Shedeur Sanders seemed to be on his way toward a significant feat. He was on the verge of being named a day one starter for an NFL team, which hasn't happened for a former Colorado Buffaloes quarterback in decades.
On Monday, Cleveland Browns head coach Todd Monken announced that Deshaun Watson would be the starting quarterback to begin the season. This wasn’t simply an unpopular opinion that some fans would dislike, it was the one decision they could not afford to make.
Watson's contract is without question one of the worst in professional sports history. The new QB1 looked objectively bad vs against the Bears and Bills during the preseason. Watson's post-game press conference where he decided to drag the fans, it felt like his time was up in Cleveland and Sanders was sliding in. How wrong everyone was. Watson has 19 starts out of a possible 68 games.
Watson, throughout the training camp portion of the offseason, was 227 of 345 with 24 touchdowns and 11 interceptions. Conversely, Shedeur Sanders was 228 of 327 with 19 touchdowns and only 4 interceptions. Sanders had one more completion than Watson despite 18 less pass attempts, with Sanders throwing 64% fewer interceptions.
Even the eye test does not support Watson. Fair or unfair, the team plays better with Sanders. Especially this offseason as he has shown significant improvements in areas of concern. To put it simply, Sanders is progressing in the right direction, and Watson is regressing in the wrong direction.
The biggest problem virtually every new coach faces, especially when the team has been consistently bad for a long period of time, is to ignore anything that happened before they arrived. It’s a nice idea that simply does not work. Monken may not care about the previous four years with Watson, but he needs to.
Watson’s issues are not coaching specific. Monken entered this job with goodwill from the fans that had not been present for some time. Most of which came from his ‘no nonsense’ approach as well as a clear indication that he would not put Sanders on the ‘back burner'. Monken’s own words on this subject are going to come back to haunt him.
Many national pundits who have very little context for the landscape in Cleveland chose to believe Watson should be the front-runner due to the size of his contract. Which is a lazy and safe take. It’s what one says when they have very little pertinent information. Like many other takes, it lacks context and comes from an antiquated logic.
The money is a driving force in the first three years of a five-year deal. In year five, that money, which is fully guaranteed, is no longer an acceptable excuse. They were going to pay that money no matter what. It’s not like the money spent is less if he’s good. Which he hasn’t been for six years.
The Watson of old is not coming back. He acknowledged that himself last week. Why not make a brand move and grow Sanders' career? However, the decision to start Watson wasn't made on a whim. This wasn’t even an army of Sanders fans stuffing the proverbial ballot box. The notion of no more Watson is an idea that is held by more than 80% of the fanbase. As reactions have poured in, it also seems to be the opinions of most football analysts and former players.
“Pathetic. They boo him because he’s an avatar for the worst trade in NFL history, the worst contract in NFL history," said Kevin Clark via ESPN. "The Browns fans have seen a lot of bad quarterback play, and even in that context, he’s among the worst. For the starting job, I would have gone Shedeur first, trade for someone second, third would be Dillon Gabriel, fourth would be Dan Orlavski (retired), fifth would be Bernie Kosar (retired for 30 years), and last would be Deshaun Watson. I don’t know how you face this fanbase and say this is the quarterback you deserve.”
People do not need to be Shedeur Sanders fans to be outraged. The concern around this decision began long before Sanders was drafted. To be fair, the concerns regarding this decision started to build roughly around the time Shedeur was born.
The cycle of quarterback decisions based on the wrong factors must be broken. The entire team is an exercise in getting younger. Trading away Myles Garrett for Jared Verse is just that.
Loyalty is a badge of honor that most Browns fans wear. A personal seat license waiting list that is over 25 years old, a stadium that is almost always sold out, consistent performers in merchandise sales. All of it has been a sign of the Cleveland fans’ willingness to show loyalty despite 30 years of football ineptitude.
When the same approach has rendered awful results, it's time to start doing something else. That something else, might start with basing decisions on football criteria. Not a contract, not years of service and certainly not from some sense of fear that forces coaches to think like they did decades ago.
Nothing about the Watson decision feels born of football reasons. If it had, Monken would have announced Sanders as the starter weeks ago and Watson never would have been a realistic option.
For now, Sanders fans will wait to see him spark up excitement again. Colorado fans who follow the NFL will wait another year for a good QB to be named starter for the season.
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