat handle containing electronics and a battery. It's made by HapiIabs, which is based in the land of slow, languorous meals — France.
HOW IT WORKS: The fork contains a motion sensor, so it can figure out when it's being lifted to the mouth. If it senses that you're eating too fast, it warns with you with a vibration and a blinking light. The company believes that using the fork 60 to 75 times during meals lasting from 20 to 30 minutes is ideal.
Between meals, you can connect the fork to a computer or phone and upload data on how fast you're eating, for long-term tracking.
The electronics are waterproof, so you can wash the fork in the sink. If you want to put it in the dishwasher, you have to remove the electronics first.
WHY YOU'D WANT IT: Nutritional experts recommend eating slowly because it takes about 20 minutes to start feeling full. If you eat fast, you may eat too much. The fork is also designed to space your forkfuls so that you have time to chew each one properly. It's like having your mom in a utensil!
WHAT IT DOESN'T DO: The fork has no clue about the nutritional content of your food or how big your forkfuls are. It can't tell if you're shoveling lard or stabbing peas individually.
AVAILABILITY: The company is launching a fundraising campaign for the fork in March on the group-fundraising site Kickstarter.com. Participants need to put down $99 for a fork, which is expected to ship around April or May. Those forks will connect to computers through USB cables.
Later this year, the company plans to start selling Bluetooth-enabled forks to the general public. No price was disclosed for that version.

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