Cleveland Browns: What should the Browns do at QB?

Take a QB in Free Agency

Whether it be the watching management go back and forth with good quarterbacks like Kirk Cousins and Tyrod Taylor on their current deals or watching the Patriots shopping out Jimmy Garoppolo for picks, I can see how our fan base could feel a little ill-tempered. The Cleveland Browns haven’t had a solid quarterback to call their own since what feels forever and I can see how the opportunity to go get one of these few quarterbacks could be enticing.

While Kirk Cousins has seemed like a solid quarterback in Washington, he has had a tremendous supporting cast that would make him look a bit better than advertised. In Cousins’ 41 career starts, Cousins is 2-11 versus teams with nine or more wins and 5-13 against teams that have eight or more wins. Yes, Cousins has the overall stats and has not always had a great defense but one would assume by looking at his stats sheet that he does struggle greatly when facing an above average defense.

Cousins also wants a deal worth a lot of money that I personally don’t think he deserves and has been quoted saying he won’t do a team-friendly deal because it would “it would be a selfish move to hurt future quarterbacks”. Yeah, okay Kirk. With a high price tag and less pieces for Cousins to work with in Cleveland, this would be a massive mistake.

In his first two career starts, Jimmy Garoppolo looked like Tom Brady at times. Garoppolo looked so much like Brady, that there were even talks that maybe the Patriots should have just continued to roll with him. That is of course until Tom Brady came back and we realized that he still looks like he hadn’t lost a step. The Patriots made it known toward the end of the season that they would be open to shopping Garoppolo when ESPN’s Adam Schefter reported that a starting point for trade talks would need to involve a “first and fourth-round round pick”.

For someone with only two starts under their belt, that price is way too high. Seeing Garoppolo succeed in the system that Bill Belichick has built up in New England is no surprise. We have seen this trick by the Patriots before, just ask the Kansas City Chiefs how well Matt Cassel (who went 11-5 for the Patriots the year Brady tore his ACL) worked out.

My main point here being, the Browns shouldn’t waste their time trading away picks or throwing money away to talents who haven’t proved they are worth that value. The Browns ultimately need to be focused on making this overall team better first before plugging a quarterback in and praying for the best. The best way to do that is to invest in the draft and how can the Browns do that if they are trading away picks for players that the other teams don’t wish to keep.