I cringe – a lot, in fact — every time I hear a head football coach at any level say that he will hold an open competiton for the quarterback job.

And I certainly did so again when Hue Jackson announced such for the job in Cleveland.

I guess that’s about all he can do right now – there are four candidates, none of whom really excite you as the starter to open the season – but I still don’t like it. It means the Browns have questions – plenty of questions, more than you can count, really – at the most important position in team sports.

It’s OK to have an open competition at left tackle.

Or Right guard.

Or tight end.

Or running back. Yeah, running back by committee is A-OK.

Or defensive end.

Or middle linebacker.

Or even strong safety.

All those positions are important, but none can hold a candle to quarterback in that regard.

The quarterback is the face of the franchise. It is the team’s foundation.

But if a coach doesn’t know who that face is, or what the foundation looks like, he lays awake at night worrying about it. For without a great quarterback, the team can’t be great. And if the team isn’t great – at least great eventually – then the coach will eventually get fired.

Jackson doesn’t want to get fired. That happened to him once already, in Oakland, and he obviously didn’t like it.

To have a quarterback derby, as it were, is, in essence, the coach saying, “I don’t know which one of these guys, if any of them, are worthy of opening the season under center, so I’m going to give them all a chance and see what happens.”

It is the equivalent of throwing a bunch of mud against the wall and watching to see if any of it sticks.

The Browns haven’t really had their quarterback since Bernie Kosar in the early 1990s.

The other teams in the AFC North – the Pittsburgh Steelers with Ben Roethlisberger since 2004, the Baltimore Ravens with Joe Flacco since 2008 and the Cincinnati Bengals with Andy Dalton since 2011 – have all had their quarterbacks for a long time.

It is the reason why those teams have experienced different levels of success in the last decade or so, and the Browns have not.

To know that the Browns still don’t have their guy right now, and may not really have him by the time the season comes around, is numbing.

And until that changes, the Browns’ fortunes won’t change.