The Cleveland Browns shocked the world on Saturday afternoon, selecting Shedeur Sanders with the 144th pick in the fifth round of the NFL Draft.
There was a time not long ago when Sanders felt like a real possibility for Cleveland in the No. 2 slot. Instead, the Browns passed on quarterback after quarterback through the first two rounds, selected Oregon southpaw Dillon Gabriel in the third round, then still went with Sanders when the moment arrived.
It was more than simple happenstance, too. The Browns traded up to get ahead of the Philadelphia Eagles and secure the Colorado signal-caller, which puts five quarterbacks on the Cleveland depth chart. Sanders joins Gabriel, Joe Flacco, Kenny Pickett and Joe Flacco in what is, without doubt, the oddest QB room in the NFL.
Sanders probably hasn't heard from all his fellow quarterbacks in Cleveland yet, but he has received a phone call from Pickett.
#Browns QB Shedeur Sanders said Denzel Ward and QB Kenny Pickett have already reached out to him.
— Mary Kay Cabot (@MaryKayCabot) April 26, 2025
Credit to Pickett for embracing competition and acting with professionalism. Not every quarterback would take the selection of their potential replacement in stride.
If we want to look for examples of such nefarious actors, we can go back to last season, when the Pittsburgh Steelers signed Russell Wilson. His predecessor, Kenny Pickett, was so miffed by the move that he requested a trade.
Oh wait.
Kenny Pickett welcomes Shedeur Sanders to Browns and leaves Steelers fans upset
Pickett's handling of Wilson's arrival in Pittsburgh was less than ideal. He felt betrayed, per ESPN's Brooke Pryor, believing the Steelers were reneging on a previous promise of first team reps. Rather than taking one on the chin and fighting for his job, Pickett forced his way out the door and spent the 2024 campaign sitting behind Jalen Hurts in Philadelphia.
"Pickett expressed that he would rather play elsewhere and make a fresh start than compete from second place in Pittsburgh," Pryor wrote. "On March 11, the day legal tampering opened in the NFL, and less than 24 hours after Wilson's announcement, rumblings of Pickett's anger began reverberating around the league, per sources who were involved in free agency negotiations for available quarterbacks."
He got a Super Bowl ring out of it, with his hometown team no less, so one can hardly criticize Pickett for how things ended up. The Russ era was short-lived in Pittsburgh after he lost five straight games to end the season, including a 14-point loss to Baltimore in the NFL Playoffs.
Still, Steelers fans would've preferred a more tempered and open-minded approach from Pickett, who plainly had not performed well enough to command first team reps in a viable competition.
Pickett is taking a new approach in Cleveland. He has expressed his expectation to start, but the Browns almost definitely won't pick the 26-year-old when training camp reaches its conclusion. Joe Flacco has a heftier contract with several performance-based incentives, while both Sanders and Gabriel offer more long-term equity for a Browns team looking to build a sustainable winner. Heck, if Deshaun Watson returns this season, he probably leapfrogs Pickett on the depth chart, too.
Pickett won't be QB5, but there's a good chance he ends up as, like, QB3 or QB4. That is assuming he even makes the Browns' regular season roster. And yet, despite the sudden murkiness of his immediate future, Pickett is handling the situation with grace. Pittsburgh fans wish he learned this lesson earlier.