Shedeur Sanders accounted for four touchdowns in a 364-yard passing day against the Tennessee Titans. The breakout performance may cause owner Jimmy Haslam to question his top talent evaluators. (Cleveland Browns)
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Editor's note: Tony Grossi is a Cleveland Browns and NFL analyst for TheLandOnDemand.com and 850 ESPN Cleveland. He has covered the Browns since 1984.
Second thoughts on Titans 31, Browns 29 …
1. Shedeur Sanders’ breakout performance in a losing cause to lowly Tennessee earned him the starting job for the remaining four games. While that doesn’t sound like breaking news, it certainly was out of character for coach Kevin Stefanski to commit to Sanders beyond “week to week.” So why has Stefanski committed to the one quarterback who wasn’t given first-team reps in training camp and regularly was exiled to a practice field with undrafted free agents? “I think he has constantly and consistently gotten better in each one of these games and how he’s approached his game,” Stefanski said. “He’s been working very hard, so I feel good about where his development is heading. He knows there are always going to be plays that he can be better [at] and those types of things, but he’s very intentional about getting better each and every game he’s out there.”
2. The unspoken question is whether Sanders was showing the commitment to his profession from the onset of his time with the Browns. I mean, something had to be behind his banishment to fourth string, right? The leak to ESPN analyst Rex Ryan early in the season that resulted in a bizarre rant questioning Sanders’ work ethic certainly suggested somebody in the building wasn’t happy with Sanders. Shortly thereafter, Sanders himself admitted his playful nature rubbed some the wrong way. In any case, Sanders has shown maturity on and off the field since taking over for concussed Dillon Gabriel as the team’s starting quarterback three weeks ago. In his media availabilities, he’s sounding more like a professional quarterback than a social media content creator. Following the Tennessee game, Sanders was asked about his composure in leading his team back twice from double-digit deficits. “I’ve been this way,” he said. “So, this is God showing a lot of people who I am. You know, a lot of circumstances will sometimes get you mentally not in your best place. And you got to find your happy place. So, I think that’s kind of … I’ve been praying and doing a lot, you know, talking to God this week in general, to get back to that place, to get back there.”
3. Sanders has made the remaining four games incredibly interesting but also incredibly critical. He has the chance to stake his claim as the Browns’ franchise quarterback going forward. His performances against the Bears, Bills, Steelers and Bengals will affect a host of major decisions awaiting owner Jimmy Haslam – starting with possible changes in his organization and extending to the draft. Now, seven starts in total is not a large enough sample size to be sure about anything. But the Browns put themselves in this awkward position by discarding Sanders like a redshirt freshman until Gabriel’s injury. It has been postulated how ironic it is that Sanders can possibly save the jobs of the men who evaluated him as the fourth-best quarterback in camp. Rather than saving them, however, Sanders may actually be exposing them.
4. Yes, the Browns were the only team to select Sanders and rescue him from the most dramatic free-fall in NFL draft history. But it’s not like anyone in the building had a strong conviction about Sanders. After selecting Gabriel in the third round, GM Andrew Berry freely admitted the plan never was to take a second quarterback in the draft. He said Sanders was a value pick, meaning the Browns had a higher grade on him than the fifth round in which he was taken. (It has been reported elsewhere that the Browns had a fourth-round grade on Sanders.) And this came after Berry traded for Kenny Pickett and signed Joe Flacco in free agency. At training camp, Stefanski devoted most of the first-team reps to Pickett and Flacco and the rest to Gabriel. Certainly, nobody in the building advocated for Sanders, or else he would have received more attention. Then Berry changed plans by trading Pickett. Then he changed plans again by trading Flacco. The organization decided at that point that Gabriel was more ready to be rushed in as the starter. Once again, nobody advocated for Sanders. It’s possible that if Gabriel had not been concussed in the Ravens game on November 16, he still might be playing.
5. So I asked Stefanski on Monday, “Was it a mistake not to start Sanders earlier?” He answered, “Yeah, I’m not going to get into those type of things. I’m obviously focused on what’s in front of us.”
6. If Sanders continues to improve over the last four games, he would force the Browns to consider naming him the starter in 2026 and save their two first-round picks in the draft for positions other than quarterback. It is a decision loaded with risk. If they’re wrong, Haslam will have blown the opportunity to have a franchise quarterback in place for the opening of his Brook Park indoor stadium in 2029. If Sanders proves otherwise – for the record, I am still skeptical … but open-minded -- it would be a case of sheer dumb luck that the Browns could stumble onto their next franchise quarterback this way. Actually, though, it should cause Haslam to seriously question whether he has the right talent evaluators in the building.