NFL Insider Predicts Cleveland Browns to Make Significant Trade

The Cleveland Browns have remained very quiet on the trade front this offseason, but things could change at some point in 2025.

It's no secret that the Browns have multiple clear trade candidates on both sides of the ball, and it's actually surprising that we haven't heard more chatter about Cleveland shopping any of them over the past several months.

However, Zac Jackson of The Athletic feels that the Browns could make a cost-cutting trade soon, naming cornerback Greg Newsome II as a possible candidate to be dealt.

"But Newsome doesn’t start in the base defense, and the fifth-year option structure means the Browns would incur no dead money if they traded him at some point before November," Jackson wrote. "Both Newsome and Martin Emerson Jr, the team’s No. 2 cornerback, are only signed through 2025. If the Browns can only choose one for the future, given their cap issues, Newsome could be moved strictly based on the savings and 2026 cap rollover a trade would create."

Newsome is coming off of a disappointing 2024 campaign in which he played 13 games and logged 27 tackles, an interception and five passes defended. He played in just 70 percent of the Browns' defensive snaps, by far a career low.

It doesn't seem all that probable that Cleveland will retain both Newsome and Emerson in free agency next March, so it stands to reason that one of them could be dealt before the trade deadline in November. Given that Emerson will probably be the cheaper of the two to re-sign, Newsome definitely makes sense to trade.

A former first-round pick, Newsome has not exactly lived up to expectations with the Browns. Perhaps he would be able to more properly flourish elsewhere.