New Browns head coach Todd Monken did not get to meet Myles Garrett in person before the club traded him to the Rams earlier this week.
But Cleveland received Jared Verse as part of the deal, and the third-year edge rusher has already gotten to the building. That’s got Monken excited about the future.
“I mean, he’s gonna fit us like a glove,” Monken said in his Wednesday press conference, via transcript from the team.
“You wish you had unlimited time to meet with him and try to catch him up to speed. But just his willingness to get here, be here this morning to get into meetings and be on the practice field says a lot about him.”
Monken had to coach against Verse last year when he was Baltimore’s offensive coordinator.
“[H]e was one of those guys where you certainly had a game plan for and I think he’s only going to continue to ascend,” Monken said.
“[C]ertainly, his tape speaks for itself. I mean, being a Defensive Rookie of the Year and then a Pro Bowler. How many guys have done that? It’s a pretty elite group he’s in.”
Verse, 25, recorded 7.5 sacks, 11 tackles for loss, and 27 quarterback hits to reach his second consecutive Pro Bowl in 2025. He also had a sack, three TFLs, and seven QB hits in three postseason games.
The Browns traded away the current defensive player of the year when they dealt Myles Garrett to the Rams earlier this week, but they emerged from the trade with the last two defensive rookies of the year.
Jared Verse won the prize in 2024 and linebacker Carson Schwesinger gave the 2025 Browns a pair of award winners on the defensive side of the ball. Verse has not been a member of the Browns for long, but the edge rusher knows enough about his new team to know that Schwesinger provides him with a comfortable security blanket.
“Man, that boy can fly,” Verse said, via a transcript from the team. “Nah, he can work. I like that a lot. I like knowing that behind me that I can . . . I don’t got much to worry about if something, you know, I can play freely because I don’t have to worry if something gets by me. He’s going to be able to handle that. He’s going to be able to clean everything up. So now that’s the exciting factor of it.”
The Browns did not win much with Garrett on the roster, but they usually had a strong defense. The presence of Schwesinger and others provides reason to believe that will continue to be the case and the hope is that the other assets that Cleveland acquired will lead to more victories while Verse is a member of the squad.
During his time with the Browns, Myles Garrett earned all the individual achievements a defensive end could have. Now he’s setting his sights on team goals.
After he was traded to the Rams, Garrett said on the team’s YouTube channel that he’s now in a place where he thinks he can win a Super Bowl.
“I’ve done pretty much everything I set out to do in Cleveland, I’d given my all and my everything, and I’m very fortunate for my time there,” Garrett said. “But it’s always been about winning and I want to win a championship and I’m happy to be part of a franchise that’s in a position to do that, and do that for years to come.”
Garrett said he was drawn to the Rams because he thinks head coach Sean McVay and General Manager Les Snead have built a team that can contend for years to come.
“It starts with Sean and Les making this an appealing destination,” Garrett said.
Garrett only made the playoffs twice while he was with the Browns, and never advanced past the divisional round. His expectations with the Rams are a lot higher than that.
The recent federal LM-2 filing from the NFL Players Association including a stunning revelation regarding Browns quarterback Shedeur Sanders. In his first year in pro football, Shedeur earned $17.7 million in royalty payments.
In an interview with Front Office Sports, Colorado coach Deion Sanders (who also is Shedeur’s dad) addressed the record-setting number.
“I don’t know if people really dug into that,” Deion said, explaining that the payment wasn’t the result of jersey sales.
So if it wasn’t jersey sales, what drove the number?
“A tremendous deal with the NFLPA,” Deion said. “A tremendous deal.”
Deion previously mentioned “licensing” and “cards.” Some believe the number was largely driven by a trading-card deal negotiated before Shedeur fell to round five in the 2025 draft.
Regardless, Shedeur shattered Tom Brady’s prior one-year record of $9.5 million, establishing a new bar that will not be easy to catch.
Myles Garrett was so dominant last season that he earned all 50 first-place votes for Defensive Player of the Year. He also won the award in 2023, becoming one of only nine players to win multiple DPOY awards.
Only Aaron Donald, Watt and Lawrence Taylor have more with three each.
In nine seasons, Garrett has earned seven Pro Bowls, five first-team All-Pro honors, the single-season sacks record (23 in 2025) and 125.5 career sacks.
He is only 30, with a lot of career left as he embarks on a new chapter with the Rams.
Garrett wants more despite a near certainty that he will be a first-ballot Hall of Famer.
“I see a position to solidify myself here, as well, among the very greats,” Garrett said at his introductory news conference. “I still have plenty of great years in front of me and being able to cement that legacy, not only as a football city here in L.A., but as an individual and winning DPOY and a Super Bowl or more. Those things are definitely pressing on my mind, and I have a definite bit of urgency to do it and do it right away.”
A Super Bowl ring is the one thing missing from his resume, and Garrett should have chances to accomplish that.
