Cleveland Browns make a great investment in Case Keenum

The Cleveland Browns sign quarterback Case Keenum for 3 years and $18 million. It’s a lot for a reserve but he’s trusted by head coach Kevin Stefanski.

Quarterback Case Keenum has been reunited with Kevin Stefanski, his former quarterback coach at Minnesota, as suggested by Dan Justik, Mitch Zoloty and others at Dawg Pound Daily. It’s not quite official as contracts cannot be signed until the start of the new year on Wednesday, but no one seems to doubt that it will go forward.

This is a terrific deal for the Browns, and people saying that the Browns overpaid are crazy. Keenum is probably the best backup quarterback in the league, but he will not make as much money as other backups such as Joe Flacco, Teddy Bridgewater, Mitchell Trubisky or several others not projected to be starters.

Ever since Bill Belichick released Bernie Kosar to install Vinnie Testaverde as the starting quarterback, the Dawg Pound has tended to hate and fear backup quarterbacks, viewing them as a threat to the team. This is cuckoo.

Backup quarterback is a real position on a football team because you absolutely need to have someone backing up who can play the position. To ease your minds, however, there is no way in God’s green earth that Case Keenum is being hired to take away Baker Mayfield‘s job. Keenum is 32 years old and has only a  27-35 record as a starter. No NFL team wants him as a starter at this point in his career, though he is capable.

In 2017, working with Kevin Stefanski in Minnesota, Keenum was statistically an outstanding quarterback, going 11-3, and throwing 22 touchdown passes versus only 7 interceptions. He also boasted a 67.6 percent completion average and seventh in the league in passer rating with 98.3.

Most importantly, he won a playoff game for the Vikes and made it all the way to the NFC Championship game, losing to Nick Foles and the eventual Super Bowl champion Philadelphia Eagles.

Keenum is one of the few players who is a definite upgrade over Drew Stanton, who is being shown the door after not throwing a pass for two years in a real game. For that matter, Stanton seems like he has been around forever, but will be only 36 this season, which is not old for a quarterback anymore.

If his knee has healed from last year, he can still sling it and would have been a viable but not very exciting option. Stanton, however, was 11-6 as a starter for his career, whereas Keenum won 11 games in a single season.

He is the smart, game-manager, precision passer who Baker Mayfield can learn from. He doesn’t have quite the cannon that Mayfield does, and he is not as athletic, fast or elusive, but he can play quarterback.

The Browns still have Garrett Gilbert under contract as a potential number three quarterback.  Gilbert was the top quarterback in the short lifetime of the Alliance of Awful Football (AAF), which went kaput last year.

Gilbert might be viable in the case of a dire emergency in which both Mayfield and Keenum go down. Gilbert has been in the league a while, and believe it or not, has a Super Bowl XLIX ring to show for his efforts, as an understudy for Tom Brady.