The Cleveland Browns could soon have to make an interesting quarterback decision.
Dillon Gabriel is still the starting quarterback, but fans have called for Shedeur Sanders to start games. Yet, Deshaun Watson is inching closer to a return, as he could have his practice window activated in the coming weeks.
However, even if Watson is healthy, Browns insider Ken Carman doesn’t think the veteran will start or play in any games this season.
“I’m ready for someone new. I’m ready for name whoever it is,” Carman said on 92.3 The Fan. “As this season goes, I’m ready for Shedeur. I don’t have very much belief that Deshaun Watson will get his career restarted anywhere else, and even if he does, fine. The fans don’t like him here; this has been a nasty chapter in our history here. I’m getting Facebook invites for when the guy gets cut, for crying out loud.
“They don’t want him out there. If I’m looking at it from a football sense and I’m just a football coach, yeah, of course, what Albert Breer says is true. But, I’m not; I talk to fans every single day of my life. And, they don’t want him out there. The ones who do have just given up. You are curious to see Shedeur.”
Carman believes Watson’s time with the Browns was a failure, and he shouldn’t play another game for the team, even if he is healthy.
Instead, the Browns insider thinks Cleveland should stick with Gabriel and start Sanders later on in the season before finding a franchise quarterback in the offseason.
Although Carman doesn’t want to see Watson play for the Browns, the veteran quarterback is closing in on a return.
Watson has been showing videos of himself training, and Cleveland could activate his 21-day practice window very soon, according to insider Mary Kay Cabot.
“Deshaun Watson continues to make excellent progress in his comeback from a re-ruptured Achilles, but the Browns aren’t opening his 21-day practice window this week,” Cabot said, citing a league source. “The Browns will wait at least until least Week 12 against the Raiders to designate Watson for return from reserve/Physically Unable to Perform. They expect to have more clarity on his timeframe over the next couple of weeks.”
However, Browns head coach Kevin Stefanski said on Monday that he wasn’t sure what the plan for Watson is.
“I’m not sure if that’s what we’re doing,” Stefanski said.
Watson has been out for more than a year due to an Achilles injury. He had a setback in January, which resulted in a second surgery.
As Cleveland was searching for their franchise quarterback, the team made a bold move to acquire Watson from the Houston Texans.
The Browns acquired Watson in a package that included three first-round picks. Cleveland then signed Watson to a $230 million contract that was fully guaranteed.
Due to his poor play and injuries, the trade hasn’t worked out, and before the season, Browns co-owner Jimmy Haslam called the trade a big swing-and-miss.
“We took a big swing-and-miss with Deshaun,” Haslam said. “We thought we had the quarterback; we didn’t. And we gave up a lot of draft picks to get him, so we’ve got to dig ourselves out of that hole. … (The trade) was an entire organization decision and it ends with Dee (Haslam) and I, so hold us accountable.”
Watson went 9-10 as the starting quarterback for the Browns.
Kansas City Chiefs quarterback Gardner Minshew is in a situation he hasn’t been in too often, given how his NFL career has played out.
Often in quarterback battles in preseason, going back to his Jacksonville Jaguars days in 2019 and 2020, along with stints with the Indianapolis Colts and the Las Vegas Raiders last year, Minshew has always been in with a shot at playing in the regular season.
But now, coming to a franchise that has Patrick Mahomes as its quarterback, Minshew isn’t about to beat out No. 15 for the starting role. So his position is a little different from what he is used to.
So, how does he approach it?
“Just the same,” Minshew said. “Every day you’re out here to get better, you know? It’s for the coaches to do the competition, for them to take stats and figure out. For us, for me, it’s just getting out there and getting better with every rep, trying to learn, not make the same mistakes, and push myself in the ways that the coaches are asking me to push myself.”
So Minshew’s approach doesn’t change, and he got some nice work in the 20-17 preseason loss to the Arizona Cardinals, going six for nine for 54 yards, while he also rushed for a touchdown before being asked to take a seat.
It is all a learning process, and Minshew isn’t in a battle with Mahomes for the starting role; he’s in a battle with himself to get better every day so that, in the event he is needed at some point in the regular season, he can operate Andy Reid’s offense well enough.
Minshew feels content where he is right now, and when you have the best head coach/quarterback duo to learn from, it makes it that much easier to love what you’re doing.