BEREA, Ohio — Shedeur Sanders, who will make his starting debut Sunday in Las Vegas, believes he can turn around the fortunes of the Browns, just like Baker Mayfield said he could in 2018.

“I know our fans have hope and I’m the one that … (a teammates screams in the background)…I know our fans have a lot of expectations and hope, and I would be doing a disservice to myself and disservice to the organization if I didn’t feel like I am the guy,“ he said. ”I did everything I need to. I’m doing everything I need to to prepare to be the best version of myself as possible.

“With the circumstances, everything got to be sped up and that’s great. I like pressure in life. I’m just excited for everything. So I feel like I’m the guy, I know I’m the guy, but you’ll just have to be able to see. The game got to speak.”

Sanders, starting in place of concussed rookie Dillon Gabriel, becomes the 42nd quarterback to start a game for the Browns since 1999, and the 18th rookies. The other 17 all lost their starting debuts. He’s also the 13th QB to start for Kevin Stefanski in his six years here.

“I think it’s everything we all think,” Sanders said. “I think it’s going to be exciting. I know a lot of y’all going to be there. I know you can’t miss it. You cannot miss this moment. It’ll be definitely exciting. We’re going out there with a purpose, going out there mentally ready, no distractions, no anything, and I’ll be excited.”

Sanders won’t even let the fact that his Granger Township home got broken into distract him. Three masked thieves stole $200,000 worth of property.

“I know this is a trending topic that my house got broken into, but I am in a mental space now to where it’s not too much that could phase me honestly, that’s going on,” he said. “And none of my jewelry got took anyway, so by the way, none of my jewelry got took. So now it’s just caught slip. It happens.”

Sanders acknowledged that things should go a lot better for him this week in Vegas with a full week of practice under his belt. He’ll take his first snaps with the starting offense in practice, and have a gameplan designed for him. When he replaced Gabriel in the second half of the 23-16 loss to the Ravens, going 4 of 16 for 47 yards with no touchdowns and one interception for a 13.5 rating, he had never taken a snap with the starters.

“Yeah, I’m truly excited for that,” he said. “Knowing that I have a piece of offense and a say so and how things fit my eye and place the players exactly where they need to be. Seeing how they come in and out of route, seeing the structure of the O-linemen, seeing their sets, seeing, just having a feeling. I’m more of a feel type of person, so that’s how I learn, that’s how I do everything. I’m not just, I’m going to just watch it, it’s just going to happen.

“No, I got to be out there, feel it, I got to move around. It’s like so many details that it takes for me to feel my best and play my best. I’m doing everything in my power and the team’s doing everything to help me get prepared.”

Despite hanging his head during and after the game and pinning the loss on himself to his teammates in the locker room afterwards, he found some bright spots in the loss. On the final, two-minute drive, he hit fellow rookie Gage Larvadain in the hands with the potential gamewinning touchdown pass in the end zone, but it was broken up.

“Really the positives from that game is just being able to go in there, breaking that barrier and coming off the sideline for so many weeks and being able to do that,” he said. “I don’t think a lot of people understand how challenging that is from a rookie going into a game. Now, a lot of NFL vets, backup quarterbacks, they’ve been in the league, you feel me? I’m just coming out of college, so it’s a different feeling, but I enjoy it as the game went on and I settled in, OK, I know what’s going on.

“As long as I get comfortable, which I am each and every day, seeing the guys running the routes and being out there, it feels good. So I know for sure I’m going to do everything in my power and as a team, we’re doing everything in our power to make sure we have success on Sunday.”

This post will be updated.

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