Cleveland Browns: 3 goals for Jacob Phillips’ rookie season

The Cleveland Browns drafted a quality linebacker in Jacob Phillips, and here we’ll highlight three goals for his rookie year.

The Cleveland Browns defense should have difference-makers on the defensive line and in the secondary, at minimum.

Myles Garrett, seemingly Olivier Vernon, if he stays healthy, Adrian Clayborn and Chad Thomas should be a productive defensive group. Andrew Billings should also be a quality addition as a run-stopper, too, and should fortify the interior defensive line rotation.

In the back end, Denzel Ward, Greedy Williams, Kevin Johnson, and/or Terrance Mitchell, if he’s mostly healthy, should be a good cornerback group, too. And hopefully, Ward, Williams, and Johnson, in particular, are often used in the press man variety.

Plus, if he’s used predominantly in the box, Karl Joseph should be a nice free-agent addition, and I’d expect Andrew Sendejo and especially Grant Delpit to bring stability to Cleveland’s coverage in the deep third/up the seams.

The linebacker position, though, is a question mark. Along with that, Bleacher Report’s Brent Sobleski also recently stated that the “Browns feature the league’s worst linebacking corps.”

Granted, Sobleski did suggest Nigel Bradham as a free agent solution to help out that group and I agree with Sobleski and DPD’s Randy Gurzi in that Bradham could be a stabilizing addition as a capable three-down backer.

That being said, if Cleveland does not add Bradham, a player that would appear to be an impact player this season is rookie Jacob Phillips. Feasibly on the outside with B.J. Goodson potentially at the middle a bunch and Mack Wilson, Phillips could help the Browns considerably, and in the run game, even more so.

Now, I’ll hit on three goals for Phillips’ rookie year for the Cleveland Browns.

Alrighty, we’ll get started then.