{"id":225667,"date":"2025-07-21T22:56:08","date_gmt":"2025-07-21T22:56:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/225667\/"},"modified":"2025-07-21T22:56:08","modified_gmt":"2025-07-21T22:56:08","slug":"browns-cb-denzel-ward-earns-acclaim-from-nfl-personnel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/225667\/","title":{"rendered":"Browns CB Denzel Ward earns acclaim from NFL personnel"},"content":{"rendered":"

As long-time Cleveland Browns<\/a> cornerback Denzel Ward prepares to start his eighth NFL season, he still finds himself viewed as one of the NFL\u2019s very best.<\/p>\n

On Thursday, ESPN\u2019s Jeremy Fowler wrapped up his annual positional top ten lists, compiled from polling the opinions of the league\u2019s coaches, executives, and scouts, and the final installment ranking the NFL\u2019s cornerbacks<\/a> featured a pleasant surprise with Ward landing at No. 3.<\/p>\n

The high ranking is a strong endorsement for Ward, as he ranked only behind reigning Defensive Player of the Year Patrick Surtain II and Houston Texans<\/a> cornerback Derek Stingley Jr., who was given a record-setting extension in March<\/a>. Even as the Browns\u2019 defense took a step back last season from the phenomenal highs the unit displayed in 2023, Ward maintained his usual high level of play and earned the fourth Pro Bowl selection of his career.<\/p>\n

Here is what one NFL defensive coach had to say about Ward:\u00a0<\/p>\n

“Really good feet, smooth, comfortable with the ball in the air\u2026 he’s been good for a long time. Has God-given talent that you can’t really match.”<\/p>\n

2025 marks the sixth straight year that Ward has ranked within the top ten of Fowler\u2019s survey, a testament to how consistent the former fourth-overall pick has been for the Browns defense.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"As long-time Cleveland Browns cornerback Denzel Ward prepares to start his eighth NFL season, he still finds himself…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":225668,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[247,265,86,85,54,3626,7345,1068,1085,12,388,7,221,253,20842,2512,379,1070,248,267,88,6,35196,245,537,858,8206,530,818,817,829,9,266,819,1069,8205,222,776,5134],"class_list":{"0":"post-225667","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nfl","8":"tag-american","9":"tag-american-football","10":"tag-browns","11":"tag-cleveland","12":"tag-cleveland-browns","13":"tag-denzel","14":"tag-denzel-ward","15":"tag-derek","16":"tag-derek-stingley-jr","17":"tag-espn","18":"tag-espn-inc","19":"tag-football","20":"tag-houston","21":"tag-houston-texans","22":"tag-hub","23":"tag-ii","24":"tag-inc","25":"tag-jr","26":"tag-national","27":"tag-national-sports","28":"tag-news","29":"tag-nfl","30":"tag-nfl-hub","31":"tag-overall","32":"tag-overall-positive","33":"tag-patrick","34":"tag-patrick-surtain-ii","35":"tag-positive","36":"tag-scores","37":"tag-sport","38":"tag-sport-scores-u0026-statistics","39":"tag-sports","40":"tag-sports-news","41":"tag-statistics","42":"tag-stingley","43":"tag-surtain","44":"tag-texans","45":"tag-u0026","46":"tag-ward"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/114893696681635444","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225667","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=225667"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225667\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/225668"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=225667"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=225667"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=225667"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}