Will Shedeur Sanders be Cleveland’s starting quarterback in 2026?
It’s possible. But new Browns head coach Todd Monken was not ready to commit to that during his introductory press conference on Tuesday.
The first question to Monken was if Sanders would begin the offseason as Cleveland’s QB1 and what his approach to QB would be. But Monken didn’t divulge much about his plans for the position.
“Well, I think like any position on the team, that’s still to be determined,” Monken said. “Am I excited about Shedeur? Am I excited about all the quarterbacks in the room? Am I excited to coach this football team? Absolutely. I can’t wait for them to get back and for us to get started.”
With the Browns recently releasing a video on social media with Monken and Sanders sharing a moment that included Monken noting how the Ravens wanted to draft Sanders last year, the new head coach was also asked how he evaluated the quarterback coming out of Colorado. But Monken declined to talk about that, given his evaluation was for another team.
“Obviously, we had an affection — like a lot of teams — of Shedeur’s skill set and what we thought he could become,” Monken said. “But I really wouldn’t want to go in depth of another team’s process.”
What Monken did talk about was what he likes in a quarterback, focusing heavily on intangibles.
“Well, I’m just going to start with personality traits,” Monken said. “When you talk about who’s going to lead this team, who has the ‘it’ factor, who has those characteristics that the team wants to follow and believes in him because the ball’s in their hand every down? This game’s going to come down to two-minute situations, four-minute situations. You’ve got to be able to execute at a high level. And we’re just talking about some of the characteristics that you’re looking for, let alone some of the physical traits that we’ll get a chance to talk about later.”
The Browns have been in search of consistent, steady, productive quarterback play effectively since the team re-entered the league in 1999. Time will tell if Monken can develop Sanders or any other quarterback into that kind of player.
