Shedeur Sanders’ second preseason outing was nothing short of brutal. After a promising debut against the Eagles in Week 1, in which he scored two touchdowns, the rookie quarterback spent most of his second game against the Rams in Week 3 running for his life, thanks to a leaky offensive line that collapsed almost immediately on every snap.
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Sanders attempted just six passes, completing three for 14 yards, while being sacked five times for a loss of 41 yards. By the time he left the field, the Browns had netted -27 total yards of offense with him under center. Simply put, his last chance to impress head coach Kevin Stefanski before the regular season began couldn’t have gone worse.
So, how did the Colorado product find himself in this position? Part of the problem was that Sanders wasn’t playing behind Cleveland’s starters. Instead, he was left with a patchwork unit of backup linemen, many of whom will not make the final roster.
The result evidently was ugly: constant pressure, no clean pockets, and a quarterback forced to drift back and hold the ball longer than he should. Even Sanders’ one near-highlight, a scramble where he dodged two rushers before nearly connecting with Trayveon Williams, ended incomplete.
But amidst this poor run of play from the Browns’ O-Line and Sanders not releasing the ball quickly, the telling eyebrow-raiser came from HC Stefanski.
With just over two minutes to go and the Browns needing a drive, the Browns honcho yanked Sanders and inserted QB5 Tyler Huntley. Huntley then led the Browns to a game-winning field goal, but for Coach Prime’s son, it was a lost chance to show he could operate in a two-minute drill, the exact situation every young quarterback needs to prove himself.
“I didn’t know I was out,” Shedeur Sanders admitted afterwards. “I was powering up for that two-minute drive, because that’s just the situation that every quarterback dreams for.”
Naturally, the above-mentioned chain of events didn’t sit well with NFL veterans watching from the outside. Former Pro Bowler wideout TJ Houshmandzadeh, for instance, was blunt. He accused the Browns of setting Sanders up to fail:
“From my assessment, they don’t want a controversy,” the ex-NFL WR said on Nightcap. “Why does Flacco start the game? We know what he can do. He led y’all to the playoffs the last time y’all let him play. So if you’re trying to figure out who you gonna play in case Flacco gets hurt, Dillon Gabriel, Shedeur, you let them split the game. You let them battle it out.”
Instead, Sanders got buried behind fringe players who, as Houshmandzadeh pointed out, were never going to make the roster.
“Everybody Shedeur played with, they get cut tomorrow,” the veteran added. “And so you didn’t give this man a fighting chance to compete. He went into a gunfight with two knives. He gonna lose that every time.”
NEW: Former #NFL Stars T. J. Houshmandzadeh, @ochocinco, and @ShannonSharpe CALL OUT Kevin Stefanski for rigging things to make #DillionGabriel look better while #ShedeurSanders played with players who are all going to be cut to ensure “no controversy” on the backup #Browns pic.twitter.com/OtMQEJou4g
— The Ball Out (@theballoutmedia) August 24, 2025
Even seasoned analyst Skip Bayless had a similar take on the situation:
“They sabotaged it, they rigged it against him today, putting him in with third and fourth-stringers, fifth-stringers, you got no shot at quarterback”.
It’s a scathing assessment, but one hard to dispute given the circumstances. Whether by design or by mistake, the reality is that the Browns didn’t give their rookie quarterback much of a platform to compete.
And for a player already under the microscope after his dramatic draft fall, every lost chance feels magnified. Safe to say, it will be interesting to see how Sanders’ rookie NFL season will play out.
Will he work his way up as the starter? Or is a trade on the cards? Lots of questions and equally intriguing answers lie ahead.
