{"id":136726,"date":"2025-06-17T10:16:10","date_gmt":"2025-06-17T10:16:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/136726\/"},"modified":"2025-06-17T10:16:10","modified_gmt":"2025-06-17T10:16:10","slug":"beat-writer-assesses-browns-quarterback-competition-pickett-unremarkable-sanders-accurate-and-decisive","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/136726\/","title":{"rendered":"Beat Writer Assesses Browns’ Quarterback Competition: Pickett ‘Unremarkable’, Sanders Accurate And Decisive"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Browns\u2019 quarterback competition is through its first phase, and the reviews, meaningless as they may be, are in. At least in the eyes of Browns reporter Zac Jackson<\/a>, there is a clear frontrunner, as well as some intrigue. While Joe Flacco is the favorite to start, the rookies are surging.<\/p>\n

As for Kenny Pickett<\/a>, Jackson had little to say about him in the Browns\u2019 quarterback competition. Outside of writing that he is typically first in warmup lines and a lot of drills, he only added, \u201cPickett has been unremarkable\u201d. Unremarkable, though, doesn\u2019t mean bad, especially not in OTAs and minicamp. The real race won\u2019t begin until training camp, but while they split fields then, there are only three preseason games.<\/p>\n

\u201cFrom here, the belief is that Flacco is the clear favorite to win the first phase of that competition and the starting job\u201d, Jackson wrote. But the rookies are making the Browns\u2019 quarterback competition more interesting.<\/p>\n

Of Dillon Gabriel, Cleveland\u2019s third-round pick, he finished minicamp \u201cstrongly\u201d following some erratic play. But Shedeur Sanders seems to have the highest potential to make the Browns\u2019 quarterback competition interesting.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe addition of Sanders is actually what makes it intriguing. Not just his presence, but the accuracy and decisiveness he\u2019s shown this spring\u201d, he wrote. \u201cSanders has been good enough this spring to make coaches believe he\u2019s worthy of more chances this summer\u201d. Assessing the Browns\u2019 quarterback competition, he has seen \u201cenough impressive throws to make me think Cleveland might be on to something with him\u201d.<\/p>\n

But he also downplayed even what he saw, noting HC Kevin Stefanski\u2019s repeated overtures. Much of what the Browns are assessing as the quarterback competition ensues happens outside of the media\u2019s eye. But, of course, the media, and we, can only go on what is available.<\/p>\n

Cleveland traded for Kenny Pickett earlier this offseason, signing Joe Flacco as a free agent for a reunion. They drafted Dillon Gabriel in the third round, then added Shedeur Sanders in the fifth. The Browns insist they mean to have a legitimate four-way quarterback competition<\/a>, but that\u2019s hard to pull off.<\/p>\n

Adding to the fracas is Deshaun Watson, the Browns\u2019 nominal starting quarterback whose failures and health precipitated this competition. Recovering from an Achilles injury, the prevailing assumption is he will be unavailable for at least some time. But if he has an accelerated recovery<\/a> and is ready to play, what do they do then?<\/p>\n

My guess is they would not play him, essentially writing off his future with the team. When the owner already publicly admits it was a horrible mistake<\/a>, it\u2019s kind of hard to recover from that. The Browns wouldn\u2019t be staging a four-way competition to find another quarterback if Watson showed any legitimate long-term promise.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Browns\u2019 quarterback competition is through its first phase, and the reviews, meaningless as they may be, are…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":136727,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[2054],"tags":[86,85,54,2337,1033,7,562,570,6,17],"class_list":{"0":"post-136726","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-cleveland-browns","8":"tag-browns","9":"tag-cleveland","10":"tag-cleveland-browns","11":"tag-clevelandbrowns","12":"tag-dillon-gabriel","13":"tag-football","14":"tag-joe-flacco","15":"tag-kenny-pickett","16":"tag-nfl","17":"tag-shedeur-sanders"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/114698190043083564","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136726","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=136726"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136726\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/136727"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=136726"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=136726"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=136726"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}