The Cleveland Browns have a crowded quarterback room with Joe Flacco, Kenny Pickett, Dillon Gabriel and Shedeur Sanders all competing to be the starter for the 2025 season.<\/p>\n
The Browns also have a diverse group of QBs as Flacco is 40 years old and has been in the NFL since 2008, while Pickett is 27 and is entering his fourth year in the league. Then there are the rookies — Gabriel and Sanders — who are coming off of impressive college careers.<\/p>\n
Former Pro Bowl receiver T.J. Houshmandzadeh recently shared on the Nightcap podcast<\/a> what he is hearing about the Browns quarterback competition. Houshmandzadeh says that it is currently a two-player race and that Shedeur Sanders<\/a> isn\u2019t one of the two.<\/p>\n \u201cI was told from somebody that\u2019s in the building, that ain\u2019t a player, it\u2019s really coming down to Kenny Pickett or Dillon Gabriel,\u201d T.J. Houshmandzadeh said. \u201cThat\u2019s what I was told. But now, when you get the reports that Shedeur is completing 7 out of 9 passes, like is it against the starters, or is it against the 3s and 4s \u2013 the guys that are going to get released?<\/p>\n \u201cSo it seems impressive when you see the graphic, but is it really impressive if it\u2019s not against the starters or guys that are going to be on the team. You don\u2019t know how they\u2019re dividing up the reps, and it\u2019s virtually impossible with the amount of snaps.\u201d <\/p>\n There are reports out there that Sanders has performed well in his opportunities thus far, but training camp has yet to begin and the quarterback battle will likely be decided then and throughout the preseason.<\/p>\n Shedeur Sanders is listed at +4000 to win Offensive Rookie of the Year over on FanDuel<\/a>. Our FanDuel Sportsbook review<\/a> provides a complete guide on how to sign up and use their platform.<\/p>\n Of course, with four quarterbacks competing for a starting job, it can be hard for everyone to get reps.<\/p>\n If Pickett and Gabriel are indeed out front, it could be difficult for Shedeur Sanders and Joe Flacco to make up ground with limited opportunities.<\/p>\n \u201cThere ain\u2019t enough reps. I don\u2019t think people understand man\u2026 so you\u2019ve got a four-way battle for quarterback,” Houshmandzadeh said. \u201cIf it\u2019s a four-man competition, like, how can you do it? Like Kenny Pickett, Flacco, Dillon Gabriel, Shedeur \u2013 it\u2019s not enough reps. There\u2019s not enough reps in a practice. <\/p>\n \u201cI wish two guys would get the majority of the reps one day, then two guys get the majority of the reps [another]. Like, I don\u2019t know how this is a fair competition.\u201d <\/p>\n Finally, Houshmandzadeh said that in his opinion, the Browns should go with a young quarterback this season — either Shedeur Sanders or Dillon Gabriel — and find out if they already have the quarterback of the future on their roster.<\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t get it. I don\u2019t know what Cleveland is doing,\u201d he said. \u201cI know the coaching staff don\u2019t agree with it, but I\u2019m going with one of the rookies, whether it\u2019s Dillon Gabriel or Shedeur. \u2026 Flacco\u2019s a hell of a quarterback. He\u2019s a real good dude. But he ain\u2019t your quarterback of the future. <\/p>\n \u201cKenny Pickett, I seen you play in Pittsburgh. You ain\u2019t the quarterback [of the future]. I\u2019m going with one of the young guys to see what they can do and if they can\u2019t do it, we\u2019re going to draft one of these franchise quarterbacks in the draft coming out next year.\u201d<\/p>\n If you purchase a product or register for an account through a link on our site, we may receive compensation. By using this site, you consent to our User Agreement<\/a> and agree that your clicks, interactions, and personal information may be collected, recorded, and\/or stored by us and social media and other third-party partners in accordance with our Privacy Policy.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Cleveland Browns have a crowded quarterback room with Joe Flacco, Kenny Pickett, Dillon Gabriel and Shedeur Sanders…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":173999,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2054],"tags":[86,85,54,29284,2337,7,6],"class_list":{"0":"post-173998","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-cleveland-browns-veterans-minicamp-2025","12":"tag-clevelandbrowns","13":"tag-football","14":"tag-nfl"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/114780214895385065","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/173998","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=173998"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/173998\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/173999"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=173998"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=173998"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=173998"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}