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Ray Horton leaves Arizona Cardinals, joins Cleveland Browns

The popular coordinator gets a four-year contract with the Browns.

USA TODAY Sports

Arizona Cardinals fans mourned a bit with the news that defensive coordinator Ray Horton was not named the head coach of the team, but things got worse on Friday because he became the defensive coordinator for the Cleveland Browns, joining Rob Chudzinski's staff there.

We heard of how displeased Horton was with the situation, for whatever reason. Maybe it was because he felt the team led him to believe he had a better shot than he did, or because he simply just didn't get the job. However, when Bruce Arians was hired, it became known that Horton was going to be out despite the friendship he and Arians have.

The timeline for Horton's departure went like this on Friday:

First, Arizona Sports' Kyndra de St. Aubin reported that Horton had been let out of his contract by the Cardinals.

After that, NFL.com writer Ian Rapaport clarified the situation.

However, the original de St. Aubin report turned out to be correct, as Kent Somers tweeted.

It was not long after that the Cleveland Browns announced that he would be their next defensive coordinator. Kyndra de St. Aubin then gave us more info, as she got the info from Horton himself.

Horton is getting paid. This actually lets the Cardinals off the hook with salary. They would have had to have paid whatever the difference between his new salary and the salary he had here, but it seems that he got a raise.

Horton joins offensive coordinator Norv Turner, who many fans here hoped would be the OC here with Horton as head coach.

Todd Bowles is expected to land with the Cardinals to take the defensive coordinator position that Horton vacates.

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