The Cleveland Browns’ quarterback battle between Shedeur Sanders and Deshaun Watson is the story of the offseason and is the most intriguing QB competition in the NFL at the moment. It’s rare to see a QB battle between two household names, and hopefully this is Cleveland’s last quarterback controversy for many years.
It’s tough to gauge the temperature in the room and figure out which way the coaching staff is leaning since it feels as if this has been a true back-and-forth battle thus far. Sanders reportedly closed the gap with his recent performances in OTAs, which could be why Todd Monken still hasn’t made a decision on a starter.
In a QB competition this high profile, everybody is going to have an opinion, and that includes Browns legends Joe Haden. In a recent episode of Deebo & Joe, Haden made a strong claim about Shedeur Sanders and said that he should have been the 2nd overall pick in the draft.
“I want to start Shedeur Sanders. I think we should give him the keys. I think that if we started him right now, we’re going to at least know, I believe that he should’ve been the second overall pick,” said Haden.
Haden recently said something similar and voiced his support for Sanders but admitted that Watson will likely start due to ownership’s desire to finally get some value out of his contract. In this episode of his podcast, he said that money is gone and it’s not worth wasting Sanders’ potential to go back to the Watson well.
It’s likely that the true franchise quarterback is waiting in the 2027 draft, but Sanders still has plenty of untapped potential. If there is still even a slight chance he can be the guy, the Browns need to find out this season whether or not he is worth another shot in 2027 as well.
The longer this goes on, the more people are going to chime in and give their input. It’s an important decision that Monken needs to get right, and surely he’d love to get this resolved well ahead of Week 1.
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