Shedeur Sanders earns the right to start for the Cleveland Browns

LAS VEGAS — Shedeur Sanders has earned the right to be given a fair opportunity. He’s earned the right to finish out the season as the Cleveland Browns‘ starting quarterback.

He earned that right with a solid performance on Sunday against the Las Vegas Raiders. Yes, the Raiders are a struggling team, but so are the Browns. Hence, Sunday’s game was a battle of equals and the Browns prevailed 24-10. Sanders became the first Browns quarterback since 1995 to win a game in his first start.

Sanders completed 11 of 20 passes for 209 yards and threw a touchdown and an interception, but his performance went beyond pure statistics. Sanders provided hope for a beleaguered fan base, not just hype. You saw it on the Browns’ sideline in the first quarter after Sanders rolled out, avoided a tackler, and completed a 52-yard pass to fellow rookie Quinshon Judkins. The Browns scored two plays later.

A series later, Sanders was intercepted when he tried to thread the needle between two defenders but didn’t see a third. That happens to veterans and nearly always happens to rookies. But he shook it off, and on the next series Sanders rolled out and completed a 39-yard pass to Jerry Jeudy (who fumbled on the play). Finally, Sanders threw his first regular-season NFL touchdown when he connected with rookie Dylan Sampson on a 66-yard catch-and-run.

Head coach Kevin Stefanski was grilled about Sanders’ immediate status and sidestepped what will surely be a hot-button topic in the next 48 hours. But if he and Browns general manager Andrew Berry are reading the room correctly, they’ll acknowledge the hue and cry for Sanders and make him the starter.

Dillon Gabriel remains in concussion protocol, and the unofficial rule is that players do not lose their jobs because of injury. But the Browns as a franchise have been in concussion protocol for several seasons, and Sanders provides a commodity that has been in short supply in Cleveland.

He provides hope — and bravado. At the conclusion of a pregame interview on Sunday, when Sanders was asked what he hoped to show teammates and Browns fans with his performance, he said: “That I’m who they’ve been looking for.” That’s plausible, but the Browns won’t know until they give Sanders a fair opportunity.

What the Browns do know, or at least suspect, is that Gabriel likely is not the answer.

Last month, the Browns traded veteran quarterback Joe Flacco to the Bengals and named Gabriel, a rookie selected in the third round of the 2025 NFL draft, the starter. Truth is, the ever-efficient Gabriel was probably more prepared to start at that point in time than Sanders.

Gabriel would not provide a lot of high highs, but he would also avoid low lows because he was not trying to be spectacular or prove himself to the world. He would simply take what the defense gave — no more, no less. But Gabriel would also not provide the magic of a spark. In Gabriel’s six starts, the Browns went 1-5 and failed to complete a pass longer than 35 yards.

Gabriel proved that he is capable of simply holding the line, not capable of producing magic, and what the Browns’ franchise needs now is magic.

What Browns fans caught a glimpse of on Sunday is that a maturing Sanders, given the chance, can provide this Browns team with a much-needed spark.

When he met with reporters after Sunday’s game, Sanders repeated the me-against-the-world mantra that perhaps has been the driving force since he was overlooked in the draft and began his professional career fourth on the Browns’ depth chart.

“A lot of people want to see me fail and it ain’t gonna happen,” he said. “It ain’t gonna happen.”

On the other hand, a lot of people want Sanders to succeed. Stefanski may be one of them.

Stefanski understandably would not on the spot concede that Sanders has earned another start. “I’m not gonna get into that,” he said. “Obviously, I’m proud of him, proud of the offense. There’s a ton of things to learn from it. I’m just gonna worry about today.”

But for Stefanski, the two-time NFL Coach of The Year, this is a situation where he can exercise wisdom and discernment and make the right call, the obvious call.

There is an unwritten rule that players do not lose their job due to injury. There is an equally unwritten law of the jungle that if the replacement can save a beleaguered coach’s job, he keeps playing.

Maybe Sanders is the long-term answer. Maybe he is not. But Sanders can provide excitement in the here and now.

What’s becoming apparent is that Sanders has grown to understand that he does not have to be the hero that saves the Cleveland Browns, a franchise that has been around since 1946.

While “humble” may not be a word that aptly describes Sanders, he has become increasingly circumspect.

“Being a backup and everything, sometimes you have to compromise your personality and change how you do things to never step on anybody’s toes,” he said. “So the fact that I got the opportunity and I was able to show the organization, show everybody who I really am, that was truly exciting.’’

Sanders has mentioned on a couple of occasions that one of his goals is to revitalize the Browns’ losing culture, and that the team’s rookies will be the agents of change. After Sunday’s game, he talked about his efforts along with fellow rookies to change the Browns’ culture.

“It’s extremely special, we definitely want to come in and create change,” he said. “We have those conversations. We talk about what we’ve got to do and be proactive, not reactive. We got to bring the energy sometimes. I’m not saying the vets don’t, but it’s just on the offensive side of the ball we struggle sometimes, so we need somebody to be that match. We need somebody to be that light.”

It’s great to have those save-the-world-aspirations, but Sanders is also beginning to understand that he cannot save the franchise on every play, and that the Browns have a world-class defense and a generational defensive player in Myles Garrett (who is frequently heroic).

The defense doesn’t need Sanders to be a hero. It needs him to do what he did on Sunday: make enough plays, provide some magic, and don’t put the defense behind the eight ball with careless throws, interceptions and bad sacks.

Fans and coaches saw that growth on Sunday when Sanders was tempted to hold onto the ball and try to make something happen when nothing was available. In a couple of instances, he simply took a check-down pass and lived for the next play.

What Sanders showed on Sunday is that he is capable of making the big play.

It’s admirable that the 23-year-old rookie wants to save the Browns. The larger question is whether the Browns’ leadership wants to be saved. We’ll know that in the next couple of days when the team announces which quarterback will finish out the last few weeks of the season.

What the team needs now is magic and a spark of hope. Sanders can be the magician, but he does not have to be the hero.

The Browns have made some awful decisions around their quarterback position, whether it was giving Deshaun Watson a king’s ransom to come to Cleveland or trading away Flacco. The organization has an opportunity to make the wise choice by giving Sanders the opportunity he so richly has earned.

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