Cleveland Browns: The best drafted player at every position since 1999
By Chad Porto
Quarterbacks – Baker Mayfield
This should be a no brainer. While Tim Couch is far from a bust these days (thanks Jamarcus Russell!) the Browns first try at the quarterback position since returning did not pan out well. The Browns now have a much more credible player behind center, even if some fans don’t get how good the team has it after years of hop-scotching to figure out who should start under center.
Tell me if you’ve heard this before; Mayfield is the only quarterback since Brian Sipe to have back-to-back 20-touchdown seasons. So keep in mind just how awful the Browns have been at quarterback before Mayfield came along. That’s not to say he doesn’t need to make improvements at places, he does, but he’s far from a bust and the talk of moving on from him by some in the area is extremely shortsighted and incredibly stupid.
Mayfield outpaced Couch for this list because he’s a more productive passer, though Couch was a better winner. Couch always came up big in the games that he was most needed. Too bad that stretch of time was only for two seasons, and was marred by Butch Davis juggling quarterbacks instead of just sticking with one or the other.
That made it pretty one-sided, as Mayfield already has had two good, yet not great seasons of play from under center. There’s also the idea that Kevin Stefanski will improve his play even further, and not put him in so many positions where he’s forced to throw 35+ times a game.
In games where Mayfield threw that many times during the 2019 season, the Browns were 1-5. Not because Mayfield was bad in those games, he actually had four of his better games in that stretch, completing over 65% of his passes. No, that’s not why but because it showed a severe lack of balance in an offense built around the idea of chucking the ball. Stefanski won’t let Mayfield be the only thing that the offense relies on, because no quarterback, no matter how good you are, can be that guy.
Even Baltimore’s Lamar Jackson needed help from Mark Ingram and Mark Andrews. Without them, Jackson doesn’t put together the year he had.