The Cleveland Browns have a big decision to make about their quarterback room heading into the 2025 NFL season. While Cleveland has already named Joe Flacco as its starting QB, the team still has to sort through Kenny Pickett, Shedeur Sanders, and Dillon Gabriel to figure out the backup rotation, and whether they really want to have four quarterbacks on their active roster.
Arguably the least talked about of the group is Pickett, now an NFL veteran who hasn't had great success so far in his NFL career.
Recently, Jeremy Fowler of ESPN broke down how the Browns feel about Pickett considering his current injury situation.
“#Browns feel Kenny Pickett healthy enough to remain on active roster, giving them four QBs. Depth chart behind Joe Flacco still fluid,” reported Fowler on X, formerly Twitter.
“The latest is the Browns do plan to keep four quarterbacks,” he added during an appearance on SportsCenter. “I checked on that. They do feel like Kenny Pickett, despite some injuries this preseason, will be healthy enough to keep on the active roster. So certainly over the next few days, maybe some team needs a backup quarterback and there could be a trade in line, but right now they are comfortable keeping four on the 53 (man roster).”
An interesting decision for the Browns
It's very rare that NFL teams choose to keep four quarterbacks on their active roster, as conventional wisdom would suggest that those roster spots would be better distributed elsewhere.
However, that's exactly the situation the Browns find themselves in with just two weeks to go until the regular season begins.
Cleveland selected both Gabriel and Sanders in this past NFL Draft in a move that puzzled fans and pundits alike, and it remains to be seen who the Browns' official backup quarterback will be should Flacco be unavailable for any stretch of time.
The Browns have just 14 days to figure out the answer to these questions before their regular season kicks off on September 7 at home against the Cincinnati Bengals at 1:00 PM ET.
