The Cleveland Browns’ 2025 NFL Draft strategy is still being talked about, even though the event has been over for more than six months. While they made some great picks in the early rounds, they’ve been continually scrutinized for some of their choices later on, including their decision to draft both Shedeur Sanders and Dillon Gabriel.
Selecting quarterbacks in later rounds is a strategy that few teams, if any, have employed in history, and this move indicated that they didn’t have a clear plan at the position.
This played out when the season started, as they’ve moved from Joe Flacco to Gabriel to Sanders, hoping someone would emerge as a prominent QB1.
Gabriel’s performances were criticized by many analysts and fans around the league, but the jury is still out on what Sanders has accomplished in two starts.
Some are encouraged by the tape he’s put out, but others, like Jay Gruden, aren’t so impressed.
He talked through what he’s seen thus far in a segment of “The Arena: Gridiron” on X.
“The glaring things that I see wrong with Shedeur, is his feet in the pocket are absolutely a trainwreck. He struggles with where is eyes are and where is feet are. For all the reasons you guys hated Dillon Gabriel, we’re seeing the same thing,” Gruden said.
“For all the reasons you guys hated Dillon Gabriel, we’re seeing the same thing.”@Coach_JayGruden wasn’t exactly impressed with Shedeur Sanders’ 2nd start pic.twitter.com/bhfC5ie88r
— The Arena: Gridiron (@ArenaGridiron) December 3, 2025
Too Soon To Judge These Young QBs
To Gruden, Sanders and Gabriel are the same player in a lot of ways, and if fans weren’t high on Gabriel, he’s surprised that they’re fans of Sanders.
Gabriel does have a larger body of work to look through compared to Sanders’ two games, so at this point, it’s not necessarily a fair comparison.
Assuming Sanders is the starter for the rest of the season, it will be a good chance for everyone to see what he can do with more time in the offense and to understand his strengths and limitations as an NFL QB.
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