Will the Browns force Shedeur Sanders to join Brady Quinn in this dubious club?

The Cleveland Browns’ lack of success drafting football’s most important position has been well documented over the years.

Since 1999, the Browns have drafted 14 quarterbacks, including current starter Dillon Gabriel in the third and Shedeur Sanders in the fifth this past April. Among them, five first-rounders, one second-rounder, four third-rounders, one fourth-rounder, two fifth-rounders and one sixth-rounder.

None of them had a winning record as starters for the Browns, including Gabriel’s present 1-4 mark to start his career after taking over for departed veteran Joe Flacco, shipped off to the Bengals in a midseason trade.

In the midst of another forgettable season, there is mounting pressure calling for a change that can create some sort of spark on offense. Nevertheless, head coach Kevin Stefanski hastily confirmed Gabriel as the team’s starter moments after their most recent loss, a 32-13 defeat in Foxborough, as the team entered its bye week.

While many could argue that a quarterback swap to Sanders is a matter of when, and not if, there are no indications that Stefanski is willing to cut the cord off Gabriel’s experiment just yet. Last week’s admission that Sanders wasn’t taking any first-team repetitions at practice really seems to confirm that Stefanski is not close to interesting the fifth-rounder anytime soon.

And to top it all off, Sanders was inactive for Sunday’s tilt against the Patriots, with Stefanski choosing Bailey Zappe as the backup, claiming a back injury led to Sanders not dressing up for the game.

All this leads us to ask ourselves: Will Sanders ever get to see the field as a starter in his rookie campaign? If he doesn’t, he’ll be part of a two-member club of dubious reputation.

Out of the 13 quarterbacks drafted before Sanders by the Browns since 1999, all of them except one, received the opportunity to start at least one game as a rookie. The only exception? Brady Quinn, first-round pick in 2017. Quinn eventually started three games in his sophomore season, and ultimately left the franchise with a career record of 3-9.

Heck, even two undrafted rookies were afforded the opportunity to start in their rookie campaigns in Cleveland, albeit under very different circumstances. Thad Lewis started the last game of the 2012 regular season against the Steelers, with Brandon Weeden and Colt McCoy out with injuries, and threw one touchdown and one pick in a 24-10 loss. Two years later, Connor Shaw was called to duty for the last game of that season, against the Ravens, tossing one pick during a 20-10 defeat that led to a 7-9 finish to the year.

Not coincidentally, 2012 and 2014 are the only years since 1999 where Cleveland has started two different rookies in the season, with Weeden/Lewis first, and then Johnny Manziel/Shaw, respectively.

QB	Year	Round/Position	Rookie record	Browns record
Tim Couch	1999	1/1	2-12	22-37
Spergon Wynn	2000	6/183	0-1	0-1
Luke McCown	2004	4/106	0-4	0-4
Charlie Frye	2005	3/67	2-3	6-13
Brady Quinn	2007	1/22	--	3-9
Colt McCoy	2010	3/85	2-6	6-15
Brandon Weeden	2012	1/22	5-10	5-15
Thad Lewis	2012	Undrafted	0-1	0-1
Johnny Manziel	2014	1/22	0-2	2-4
Connor Shaw	2014	Undrafted	0-1	0-1
Cody Kessler	2016	3/93	0-8	0-8
DeShone Kizer	2017	2/52	0-15	0-15
Baker Mayfield	2018	1/1	6-7	29-30
Dorian Thompson-Robinson	2023	5/140	1-2	1-4
Dillon Gabriel	2025	3/94	1-3?	1-3?
Shedeur Sanders	2025	5/144	??	??

So, how long can Stefanski stave off having to bench Gabriel if he doesn’t show improvement? And, will he turn to Zappe before Sanders to lead this offense?

For now, it’s pretty obvious that Stefanski has no plans to start Sanders anytime soon. Will that still be the case if his job is on the line?

At this point, it seems unfathomable to think Gabriel can maintain his job as a starter by playing the way he has over his four first starts. And even if Zappe gets the nod before Sanders, optimism isn’t precisely sky-high there, as well.

Sanders might not get a chance to play soon, but sooner or later, Stefanski and the Browns will have nowhere else to turn but him.