Browns Place Second-Round RFA Tender On S Ronnie Hickman
MARCH 11: Hickman has now officially been tendered, per a team announcement. His Browns tenure will continue for at least one more season.
MARCH 6: Three years ago, the Browns signed safety Ronnie Hickman as an undrafted free agent out of Ohio State. Fast forward three years and Hickman has established himself as a starting safety in Cleveland. With Hickman becoming a restricted free agent this offseason, ESPN’s Jeremy Fowler reports that the Browns plan to place a second-round tender on the 24-year-old safety. 
Restricted free agents are free to negotiate and sign with other teams, but the original team can assign a tender that affects what needs to happen for the restricted free agent to be moved. With a second-round tender, the Browns have committed Hickman to at least a one-year, $5.81MM deal to stay in Cleveland.
Hickman will still be able to negotiate with other teams and potentially get a bigger deal, though. If he does find a better deal, Cleveland will get the option to match the new team’s offer sheet, If the Browns choose not to match the new team’s offer, they will be granted a second-round pick from the new team. As long as the transaction takes place more than two days before the draft, the second-round pick must be exchanged in the same offseason.
Hickman immediately found a role on the Browns as a rookie. His ability to fill in at safety allowed for Grant Delpit to roam around the defense and serve as a bit of a Swiss Army knife. In the two years since, Hickman has established himself as the team’s stalwart in the defensive backfield. His continued constancy as a deep safety in the past two years has helped the Browns defense establish itself as one of the league’s better units.
On fewer rotations in his first two years, Hickman combined for 70 total tackles, an interception, and four passes defensed. In 2025 alone, Hickman’s 103 total tackles was good for third on the team, and he saw career highs in interceptions (2) and passes defensed (7). The second-round tender is a fairly strong endorsement from the Browns who clearly wish to retain their young starting safety moving forward. We’ll now wait to see if any other teams decide to risk their second-round pick for the opportunity to lure Hickman away from Cleveland.
Browns S Ronnie Hickman Could Earn Starting Job
Early this morning, Chris Easterling of the Akron Beacon Journal previewed some opinions of players who could have breakout seasons for the Browns in 2025. One of these players was third-year safety Ronnie Hickman, whom Easterling believes has a chance to lock down a starting job in training camp.
Hickman came to Cleveland as an undrafted free agent out of Ohio State after forgoing his senior season with the Buckeyes. Despite his undrafted status, Hickman made the initial 53-man roster as a rookie and started four games in place of an injured Juan Thornhill late in the year. Last year, Hickman led the Browns in snaps aligned at safety, starting five more games for an injured Thornhill and getting plenty of time on the field in games he didn’t start.
Thornhill is gone now, having departed for Pittsburgh in free agency, so naturally, it seemed like there was going to be an opportunity for Hickman to firmly take the starting job. That was before the team signed two safeties on May 12 with extensive starting experience. Damontae Kazee signed with 63 starts in eight years with the Falcons, Cowboys, and Steelers. He’s also tallied 17 interceptions over that time, including a seven-pick performance that led the league in 2018. Rayshawn Jenkins comes in with 89 starts in eight years with the Chargers, Jaguars, and Seahawks, including five seasons in which he served as a full-time starter.
It would certainly make perfect sense for either veteran to fill in the starting role next to Grant Delpit in the upcoming season, but Hickman comes in with plenty of familiarity of the role, having shared it with Thornhill for much of last year. So far, it seems as if it’s his job to lose, forcing Jenkins and Kazee to beat him out of the spot.
The three other players highlighted by Easterling were wide receiver Kaden Davis, defensive tackle Michael Hall, and defensive end Isaiah McGuire. While Jerry Jeudy is obviously stealing the spotlight at workouts in Cleveland, Davis has been taking advantage of the absences of Cedric Tillman and Michael Woods II, catching the eyes of head coach Kevin Stefanski and wide receivers coach Chad O’Shea. The coaches have praised his work this offseason, and even if Tillman and Woods are back for training camp, the four-man quarterback race should still afford Davis several opportunities to be seen.
Hall’s rookie campaign was limited by a five-game suspension resulting from a domestic violence arrest and injury. As last year’s top draft pick in Cleveland, the Browns will be expecting a big jump for Hall in Year 2, and he should be running in the interior two-deep with rookie No. 5 pick Mason Graham, Maliek Collins, and Shelby Harris. After earning three starts in 16 appearance last year, McGuire is an easy pick to break out. With a strong sample of play in his time last year, the coaching staff thinks “very highly” of McGuire entering training camp, and he could end up with a starting job.
Browns Sign 9 UDFAs
With rookie minicamps taking place this weekend, many teams which have not already done so have unveiled their undrafted free agent classes. Here is the breakdown of the rookies who will look to make the Browns’ 90-man roster:
- CB Caleb Biggers (Boise State)
- LB Mohamoud Diabate (Utah)
- TE Thomas Greaney (Albany)
- RB Hassan Hall (Georgia Tech)
- S Ronnie Hickman (Ohio State)
- DE Jeremiah Martin (Washington)
- S Tanner McCalister (Ohio State)
- DE Lonnie Phelps (Kansas)
- LB Charlie Thomas III (Georgia Tech)
The Browns have made a pair of sizeable financial commitments out of this group. One is to Diabate, whom Tom Pelissero of NFL Network tweets will receive $250K in guaranteed money. That figure ranks amongst the highest handed out in 2023, and will raise expectations for the Utah product in training camp. Diabate spent his first three seasons at Florida, but his most productive pass-rushing campaign came in 2022 with the Utes. He totaled five sacks and 13.5 tackles for loss in 12 games.
Cleveland also earmarked $250K in guarantees for Phelps, per Aaron Wilson of KPRC2 (Twitter link). The 6-3, 244-pounder put up big numbers in his final season at Miami (Ohio) in 2021, then transferred to Kansas. The step up in competition resulted in a new career high in tackles (57), along with another notable campaign in terms of sacks (seven) and tackles for loss (11.5). Phelps, along with Diabate, will look to give the team added depth in the front seven, a spot which has been a point of emphasis during the offseason.
Greaney put himself on the NFL radar with a career year in 2022. The 6-6, 249-pounder posted a 50-693-9 statline in 11 contests last year, helping earn him FCS second-team All-American honors. The Browns have David Njoku at the top of their TE depth chart, but they have been relatively quiet on the free agent front in adding backups behind him. They also elected not to draft a tight end, which could give Greaney an opportunity to push for a roster spot during the summer.