Dillon Gabriel will become the 41st starting quarterback in the Browns' expansion era and the 12th in six seasons with Kevin Stefanski as head coach. (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.
LONDON
From the beginning, this Browns’ season was going to be written by their large and impressive 2025 rookie class. And now it will get even more interesting as the first of the two drafted quarterbacks moves into the cockpit of the NFL’s worst offense.
As expected, Dillon Gabriel, the third-round pick from Oregon/Oklahoma/Central Florida, the most experienced quarterback in college football history with 63 career starts, was promoted ahead of 40-year-old Joe Flacco to take over the 1-3 team.
Just hours before the Browns departed across the Atlantic Ocean for their International Series game Sunday against the Minnesota Vikings in London’s built-for-American football Tottenham Hotspur Stadium, coach Kevin Stefanski delivered the news that was inevitable but still premature with 13 games to go.
Stefanski’s unusually stern tone suggested the decision to bench Flacco was either a painful one for the coach or one that he disagreed with. The Browns have always made quarterback decisions through a collaborative process in the Stefanski-Andrew Berry era; Berry famously traded away Josh Dobbs moments after Stefanski named him the backup quarterback for the 2023 season.
“First of all, this is not about one person,” Stefanski said. “Joe is a captain of this football team. We’re going to need his leadership moving forward, like always, and that’s obvious with Joe, just the person he is, he’s going to be the same guy every day.”
When pressed why make the move if it’s not about one person, Stefanski repeated the refrain he has been singing since the 34-10 loss in Detroit intensified speculation about a QB switch.
“I think the big thing for me is we need to all be better,” Stefanski said. “We need to coach better, we need to block better, catch better, run better, all of the above we need to be better. And I know the quarterback position gets quite a bit of scrutiny, I understand that. But this is about our entire team playing better.”
Asked if it was solely his decision, Stefanski replied, “Yes,” unconvincingly and without elaboration.
It’s not as if Stefanski is anti-Gabriel. On the contrary, Gabriel has been pegged as Stefanski’s guy since the Browns shocked many by taking the 5-11 lefthander with the 94th overall pick of the draft. It’s just that readying a raw rookie QB for Minnesota defensive coordinator Brian Flores’ exotic blitzes on an abbreviated practice week just doesn’t sound like a recipe for victory.
“Excited for Dillon,” Stefanski said, unexcitedly. “He’s done everything, he’s handled everything really well since he’s been on campus here, so just going to have to support the young man, coaches, players, offense, defense, special teams. So, looking forward to the opportunity this week, great challenge.”
The most insight Stefanski gave was conceding Flacco’s eight turnovers were the driving force of the move.
“Obviously, we need to be better at taking care of the football,” Stefanski said. “We are minus-6 in the NFL. We’re 32nd in turnover margin and that’s very difficult to overcome.”
Still, Flacco will serve as QB2 and Shedeur Sanders, the rookie drafted 50 spots after Gabriel in the fifth round, will remain the emergency QB3.
“Yeah, Joe’s the backup,” Stefanski said, again without elaboration.
Flacco Fever curbed
Flacco was visibly downcast with the move, much like he’s been since the loss in Baltimore three weeks ago.
“I think the tougher thing is just going through what we’ve gone through the last four weeks and just not being able to produce the way we wanted to,” he said. “When you’re in the moment and you’re having conversations with people, it is what it is. You look people in the eye and tell them how it is, and that’s what it is.”
Flacco’s eight turnovers in four games brought his demise, though at least three of his six interceptions appeared to be not his fault. He was also victimized by dropped passes, miscommunication with his receivers, and an ongoing crisis at both offensive tackle positions that resulted in a league-high 24 quarterback hits.
“It was tough,” he said of the turnovers. “I think there’s some of those that, you know, it’s like, what are you going to do? And then there’s some that you look at and you really want back. That’s how it goes. They all count the same. And when you look back on it’s definitely a part of why weren’t able to be what we wanted to be.”
Two years ago, Flacco was the toast of the town for leading the Browns into the 2023 playoffs with four straight wins via 300-yard passing games in the month of December. He cherishes that memory and is not ready to declare his time as toast.
“I’ve said it before, it’s different times, it’s different years,” he said. “It doesn’t change the experience that I’ve had here and will continue to have here. It’s part of the game. It’s tough to deal with. Not getting it done, that’s the bigger thing. Just because you still try to look at the good experiences here, and listen, we got a long season left, so I’m still keeping my head up and still trying to live that out.”
Gabriel’s ready
Unbeknownst to those outside the team, Stefanski said Gabriel has been receiving reps with the first team since the season started.
“I think as much as we could,” Gabriel said. “I think reps here and there throughout practices but also respecting Flacco getting his reps throughout those weeks. So, I think we try to fit it in as much as possible, but I think we also did a good job of that in training camp.”
Gabriel received periodic reps with the first team in training camp while Sanders did not. Those first-team reps increased when Kenny Pickett was sidelined with a Grade 2 hamstring strain and then when Pickett was traded to Las Vegas prior to the cut to 53.
Gabriel parlayed those reps into two preseason appearances, in which he led the team to five scores in seven series, climaxed by an impressive 2-minute TD drive in the final preseason game against the Rams. Gabriel also led a TD drive in mop-up time in the 41-17 loss in Baltimore in Game 2.
He said he hopes to bring “great juice and great energy” to an offense that has averaged 14 points a game and has scored no more than 17.
“And that starts on Monday, the beginning of the prep week,” he said. “That starts with just having great meetings, having great practices. So, we’re taking small sample sizes and bites of the whole thing, and making sure that we just focus on what we got in front of us.”
Shedeur speechless
A week ago, Sanders made waves by saying he was ready to play despite being relegated to mostly scout team reps.
“I know if you see the quarterback play in the league right now, I know I'm capable of doing better than that,” Sanders said in an exclusive interview with ESPN Cleveland that went viral.
The comments reflected Sanders’ supreme confidence in himself but also attracted the ire of some in the media, most notably bombastic ESPN analyst Rex Ryan, who insinuated Sanders was to blame for not seeing the field based on unspecified inside information he had received.
On Wednesday, Sanders made news again simply by saying nothing.
He made himself available to reporters in the locker room, but when he was asked for his reaction to not being promoted to QB2, he smiled and merely mouthed words that weren’t spoken.
Naturally, the video of Sanders doing this went viral, attracting nearly 1 million views before the day was done.