Cleveland Browns: Hue Jackson debunks Russell Wilson rumor
By Randy Gurzi
Recent rumors suggest the Seattle Seahawks offered Russell Wilson to the Cleveland Browns for the No. 1 overall pick in 2018, but former coach Hue Jackson says that’s not true
Recent reports have surfaced that the Cleveland Browns were offered a pretty interesting trade back in 2018. As owners of the No. 1 overall pick that year, there was likely a lot of calls being made to see if they wanted to move down but rumors suggested that one call came from the Seattle Seahawks.
And the player they supposedly dangled was none other than Russell Wilson, the quarterback who led them to two Super Bowls with one ring. Cleveland was said to have turned it down, but there’s no proof such a trade was even offered.
And recently, Hue Jackson who was the head coach at the time, took the time to discuss whether or not there is any truth to these rumors.
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Jackson was recently on the Zach Gelb Show and said that he never heard of any such trade and while he believes John Dorsey and John Schneider (the Seahawks general manager) are friends, any real talk about a trade would have made it’s way to him and the rest of the organization.
"“I’ve never heard anything so crazy in my life,” Jackson said on The Zach Gelb Show. “I’m sure John [Dorsey] and John Schneider are really tight. I’m sure if they’re having conversations on their own, just jiving around and doing those kind of things – I would think if something was serious about that, we, the executive team and the organization, would have known. I never heard that.”"
Jackson goes on to say that the team wouldn’t have even accepted such a trade, considering how sold they were on Baker Mayfield who they ended up taking with that first overall pick.
Mayfield went on to set the NFL record for most touchdown passes in a season by a rookie, surpassing Wilson and Peyton Manning for the mark by one touchdown.
He may have taken a step back last season but there’s still plenty of hope that Mayfield can become the player the Browns expected him to be.
Unfortunately, he will now probably be compared to Wilson unfairly due to a trade that Jackson says was not offered.