The reality has hit 40-year-old Joe Flacco hard, and the winless record for the Cleveland Browns heading into Week 3 is posing big questions, including that of Shedeur Sanders. It is hard to miss the irony that, despite being at the bottom of his team’s depth chart, Sanders continues to be one of the most discussed signal callers in the NFL.
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However, head coach Kevin Stefanski and co. seems to have no interest in Sanders fielding a regular-season snap. And so, fans and pundits alike are once again calling for Sanders to find his way out of Cleveland.
According to Cam Newton, however, the rookie had multiple avenues to escape the Browns’ organization, just that he refused to take them.
“Per my sources,” Newton exclaimed, “It was three teams. The Cleveland Browns, with Andrew Berry being the GM. It was the Philadelphia Eagles, with Howie Roseman [as] the general manager, and also, it was the Baltimore Ravens with Eric DeCosta.”
At this point, it seems as if being a backup QB was always inevitable for Sanders, regardless of which team he was part of. That said, sitting behind either Jalen Hurts or Lamar Jackson, two of the most recognized signal callers of the modern era, would have been much better than being a QB3 to Flacco and Dillon Gabriel.
“Why wouldn’t you go to Baltimore? If any team or any person can relate to a guy like Shedeur Sanders, it’s Lamar Jackson… His impact, in the state of Florida, is almost similar to the impact of a governor,” wondered Newton.
“He can relate to what Shedeur Sanders is going through, will go through, and prepare him to be a better player, not only on the field, but off the field,” Cam added.
According to the former face of the Carolina Panthers, joining up with the reigning Super Bowl MVP would have been a ‘no-brainer’ decision. The implication appears to be that Sanders made a big error. But then Newton also offered up a different perspective on why the former Buffalo may have initially made the right choice.
“As a man in the United States of America, as a man in the world we live in today,” Newton began to proclaim, before highlighting that the Browns could offer one thing that both the Ravens and the Eagles couldn’t. That’s a potential pathway to the QB1 spot.
“You have to do what’s best for you. Even if nobody agrees with it… It wasn’t that Shedeur said, ‘I’m too good for Baltimore. I’m too good for Philly.’ Anybody in the NFL has this consistent thought, “I want to go to a team where I can play,” explained Newton.
Newton’s source also told him that Sanders simply had “too much respect” for both Jackson and Hurts to try and challenge them in any form. So, perhaps the decision to say “yes” to Cleveland begins to make a bit more sense.
It’s still a long shot for Sanders at the Browns. But his decision gives him a shot nonetheless. And at this point, that’s all that the 23-year-old seems to want.
