Insider Drops Puzzling Update on Potential Browns QB Trade

   

Quarterback Kenny Pickett (8) during the third day of mandatory minicamp at CrossCountry Mortgage Campus on June 12, 2025.

The Cleveland Browns have four quarterbacks competing for the starting job heading into 2025, but the Browns are widely expected to trade one of them before the regular season begins.

The general consensus has long been that one of Joe Flacco or Kenny Pickett will be gone prior to Week 1, with rookies Shedeur Sanders and Dillon Gabriel playing backup to whichever veteran remains.

However, Mary Kay Cabot of Cleveland.com does not necessarily think that will be the case. As a matter of fact, she feels there is is a strong possibility that the Browns keep all four signal-callers.

“But quarterback is the most important position on the team, and the Browns now have two development prospects in Gabriel and Sanders, with a possible rising veteran in Pickett. If someone makes them an offer they can’t refuse, they’ll listen. But keeping four is definitely within the realm of possibility,” Cabot wrote.

This isn't the first time Cabot has pitched the idea of Cleveland retaining all four quarterbacks, so obviously, there must be something to it. But that does not make it any less puzzling.

 

Would the Browns seriously waste a roster spot by keeping both Flacco and Pickett? Wouldn't they be better off keeping an extra wide receiver or defensive back? Or maybe they can give an impressive undrafted rookie a shot somewhere?

It just seems hard to believe that Cleveland will actually go into the season with four healthy quarterbacks in tow, but stranger things have happened, and the Browns themselves have made plenty of odd decisions over the years.