Cleveland Browns Film Room: Did Jadeveon Clowney Play himself out of Cleveland?
The Cleveland Browns enjoyed a strong season from Jadeveon Clowney in 2021, and that may be precisely the reason he ends up playing elsewhere next year.
The first overall pick back in 2014, Clowney entered the league with sky-high expectations, but hasn't quite lived up to them, thanks to injuries and a lack of bend. He's not the type of pass-rusher a team looks for from such a high selection, and has typically been considered an underachiever. He's never logged more than 9.5 sacks in a season, for instance, and he is constantly injured or banged up.
But now Clowney is underrated by many as his impact on the game goes far beyond the stat sheet. He's a terrific run defender, commands plenty of double-team and chip attention, and is just consistently disruptive even if that disruption isn't turning into high sack totals.
Clowney logged zero sacks in eight games with the Tennessee Titans in 2020 before suffering a knee injury that required surgery. He remained on the open market until mid-April, when he signed a one-year deal with the Browns worth just $8 million, with the cap hit spread fairly evenly over two years.
That turned out to be an incredible bargain for Cleveland, as Clowney paired with Myles Garrett to form one of the NFL's most terrifying defensive line duos. He finished with 9 sacks, 19 QB hits, and 11 tackles for loss in 14 games, and Pro Football Focus credited him with 53 pressures on 390 rushes for a solid pressure rate of 13.6%.
He was a very good fit in Joe Woods' defense, moving around the line, rushing opposite of and alongside Garrett, being deployed as a rover and lining up inside, and requiring double-teams on a regular basis. He did deal with some injuries, but was very effective overall, and exactly the player the Browns thought they were getting.
And now, almost a year later, Clowney seems to be moving on, which was always the most likely scenario. His value was at an all-time low following 2020, so he latched on to a presumed Super Bowl contender with an All-World EDGE to take attention away, and his production increased, putting him in a position to cash in this offseason.
The Browns should be armed with a good amount of cap space for this round of free agency, but that money isn't all to be spent. A large portion must be saved for pending contract extensions and cap hit increases, and because of that, the team can't really afford to pay big bucks to an EDGE2, which is what Clowney is.
If he's looking for more than the Browns are willing to pay, the team will need to find a suitable replacement, and unfortunately that most likely means downgrading from Clowney. Potential options include Mario Addision, Jerry Hughes, Justin Houston, Melvin Ingram, Emmanuel Ogbah, Chandler Jones, Haason Reddick, Obo Okoronwko, Kemoko Turay, Lorenzo Carter, and Arden Key, all at varying levels of cost and different projected roles.
The team will almost certainly be taking at least one, probably two EDGES in next month's draft, but it would be best to not have to rely on a rookie to start right away.
While it's disappointing that Jadeveon Clowney most likely won't be back in brown and orange, it was always the expected result, and although the Browns missed the playoffs, both sides got what they were looking for from this partnership, and Clowney now appears poised to finally land a lucrative long-term deal.
