Browns’ QB room is the most intriguing one in the NFL originally appeared on The Sporting News. Add The Sporting News as a Preferred Source by clicking here.
The Cleveland Browns had a turbulent 2025 season, but there was a small bright spot in it with the emergence of quarterback Shadeur Sanders. But that might have put this upcoming 2026 season in a bit of a pickle, particularly with the return of Deshaun Watson.
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What do Browns General Manager Andrew Berry and new Head Coach Todd Monken do now with their seemingly much more competitive QB room?
Alongside Sanders and Watson is Dillon Gabriel, making this QB room one of the most intriguing in the NFL. At least Bleacher Report thinks so in their latest piece on it.
Gabriel, unfortunately, will fall back to the third spot in the depth chart, and that is solely based on what each of the other two quarterbacks has attached to them. Sanders brings in the fan base, and his 3-4 record at the end of last season showed there was something real there.
But the Browns are paying Watson an astounding $44.9 million against their salary cap. This is a low number, opposed to the original $80.7 million that he would have been owed this upcoming season. Watson is coming off the Achilles injury he suffered in 2024, and his numbers since leaving the Houston Texans have not kept up to the same kind of aura.
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So, that leaves the controversial decision of who is QB1. The quarterback that has not played in an entire season and change, but is getting paid an arm and a leg from your limited salary cap, or the underdeveloped but massively followed sophomore star?
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