Although there seems to be mounting evidence to the contrary, I still believe that the Browns on Monday will not announce rookie quarterback DeShone Kizer as the starter for their preseason opener against the New Orleans Saints on Thursday night at FirstEnergy Stadium.
On a variety of fronts – common sense being one of them – it’s just not the right thing to do. Yes, Kizer will be the starter at some point this year – and for a number of games — but that point is somewhere down the road, probably about at the midway juncture. It’s not now. It shouldn’t be now.
Anyway, here are five reasons to start Kizer now, and five reasons not to do so:
TO DO IT NOW:
*1. As stated, he’s going to get his chance this season – the Browns have to see what they’ve got in their second-round choice to let them know if they have to go back into the NFL Draft next year with one of their five picks in the first two rounds to get another quarterback – so why wait?
*2. The other two candidates for the job, Cody Kessler and Brock Osweiler, aren’t the long-term answer. The presumed starter when training camp began a week and a half ago, Kessler has struggled some, and Osweiler wasn’t ever thought of as the starter when he was acquired in an offseason trade.
*3. This complete rebuilding project the Browns have undertaken doesn’t really get started – can’t really get started – until they get their franchise quarterback, so the longer they put this off, the longer it will take them to get where they want to go.
*4. Kizer has played better thus far in camp than either Kessler and Osweiler, and as such, the only reason there is any reluctance to start him is that he’s a rookie. The Browns have to look past that.
*5. It’s not as if the Browns are going to win the AFC North title anyway, so they can use this season to bring him along slowly and surely without costing themselves team-wise.
NOT TO DO IT NOW:
*1. Once he starts the preseason opener, there is no turning back. Kizer is the starter, Period. With that, then, asking him to start the regular-season opener against the Pittsburgh Steelers is a bit much.
*2. Head coach Hue Jackson knows better than this. He knows quarterbacks, offenses and the division extremely well. He knows the challenges of putting in a rookie from the get-go.
*3. If this happens, then it might well not be Jackson’s desire, but that of Executive Vice President of Football Operations Sashi Brown and Chief Strategy Officer Paul DePodesta. Who’s the best football mind, especially on quarterbacks, in that trio? Yeah, Jackson, hands down.
*4. Jackson realizes the value of rookie quarterbacks standing on the sideline and watching and learning for a while before being thrown into the fray.
- The Browns can win five games this year with decent quarterback play, and after last season’s 1-15 finish that beat down everybody in the organization and broke their confidence, the club can’t risk going through that kind of nightmare again just to start a rookie quarterback all 16 games.
We’ll see what happens Monday when Jackson is expected to announce his new — or status-quo — quarterback order.
