Joe Flacco. Kenny Pickett. Dillon Gabriel. Shedeur Sanders.
These are the four quarterbacks who currently have a chance to start week 1 for the Browns – and with just over two months to go until opening kickoff, the race is likely to heat up very quickly and very soon. Once this five-week hiatus is over and training camp begins, the QB battle will be full steam ahead – and as it stands right now it’s still technically anyone’s job to win.
Both of the veterans certainly have a better chance than either of the rookies, but not even the coaches know for sure who will be under center in Cleveland on September 7th. I will never claim to know for certain what is going on inside that building, and today I’ll be making an argument for each (healthy) quarterback on the roster to win that job.
Joe Flacco’s argument is probably the most simple and most obvious to the majority of fans. He’s been a professional quarterback for almost as long as the rookies have been alive. He’s a Super Bowl MVP. And he managed to salvage our season two years ago to bring us to the playoffs for just the third time this millennium. He is more accustomed to Kevin Stefanski’s offense than any of the other options we have – for a lot of fans, it would make sense that he’s the guy. With Flacco, we already know what we’re getting. There isn’t much else to be said – he’s a high-floor safety net.
A much more polarizing option is the other veteran (and other Super Bowl champion): Kenny Pickett. Many Browns fans are understandably skeptical of the 27-year-old quarterback – but his lack of success so far should be taken with a grain of salt, considering that he was stuck with Matt Canada calling his plays for the majority of his career. Going into the draft (which was just three years ago), he was a highly touted prospect and had the highest athleticism score of all QBs in his class. He won the Johnny Unitas Golden Arm Award, the very same trophy that rookie Shedeur Sanders has in his home – and was third in Heisman voting just like other rookie Dillon Gabriel. We’ve seen, time and time again, highly-touted prospects who fail in systems that aren’t designed to support them before finding success elsewhere – look no further than Sam Darnold’s breakout campaign last year as an example. As a raw talent, Kenny Pickett does have the physical abilities necessary to become the starter. He spent the past year in Philadelphia watching and learning from the eventual Super Bowl MVP, and that time could have taught him what he needed to know to become a successful quarterback in this league.
Dillon Gabriel is a player who many Browns fans were initially opposed to drafting – but his argument is also fairly strong. According to reports, he was the player that the front office wanted going into the draft. And watching his college career can very easily explain why: he can run a play-action offense and he can win games. Kevin Stefanski taking back the reins to the offense means that play action will once again be a huge part of the game plan – and as Gabriel said in one of his press conferences, he was once the “play action king” of college football. He was 46-17 as a starter in college, culminating in this past season where he led his Oregon team to an undefeated regular season. As I mentioned earlier, he came third in Heisman voting – but he was also the Big 10 offensive player of the year and holds the NCAA record for total touchdowns. He’s also extremely accurate: he had the third-highest completion percentage in FBS last season, behind only Shedeur Sanders and Will Howard. And with the consistent volatility at the left tackle position that our team faces, it helps that he’s a lefty – the majority of pressures will likely be coming straight at him rather than at his blind spot like the other three quarterbacks.
Perhaps the most polarizing of all the quarterbacks, though, is Shedeur Sanders. He is loved by many and is hated by many – but he has a strong case to win the starting job as well. He was largely considered the QB2 going into April’s draft and his draft slide allegedly had nothing to do with his talent. One of the most common arguments for him to start is that he’s deadly accurate: Sanders has the highest career completion percentage in FBS history. Like Kenny Pickett, he won the Golden Arm last season – and he was the Big 12 offensive player of the year. But perhaps the quality that helps his case the most is his ability to escape a collapsing pocket and extend plays. The Cleveland Browns’ O-line play is consistently inconsistent, and Colorado’s pass blocking this past year was consistently bad (he faced pressure on over 40% of his dropbacks last season – 15th most in college football). While he’s great at many things, Shedeur’s proven ability to succeed despite poor line play is what sets him apart from our other three quarterbacks.
While nobody has the job locked up yet, it’s reasonable to assume that the decision will need to be made sooner rather than later. And with all four quarterbacks having strong arguments to win that starting spot, we can certainly expect the next two months to be interesting.
May the best man win.
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