Stephen A.'s WARNING for what's on the line in Shedeur Sanders' first NFL career start | First Take

So Shadur Sanders, his NFL careers, he started as QB4, but Sunday he will be QB1, making his first pro start when the Browns face the Raiders in Vegas. Shadur's NFL debut came last Sunday in a loss to the Ravens where he struggled, but now he's got a week of first team reps. Shadur and company are looking to snap their three-game losing streak. Stephen A., is Sunday's game against the Raiders a make-or- break game for Shadour's future with the Browns.

game for his future with the Browns. I mean I'm not going to say the future in the NFL because there's always somebody that might give you a second chance and grab you.

But in terms of his is his future in Cleveland it's this Sunday. He cannot look like trash. He cannot go out there and complete 25% of his passes. He cannot look lost and completely discombobulated and we're not going to throw out excuses about him not having any reps with the first team. And I'm not saying this negatively towards him. I don't

believe he was put in a position to succeed the other day. I don't believe he's been put in a position to succeed with the Cleveland Browns. I view the Cleveland Browns as a house divided where whether it's offensive coordinator and the head coach having a different view than the GM and the owner or whatever it is, I don't know what the hell is

going on, but I don't believe he's in a place where collectively they are doing everything that they can to ensure his success. Dio, I know your position on this, and I know you're diametrically opposed to what I'm saying

Respectfully, I don't give a damn you have a coach and Kevin Stefanski is O2 is a two-time coach of the year

This man knows what he's doing. I respect the hell out of Kevin Stefanski There is no way that you can send a quarterback out there looking that damn lost not having any cadence any sandy reps whatsoever With the first team. No way. That's what happened. And I don't think that's an accident. That's just my personal opinion.

I don't report on the Cleveland Browns. I'm not coming from a knowledgeable and informed perspective here. I haven't gotten word from anybody. No. This is just me watching what I watched, seeing what I saw, and looking at how inept a talented quarterback like Shador Sanders, at least when I saw him in college, was in his first pro debut when he came in after Dylan

Gabriel went down. But now he's getting those reps because Kevin Stefanski has said he's starting this weekend. Now we're going to see. I'm not telling you you got to go out there and look like a star or anything like that, but he cannot look completely clueless. He cannot look lost. It cannot replicate what he did that past weekend, and he's still gonna have a future in Cleveland. I don't believe it for one second.

That's what I believe is on the line right now when we're talking about Shador Sanders.

All right, so here's, Steven A, When you kind of talk about Stefanski and your at least vantage point of how he's handled the situation, my pushback to you is this. You could sit on one in one breath and say tons of respect for,

and then also say you're making it sound like it's intentional. And that's a relatively big assumption, correct? Like when you say two time coach of the year, but you can't try them out there like

that. And you feel like you're setting him up to not have success and you're making it sound intentional. And I

think that's fine.

Okay. Okay. Fine. That's fine. What I would say to you in response directly, Dan, is this, if you are a two time coach of the year and you're universally recognized by football aficionados such as yourself as being one of those elite coaches in the game and somebody is put out there and looks completely lost from the quarterback position who is a QB to that what am I to make of that what are we to make of that could you educate us

about that because I don't know anywhere else to go. Again, I've seen bad play. I've seen bad quarterbacks. And also, to me, the greatest argument you can make in favor of Stafanski is that as good as he is, somehow, someway, we're not going to accuse him of being a quarterback whisperer, because since he's arrived in 2020, even though he's won two Coach of the Year honors, this is going to be his 13th starting quarterback.

13, damn, you can't figure out something. I guess that's an argument to making his favor that that's not his strength with quarterbacks, but that's all you can say because nothing else makes sense to me as to how a guy playing under his stewardship

could be a QB2 and could go out there and look that damn lost. I don't understand that.

And I don't all that disagree with that. I think, you know, the QB2 thing, the other QB1 is a rookie. He's only been starting for, I think, about five weeks. So like, I'm, but I don't necessarily disagree a ton with that. Here's what I would say about this whole Shadour first start situation. Anybody that is sitting here going his future hangs in balance even in Cleveland in this week. That's a ridiculous thing to say. So we're you're mean to tell me that a young man that is for the first time ever taking snaps

with the starting group for one week, he gets one week for practices with the starting group to go out there and play in an NFL game with arguably the worst skill group in the NFL. You're gonna give him one opportunity?

And Dylan Gabriel is released from concussion protocol.

Yeah.

Does he get the starting job back?

Hello.

I mean, I would lean towards Shador unless it's an absolute, utter disaster. But I think I've seen enough of Dylan. Dylan's first game was pretty good. His second game was okay, and it's kind of deflated since then.

And I know you can't put yourself inside Cleveland's locker room. You feel Kevin Stefanski feels that way too. Shadur Sanders becomes the starter this week if Dylan Gabriel is not in concussion protocol.

As long as it's not a disaster, another disaster, we can't operate.

My point is, after the game, Kevin Stefanski said Dylan Gabriel is our starting quarterback.

I would lean towards Shadour. You would lean towards Shadour. I don't know what Stefanski's gonna do.

But the thing that Stephen A is talking about, he's not talking about the way you see the football game, the schematics, the X's and O's, right? The team leadership that you feel should be in Cleveland. He's talking about what he's seen. Because from the beginning of this, we all felt that Shadur Sanders should have been drafted higher than the fifth round.

Would you agree with that?

Yes. That was our evaluation as people who understand football. He was drafted in the fifth round. Now what you and I and Cam know is when you're drafted in the fifth round. Now what you and I and Cam know is when you're drafted in the fifth round, you're treated like a fifth rounder. So all these people who love Shadur,

I love Shadur, who think that Kevin Stefanski should have been putting in a game plan to make sure Shadur Sanders was the best

he could possibly be, that's not how life works.

Correct. Which is why we've had to explain to people. This is how the NFL works. This is how second team quarterback reps work in practice, right? But you also know if you're Kevin Stefanski and you know, you have a special situation with

two rookies. You control the script, right? You can get your door Sanders those reps if he has to if he's eventually going to be inserted because you know you have different circumstances

which you have because you drafted a quarterback in the third round and the fifth round. So that's why I feel this is his only chance because the Cleveland Browns, as an organization, we can take it away from Kevin Stefanski, have shown that their top priority is not

making sure Shadur Sanders succeeds.

That's not what it is.

Yeah, but see, that's an extreme comment though, RC. You know what I'm saying? You mean to tell me that someone within the organization took him in the fifth round, and then to Stephen A.'s words, it's a house divided, and we're going to give him one opportunity with a group that's not good enough.

I don't care who you are. Most quarterbacks in the league are not going to play. Well, what's shown you that they are going to evaluate Shador Sanders in that way, but right because they haven't because they put it because they

put him for I know cam got to talk.

Go ahead. Cam.

It's going to let you finish your point. Go ahead. Cam.

No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,

RC, please. Like I understand that Dan, you're saying this from your logical football mind, right? That there's no way you put Shadur Sanders out there this week with this sorry group of people around him and then expect him to play well, right? But what I'm saying is life ain't fair, right? I'm saying that is the fair thing to think. And I'm telling you this from a dude that wasn't drafted.

I knew that when I got my shot it didn't matter what was going on around me that my film had to be hot. My film had to be a thing because I'm not being judged like the other people around me whether that's fair or not.

And I don't feel like Shadur Sanders is sitting in the spot where we're looking at all things equal. Yeah, I don't think that the Cleveland Browns are putting Shadour out there this weekend and sitting there going, you gotta win, you gotta throw for 275 plus, you gotta have two plus touchdowns, and have the best quarterback performance of anybody this season for us before you're done.

You gotta play decent football. You gotta play decent football. We ain't even getting specific.

Sure. You gotta play football and you cannot look like you look. Go ahead, Cam. OK, so what I would say in layman's terms of what has all been said is, given the circumstances that Shadur Sanders has been faced with from what we've known to have known, we see a coach that not only makes it about reps and not getting reps, and we all know that getting reps as a backup, you don't get reps with the first team. You're one play away. But then you ask the question, well, did the backup get reps when another starter was there

in Joe Flacco? The answer was yes. OK, that was kind of like highly questionable. And then what people aren't saying, this is the same coach that was not saying his name in the media for a substantial amount of time too. So given this type of circumstances and this type of treatment, this is a make or break situation for Shadour. And it is unfortunate. And to Ryan Clark's point,

it is one of those things where like, bro, you have to make sure that the film that you put out there has to be sizzling because if it's not, somebody's going to say, see, look at your boy. I told you he was no different.

I mean, look, two picks, interception, we still didn't win. And when you have that type of realization, it's not gonna look good for the optics for you moving forward as the starter in the coming weeks.

Go ahead, Steven.

Dan Olofsky, Dan Olofsky, we saw Jerry Judy and how terse his responses were when he was speaking at a press conference just the other day. wouldn't give anything more than seven words, a seven-word answer, you know what I'm saying? And everybody was like, oh my goodness, he's checked out. That's what they were talking about on Cleveland Radio and all of this other stuff. So Shadur Sanders completes 25% of his passes, throw for 47 yards, has a passer rating of 13.5.

Dan, if that happened to him again, if that happens to him again this Sunday against the Las Vegas Raiders, not Houston, Texas, not the defense we saw last night,

against the Las Vegas Raiders, what do you think is going to happen to shoot Doris Sanders?

Yeah,

I can't answer that question, Stephen A,

but here's,

no,

but no,

no, I can't answer that question Stephen 8, but here's no but no no no no no Here's here's what I have to say because I'm not making the decision I'm not making the decision for of 16 and all that there was not much else should door could have done in the situation The problems are bad on offense. So like that's what I'm trying to curb your expectation We're not talking about our deeply. Go ahead. I'm not the expectation of him, right? I'm not saying I expect Shadour Sanders to go out and elevate this offense And now all of a sudden it's gonna be one of the best office. It's not gonna be the Dallas Cowboys offense

That's not what we're saying What we're saying is this is a the feeling is that's what he has to do in order to earn another chance at the starting quarterback Because you do it like I do it I already know that so you and I both know that LeVarden had an opportunity in the corner of the end zone With the woozy a to catch a touchdown and now we're looking at a different game that goes into overtime, right? Right, we both know the dig to fanning was an opportunity where he had space in the pocket

Right and could deliver it the pastor Jerry Judy on the crosser that Jerry, like we see all that, right? We see that there were some good things that happened against the Baltimore Ravens. But my point is this, he has to go out and do all the little things that no matter what people say about Dylan Gabriel, he was able to do. Get it out of his hands, be quick with his reads, anticipate, right? He was able to do some of those things in the short field. And now, the chances Dylan Gabriel would not take,

Shadur Sanders is going to be asked to take, because if he just does exactly what Dylan Gabriel

was able to do, that's not good enough.

Yeah, I'm with you. I'm just saying, like, one, don't expect this to be this unbelievable Cam Newton versus the Arizona Cardinals throws for 400 in his first time, like holy smokes, who's this human being? Because it's not the necessary people around it. The two with the Stefanski stuff,

like Stefanski's also the coach that everyone said trotted Baker Mayfield out there and purposely tried to get him to play bad and threw it 50 times. So I just think like, the is going to do what's best or what he at least believes is best for the player and for the team.

It may not be in our opinion what is necessarily the right

stuff.

I just don't think that there's like this ulterior motive of let's go get your door to play

poorly.

No I agree with. Well I think my point is that's not wrong because Kevin Stefanski's job is to get the team ready to play, which in my estimation would have been last week making sure if Shadur Sanders was the number two, he was prepared if that came. That's where I feel Kevin Stefanski missed.

I know Kevin Stefanski. Kevin Stefanski's a great coach and he's a really good man. I don't believe in any way he's intentionally sabotaging Shadur Sanders.

Last word.

Go ahead, Steve. That's fine. That's fine. And as I told you all before, I put myself on front street. I'm certainly going to give him the benefit of the doubt, because I've known his daddy for years, who's been an NBA executive.

I've known his daddy more than 25 years, okay? So I don't root against Kevin Stefanski. I root for the Stefanskis because of Ed Stefanski. But what I'm saying to you is that as a person watching on the outside, we can't negate this is how it looks. We want to ignore everything that happened leading up to the NFL draft. We can't ignore that stuff.

They bring it up every time they're writing an article about this kid. OK, we got to take those things into consideration, okay? The way he has suffered because of that, et cetera. And then we have to take into account, once again, me being in this business for 30 years. Okay, you don't want to say that about Kevin Stefanski?

Fine.

I know of instances where there have been players who have been sabotaged by coaches because coaches wanted to send a message. This is not a person that we want on our squad. We don't know if this is a person that we want and that somebody else should want to disqualify. Am I saying that's Kevin Stefanski? Of course,

I'm not saying that. What I'm saying to you is that there are people that look at Shadur Sanders, lack of preparation for that game and that popped into their head. And if we see something this weekend, similar to that, knowing the kind of quality Coach Kevin Stefanski is, you're going to have people thinking that way.

So RC and D.O. with all of their NFL expertise and their connections and the people that they know along with Cam in the National Football League, you're absolutely right to take the position that you're taking.

But you have to understand there are many,

many people who don't have that attachment who aren't as close,

who don't know as much that are going to think otherwise. And a lot of those people are in the city of Cleveland. You can book it.

It feels like there's only one way to go since he's making his first career NFL start It feels like there's only one way to go since he's making his first career NFL start and he's going to hopefully play the entirety of the game.