Shedeur Sanders made his first career start yesterday. His ascension to the top of the depth chart was made out of necessity, but his second start will come by way of a coaching decision. 
[RELATED: GM Andrew Berry, HC Kevin Stefanski On Hot Seat?]
Kevin Stefanski said on Monday that Dillon Gabriel has cleared concussion protocol. Nevertheless, the Browns will give the nod once again to Sanders in Week 13. Cleveland won 24-10 in Vegas yesterday, and the team will give its fifth-round rookie at least one more look as a result.
“The number one job of a quarterback is to win,” Stefanski said (via ESPN’s Daniel Oyefusi). “So, excited to get that first win under his belt. And the next thing is improvement, and that’s what young players do… You get one game better, and that’s just from working at it. So, that’ll be our focus.”
Gabriel’s concussion left him sidelined for Week 12, ending a run of five consecutive starts. The third-rounder was limited to the first half of the Browns’ game against the Ravens the previous week. That allowed Sanders to finish the contest in his place. During that time, Sanders completed just four of 16 pass attempts while being intercepted once and sacked twice.
A full week of practice with the starting offense – a first in Sanders’ case given Cleveland’s logjam at quarterback through training camp and the start of the season – resulted in increased expectations for his first career start. The Colorado product had an up-and-down day highlighted on one hand by a 52-yard completion to Isaiah Bond and on the other hand by an avoidable interception. Overall, Sanders went 11-for-2o passing for 209 yards, one touchdown and one pick.
Improvement on those numbers will obviously be a goal moving forward, and future opponents will in many cases prove to be more challenging than the Raiders. Cleveland’s next game will be at home against San Francisco. Sanders and the Browns will look to build off the momentum from yesterday’s contest in Week 13 and moving forward.
When asked if this is a permanent decision, Stefanski said his attention is only focused on this week. As a result, the door could be open to Dillon – who has posted only a 5.1 yards per attempt average while completing just 59.2% of his passes – returning to the QB1 spot. Much will of course depend on how Sanders fares this coming Sunday. A win against the 49ers would make him the first rookie Browns passer since Bernie Kosar in 1985 to begin a career 2-0.
The Sanders family is the Kardashian family of football.
The Sanders family has at least one really talented person in it, which is more than you can say for the Kardashians.
Fair enough point on talent.
Hahaahhah
There was a pretty talented father who dragged the rest of them to unfortunate fame through generational wealth acquisition, opening the floodgates for a sea of public drama and accusations of opportunistic nepotism.
Wait, which ones was I talking about again?
Mannings?
Getting rich with no discernible skills is a talent, no?
I said it when it happened: this guy is going to be the biggest steal of the draft. He’s already starting and performed reasonably well, even for a rookie. When he matures he has a good chance of being very very good.
“biggest steal of the draft”??
You must have missed it? The only things he mentioned in his post game interview were HIMSELF and god. There’s no “I” in team!
The number of NFL fans who desperately want Sanders to fail is truly mind boggling.
The number of Sanders fans that have no reading comprehension is mind boggling. Nobody desperately wants him to fail. We just realize he’s not that good and is more concerned about himself and his image than carrying a team.
Ah, another pro scout surfing the Internet.
Not a fan of Sanders, but I prefer to see how he actually plays before getting all pissy about the stuff he says.
@BaseballFan12: “Nobody desperately wants him to fail.”
This is 1000% false. Any time Shadeur missteps, it’s like Christmas morning to some people. The glee people take in this dude even throwing an incompletion is insane. It’s worse than even Tebow. I’m not a Shadeur fan at all but the hate he gets is off the charts. Some of that he’s brought on himself and some of it is something else.
I must have missed where interviews were a stat lmao
“Sanders performed reasonably well on the field”
“DiD u SeE hIs InTeRvIeW?!?!?”
Lmao another miserable person that can’t stand Shedeur finding success for whatever reason.
There may not be an “I” in team, but there is a “me”; there is also “tea”. But, I digress.
He is young, he just got his first professional win, and we’re really going to dissect his post game interview now? He was clearly excited and happy about the results. I don’t think anyone in the Cleveland locker room is thinking about a post game interview a rookie QB just gave.
They asked him questions about himself in the interview. He’s gonna answer with I
I hope you are right and it’s a matter of when and not if he matures. I agree, he played well enough for the next start. Rest of the team there is a mess, coach will get fired after this year and the skill players on offense not great outside of Judkins. So, it will be impressive if he continues to do well and improve. I think that part gets lost, everyone saying it was the Raiders but he is also playing for a poorly run Browns team, so he’s overcoming that too. **Before anyone attacks me, this is no glazing, no hate. Just observation from a neutral football fan.
Don’t look back Shedeur….the QB job is yours for the taking 👍🏼Let’s go Browns
They should let him run with the starting job the rest of the way, but I’m of the opinion that Stefanski is going to be quick to sit him. If he does, Stefanski should be immediately fired, too.
Kevin will let him play as long as he’s improving. Kevin really likes his young QB’S and wants them to succeed. If he continues to improve, Dillon won’t replace him …
well sanders didn’t look good against a bad team . his highlights were only check downs and wide open throws . that tells u right there he didn’t show anything great . I mean the entire game he looked avg against a bad team . I wanna see him play a good team and then we can see how good he is and then I’d need a larger sample size to get a good idea but I honestly think he’s all hype I never saw anything great about him in college
He plays well against a good team you’ll just move the goal post and find weird reasons and make excuses to down play his performance.
“Oh his team played a good game but Shedeur held them back”
“Oh he has good field position all game”
You’re gonna hate on him regardless and that’s just a sad existence to actively hope root and want to see him fail
His 66.7% accurate-pass rate ranked seventh among quarterbacks in Week 12, and when paired with an official average depth of target of 9.4 yards — the sixth-highest of the week Sanders performed better than people think he did.
You’re being unreasonably emotional. I get that, past the jokes, some people are unreasonably critical of Sanders’ play, but that’s not happening here. Kevin’s post was not insulting or over the line. He is talking purely about his impressions of Sanders’ play. I think it’s fair to say that we all should see more before making up our minds, which is similar to his final thought above. It seems reasonable, and nobody is necessarily beholden to be impressed by any player.
If you offered counter-analysis without predictive and unverifiable personal attacks, you would not be receiving the response that you’re getting. This isn’t about a greater “Sanders versus the haters” argument right now, this is about how you are responding to specific posts in specific situations. Consider that whatever valid points that you may have will inevitably be lost in how you’ve delivered them.
Emotional cause I’m pointing out people like Kevin T will always move goal posts when it comes to Sanders? Yeah, no.
He already moved the goal posts downplaying how Sanders played against the Raiders (apparently Kevins expectation was peak Brady in Sanders first start ever) in his comment above lmao. And he’s suddenly gonna not move them again if he plays well against a better team?
People like Kevin live in a damn if they do damn if they don’t mentality where nothing Sanders does is gonna make him like or root for Sanders to succeed. And that’s sad
Well he certainly has improved and he looked fine. Better then Dillon did against the Jets. Shedeur hit those deep throws, Dillon did not …
The Raiders are bad mostly because of their offense. Sanders played against their 15th ranked defense. You can say that the Browns defense isn’t as good as they looked because they were going up against a terrible offensive line
I not a Sanders fan nor hater. I am a Browns fan. What I saw was a rookie making his first start who made a handful of really good plays but looked like a rookie the rest of the time. He made significant progress with his pocket presence. He found a way to get the ball downfield when the play broke down.
I’m not ready to annoint him the GOAT, but he played well IMO. Let’s hope he progresses.
Get out of here. You’re being too reasonable.
At the very least, Sanders currently holds the best winning percentage by a starting QB in NFL history…
Him becoming the guy would still be funny that the browns used a 3rd round pick on a backup qb instead of signing a veteran backup and drafting a good player of need at another position who could start.
The Browns traded for Pickett and signed Flacco PRIOR to drafting either rookie QB….Gabriel was drafted to be a bridge QB and Sanders the developmental QB…
I thought the same thing during the draft. If you were interested in Shadeur and had a need for QB, taking Gabriel first (who no one rated above Sanders) was a wasted pick, and will only create more drama next offseaon. They may need to trade one of them off the team and bring in a veteran backup for some stability. Of course, if the current regime stays, they’ll mess that up, too.
“no one rated above Sanders”…wrong, or at least “unknowable”. 32 teams passed on Sanders at least 4 times. Who knows if anyone would have taken Gabriel had the Browns passed?
Why is that funny? Teams swing and miss on QBs all the time. Maybe it was a smart contingency plan?
It would be a wasted 3rd round pick that could’ve gotten a good player who could start or at least play part time at a different position of need. Washington took 2 qbs in rg3 and Cousins in the same draft too, and won nothing with either of them, just like the browns won’t win anything with Gabriel or Sanders.
You posted the same thing about Brady in 2000. I remember
Different person. Wasn’t even school age back then.
Right call. You’ve seen what Gabriel can do and it isn’t much. Might as well see what Sanders has rest of the season so you know which direction to go heading into the off season.
If Cleveland decides to draft a QB next year
Colts should trade for Sanders if Jones becomes too pricey
Cardinals should as well if the Murray era is over
Vikings if JJ really isn’t the guy
Jets definitely should take a chance
Steelers to sit behind Rodgers for a year if they opt to bring him back
Rams as the heir to Stafford
He completed 11 passes against the worst team in the league, let’s pump the brakes a bit.
Guess drops and receivers not catching catchable balls don’t exist in your world suddenly when it comes to Shedeur
There’s a reason his actual completion percentage should have been 66% if guys didn’t drop balls and miss catchable passes which was top 10 this week but go on. Dont let facts get in the way.
Imagine if they’d have drafted a WR with one of those two QB picks…
And/or an OT.
All true, and Gabriel and Flacco suffered the same lack of support.
But the 15th ranked defense. Sanders doesn’t play against the Raiders offense. Of course you may know that
Browns aren’t trading Sanders…..
They draft a QB next year they’re not gonna keep new 1st round QB, Gabriel, and Sanders and deal with that circus. They’ll trade Sanders if they draft a 1st round QB
Same reason Patriots traded away Milton this off season to the Cowboys. They didn’t want the distraction to affect Mayes growth in the event he struggled and fans media calling for Milton.