With the 144th overall pick in the fifth round of the 2025 draft, the Cleveland Browns ended Shedeur Sanders’ precipitous slide down the board, and gave him an NFL home.
This was not at all what anybody outside the league expected. Based on Sanders’ tape alone, he looked like a second-round talent, which – based on quarterback prospects over time – could have shoved him into the first round, given the importance of the position.
Instead, Sanders had to wait and wait and wait, and everybody watching on ESPN or the NFL Network had to wade through an intolerable level of Sanders discussion, while dozens of deserving prospects had their own stories overshadowed. ESPN’s Mel Kiper Jr, one of the industry’s most-respected draft analysts, was particularly strident in his arguments that the NFL had no idea what it was doing by letting Sanders go undrafted for so long.
Beyond the morning show-level “dialogue” is the specter of Sanders’ value to the NFL, and how he overcomes this embarrassment. The 23-year-old is certainly not the first quarterback to be drafted far below what his talent would indicate, but the reported issues that he brings to the league, if true, would explain a lot.
“At the [scouting] combine, it is now well documented some of his formal interviews did not go well,” NFL Network insider Tom Pellissero said of Sanders’ meetings with teams in the lead-up to the draft. “One assistant coach told me in all his years, it was the worst formal interview he’d ever been through. People said that Shadeur was trying to dictate how he wanted things to go, and made them feel small.”
Other insiders reported that when NFL coaches asked the quarterback to show his work on schematic packages he’d been given and subsequently asked to explain in the room, Sanders was unable to do it, and the sense was that this was not about a lack of processing ability. Sanders simply didn’t do the work.
Now, if Sanders is to transcend what has been done to his reputation in the court of public opinion – and it should be said that figures such as Jerry Jones and Sean Payton were willing to go on the record to defend Sanders’s character – he has plenty of work to do. The Browns had already selected Oregon quarterback Dillon Gabriel in the third round, and Gabriel – who set the FBS record for total touchdowns in his estimable collegiate tenure – will not be an easy guy to beat.
Last season, Gabriel was among college football’s most efficient quarterbacks when throwing deep, when pressured, and when going through the receiver progressions every NFL quarterback must master. Were Gabriel not a smaller (5ft 11in, 205lb) quarterback, a lefty, and 24 years old, Sanders as a backup and Gabriel as the starter probably wouldn’t be a discussion. Sanders will also have to compete with veterans Kenny Pickett and Joe Flacco for the starting job in Cleveland.
Beyond the off-field stuff, Sanders’ adjustments to the NFL will be interesting. Sanders did what he did in 2024 behind perhaps the NCAA’s worst offensive line, which is the main reason he was sacked 40 times and pressured 204 times on his 563 dropbacks. And he was pretty good himself under pressure – per Pro Football Focus, Sanders completed 76 of 138 passes when disrupted for 1,117 yards, 12 touchdowns, five interceptions, and a passer rating of 95.6.
The two quarterbacks selected in the first round, Miami’s Cam Ward (first overall by the Tennessee Titans) and Ole Miss’s Jaxson Dart (25th overall to the New York Giants) had passer ratings under pressure of 88.7 and 83.9, respectively.
Colorado’s offense also did not give Sanders the benefit of enough of the concepts far more familiar to NFL quarterbacks, like play-action, designed pocket movement, pre-snap motion, and advanced route concepts designed to give the quarterback easier openings.
In one way, that gives Sanders an edge – schematically, he was swinging a weighted bat at Colorado, and now, that burden is relieved to a certain extent. But adjusting to the offense put forth by Browns head coach and offensive shot-caller Kevin Stefanski, which is filled with those positive constructs, will take more than a minute. And the history of college quarterbacks converting from simple spread-out offenses to the dimensional complexity of the NFL is not a favorable one.
There’s also the fact that Sanders’ coaches will have to be completely bought into the idea of his presence on the roster. This could be fractious. Haslam strong-armed former Browns general manager Ray Farmer back in 2014 to pick all-time draft bust quarterback Johnny Manziel with the 22nd overall pick in the first round of that draft, and led the charge for the Deshaun Watson trade and subsequent contract in 2022, which ultimately combined to form perhaps the worst deal in sports history. If things are no different now, that’s not good for anybody involved.
“We felt like he was a good solid prospect at the most important position,” Browns general manager Andrew Berry said of Sanders soon after the pick was made. “We felt like it got to a point where he was probably mispriced relative to the draft; really the acquisition cost was pretty light. And it’s a guy that we think can outproduce his draft slot.
“I wouldn’t say it’s any more than that. Shadeur has kind of grown up in the spotlight. But our expectation is for him to come in here and work and compete.Nothing’s been promised; nothing will be given. So I may hesitate to characterize it as a blockbuster – that’s not necessarily how we thought of the transaction. But we are excited to work with him.”
Ergo, the Browns are already hedging their bets and hoping that the spotlight that will come with the pick of Sanders doesn’t outweigh the actual football stuff.
Sanders became a college star by turning around – along with his father, Hall of Famer Deion Sanders, and brilliant teammate Travis Hunter – a formerly destitute program in Colorado, and his slide in the draft was the perfect drama for every talking head in the world. But now, with minicamp workouts starting sooner than later (the Browns’ first minicamp begins on 27 May), Sanders’ story now must be all about the tough, grueling work, and adhering to a system as opposed to calling the shots.
From the first playbook installation to the crucible of the preseason, Sanders has mere months to make his point before the regular season starts in early September. He has already shown the toughness and grit to make that happen, but as to the ability to work in an environment where neither he nor his father are the alphas in the equation, the jury is still out.
It’s crude to encourage Sanders to be “humbled” by this experience; that’s not what it’s all about. But if this experience provided a reality check for Sanders, letting him know in uncertain terms that the path to NFL success can be littered with obstacles (both external and self-inflicted), that may not be the worst thing in the world.
