Cleveland’s new offensive coordinator, Travis Switzer, has his work cut out for him in his first year as an offensive coordinator in the NFL. He gets the luxury of choosing his quarterback between Deshaun Watson and Shedeur Sanders.
Welcome to the big leagues.
One thing that is true about the situation that Cleveland is in is that their hand is hovering over the eject button for both guys. If it doesn’t go well for either or both of them this year, then it is a total reset button and move on to the next guy.
There is another side to that coin. If either of them plays well, then Cleveland will be in a bit of a predicament. They will either be forced to commit to one of them long-term or make a tougher decision to move on. If it comes down to that, there will be quite the conversation surrounding it, no matter which guy ends up being.
Thankfully, that decision is a long way away. For now, the team and the quarterbacks are just focused on improving daily and learning the new offense. On Thursday, Switzer was asked about the development of Sanders and the progress that both guys have made so far.
Sanders talked about the big amount of development that he has made over the past couple of weeks since the new staff got there. He is improving on a daily basis and really honing in on the system.
When answering about both guys, Switzer commented, saying that they are pleased with the progress that both players are making, but stopped short of saying that one was ahead of the other.
Head coach Todd Monken commented, saying that he wants to have a guy in place by the time the guys come back for training camp, so if he holds to that, a decision is coming in the next couple of weeks.
The unique part about this competition is that both quarterbacks are vastly different from one another. Watson, if he can return to his prior form, brings a level of athleticism that is unique to every other quarterback in the NFL. That’s obviously a major assumption to make, but that is certainly a possibility. Sanders, on the other hand, is definitely more of a pocket quarterback whose athleticism is good enough to survive in the pocket, but is limited when he breaks contain.
It will be like Monken is selecting between the two skill sets of his last two quarterbacks, Lamar Jackson and Stetson Bennett. The positive is that he found great success with both styles of quarterback play, and he will have to find it again with his new team.
The competition will continue to heat up, but for now, both Watson and Sanders are continuing to progress as they get more comfortable with the playbook and are stacking good days on top of each other.
This article originally appeared on Browns Wire: Browns OC Travis Switzer provides update on quarterback competition
Reporting by Anthony Moeglin, Browns Wire / Browns Wire
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
