Look at your watches. Look at the calendars on your walls. The whistle has blown. The gates have latched shut. And the Cleveland Browns have officially dispersed. The clock has struck midnight on the mandatory mini camp. And as of this moment, we are staring down the barrel of a six-week void, a dead zone where the fields are empty.
But the implications of what just transpired are screaming for our attention. We have hit the break. And while most people are looking toward the beach or the golf course, we need to have a very serious, very uncomfortable conversation about what happened on those practice fields over the last few days because the propaganda machine is spinning.
The narratives are being polished. And if you aren’t paying close attention to the actual words coming out of the mouths of the men in charge, you are going to miss the most significant shift this franchise has seen in years. We need to talk about reality versus delusion. We need to talk about the difference between a player who is operating a machine and a player who is trying to remember where he left the keys to one.
I have watched the tape. I have listened to the press conferences and I have analyzed the transcripts from coach Todd Monkin and QB coach Mike and what I am seeing is a collision between technical excellence and emotional sentimentality. If you strip away the jersey numbers and the names on the back and you just look at the mechanics of the game, >> what is it? 10 or 12 weeks, whatever it’s been, he’s done a great job of of defining his footwork, playing with a base, uh, learning the offense, working his butt off to, you know, to
really master his craft. And it’s been fun to watch Sean. He’s done a really good job. He’s gone like that. He’s getting through progressions, getting through progressions faster. Uh, and his feet are matching that that that mindset. >> Todd, just to put a bow on this, uh, since we didn’t get to talk to you yesterday, now mini camp is officially over.
Last time we talked to you, you said chances are you will not have your quarterback. >> Yeah, I don’t see that. >> So, you’re just going to go into the summer break, status quo, and come back. >> We’ll start off all camp just like we’ve been doing. We’ll alternate those guys. Will you ever will you have a run with me by uh having the pads on which push into the second week of training camp? >> That’d be great.
I don’t know if I will, but I’d love to. I’d love to have it now. We just do. >> Todd, what has stood out to you about Shor’s body at work? I know we talked about the progress that he made, but you know, he’s put a cap on a workout program kind of encapsulate uh the growth that you see. >> Well, I just think he’s doing a better job.
I think he’s being more decisive now. It’s easy to say we’re not in pads. It just feels like he’s making quicker decisions. The ball’s coming out of his hands, which he’s going to have to do. Not that he doesn’t have playmaking ability cuz he does. But his ability to process quicker and get the ball out of his hands and eliminate lost yardage plays is going to be huge for us to be able to stack plays and score, which is ultimately the number one thing to do.
But is that the point of waiting for pads to >> to determine your one, two, three? >> 100%. >> It’s hard to really say. >> It’s hard to say. And >> you know, I mean, whether it would have been a little legit pressure, it wouldn’t have been. Would he have had all that time, I don’t know. There’s still a lot to see quarterbacks and the old line, especially once we put the pads on.
I mean, you know, >> is there any negative since you wanted your quarterback now? Is there any negative that heading into training camp, at least at the beginning, you don’t have? >> Well, I don’t see it that way. It would be if I didn’t think either one of them were capable of of starting. I It would feel different if I didn’t feel like their progression hadn’t gotten to this point where I think they both can start and play winning football.
I’m convinced of it and I I’d say it I’d say it if I didn’t. I mean I I’m just I can’t decide now because I think both have earned the opportunity to continue to compete once we put the pads on. thought was saying yesterday he was talking about the difference in system and he said there’s a lot more more responsibility on the quarterback in this you know kind of paraphrasing a little bit but the responsibility placed on the quarterback play [clears throat] you know what they’re asked to do is different um I you would think that would be the case in any system but can
you maybe dissect maybe a little bit of what he’s talking about in terms of what you ask your quarterbacks to do that might be a while. I don’t know that. I mean, what you ask your quarterback to do is a byproduct of what they’re capable of doing and how much ownership they want in QB control, right? Some guys want them, some guys don’t, some guys don’t want.
>> It becomes clear that we are witnessing a revelation in the form of Shedor Sanders. Let’s start with the concept that is going to define this entire off season. It’s a phrase that Todd Monkin used and it’s a phrase that should be studied by anyone who wants to understand the psychology of an elite signal caller.
He said Shedor Sanders wants that smoke. Let that sink in for a second. Let it marinate. He wants that smoke. On the surface, it sounds like standard football jargon, a coach praising a player’s competitive fire. But when you peel back the layers, when you look at the film that Monkin is referencing, it exposes a fundamental truth about who is currently in command of this offense. You watch the footage.
You watch Shudder Sanders walk up to that line of scrimmage. He isn’t just standing there waiting for the play to happen to him. He is hunting. You see him making signals to the wide receivers, pointing out the subtle shifts in the secondary and having the sheer processing speed to change the pass progression before the ball is even snapped.
This is what Monin means by the smoke. >> Cuz when they take that control or they change a play or they change a protection, it falls on them right now. They’re the ones that have to explain why they did what they did. Not everybody wants that. Our guys want that, which is cool because again, no, not everybody wants that. Not everybody wants to be that diligent and work at it to where when the moment comes up, they’re capable at the line of scrimmage of getting us into a premium play.
And all of our guys are capable of that, which >> he is talking about a quarterback who isn’t afraid to take the wheel of a high-speed vehicle in heavy traffic. He is talking about the mental fortitude to see a defense trying to disguise a look and having the audacity to say, “I see exactly what you’re doing and I’m going to punish you for it.
” This isn’t just development. It is an assertion of dominance. While others are trying to learn the playbook, Shadir Sanders is rewriting it at the line of scrimmage. Now, we have to address the QB tracker. I’m going to be honest with you. I’m not a fan of these daily stat counts in mini camp.
They are often stripped of context and used to create false narratives. But since the media is obsessed with them, let’s look at the facts. Let’s look at the actual numbers from mandatory mini camp number three because they tell a story of surgical precision that the box score alone cannot capture. Shadur Sanders went 10 of 13. He had no touchdowns. He had no interceptions.
And to the casual fan, that might look like a pedestrian day, but you have to understand the objective. Todd Monin wasn’t asking for the long game today. He wasn’t looking for the 60-yard highlight reel throw that makes the evening news. Today was about the short game. It was about quick screens. It was about quick outs.
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It was about quick slants. Monin wanted the ball out of the quarterback’s hands in a heartbeat. He was testing the internal clock. He was testing the rhythm. He was testing the foot speed and in that specific high-pressure environment of rapid fire execution, Shedder Sanders was the superior performer. He wasn’t just good. He was the better quarterback on the field. I’m not being biased.
I’m looking at the data. He had the biggest plays of the camp. He lit it up. While Deshawn Watson went 14 of 18 with two touchdowns and Dylan Gabriel went five of six with a score. Those numbers exist within a vacuum. When you look at the how and the why, the story changes. This brings us to the crux of the disagreement.
The point where the math stops mathing for the Watson supporters and the reality of the coaching staff’s words starts to take over. We need to pay very close attention to the linguistics of Todd Monkin and coach Mike. There is a massive gaping canyon between how they speak about Shadur Sanders and how they speak about Deshaawn Watson.
And if you aren’t listening to the subtext, you are flying blind. When the coaches talk about Shadur, the language is technical, precise, and grounded in the tangibles of the position. They talk about foot speed. They talk about processing information. They talk about getting the ball out of his hands fast. They talk about moving the sticks.
These are the building blocks of a great quarterback. These are the measurable repeatable actions that win football games on Sunday. When they talk about shedur, they are talking about a machine that is functioning at peak efficiency. Now contrast that with the way they talk about Deshaawn Watson. Pay close attention to the vocabulary.
>> Todd, what has stood out to you about Shor’s body of work? I know we talked off the progress that you made, but you know, she put a cap on the workout program. can kind of encapsulate uh the growth that you see. >> Well, I just think he’s doing a better job. I think he’s being more decisive now. It’s easy to say we’re not in pads.
It just feels like he’s making quicker decisions. The ball’s coming out of his hands, which he’s going to have to do. Now, D doesn’t have playmaking ability because he does, but his ability to process quicker and get the ball out of his hands and eliminate lost yardage plays is going to be huge for us to be able to stack plays and score, which is ultimately the number one thing to do.
>> You mentioned uh some of the things that you would like to see from Shadore moving forward. Uh how about Deshawn? Are there things that you would still like to see from him as you go through camp? >> Sure. No, I think again. You’d have to ask uh Deshawn this. I think he’s excited to play again and to play at a high level.
>> When Watson’s name comes up, the technical jargon disappears. The talk of foot speed and processing power vanishes into thin air. Instead, we hear about excitement. We hear about how he wants to come back. We hear about his desire to get back to where he used to be. Do you hear the disconnect? Do you see the excitement fallacy in action? It is the belief that because a player is excited to return or because a coach is excited to have him back, the technical flaws and the processing delays will somehow take care of themselves. But excitement
is not a mechanic. Wanting to come back is not a pass progression. You cannot excitement your way through a zone blitz. You cannot desire your way into faster foot speed. When a coach spends his time talking about a player’s emotional state rather than his throwing mechanics, it is a red flag that should be visible from space.
They are talking about Watson’s scramble drill, sure, but they aren’t talking about his ability to sit in the pocket and dissect a defense with the same technical reverence they use for Shadur. They are talking about the idea of Deshawn Watson while they are talking about the reality of Shadur Sanders.
This mindset is dangerous for a franchise. It tells the fans that there is a secret vault of talent that Watson is just waiting to unlock while the guy standing right next to him is actually doing the work in the present tense. It defies the laws of football economics. You simply cannot prioritize excitement over execution and expect to win in a division this tough >> winning it. But it’s okay. We’re human.
We’re going to make mistakes. You’re you’re not going to play flawless football. It’s okay. Just go to the next play. Go to the next play. And I think the things you you don’t see out here, you do a little bit is I think plays with his feet. So that that’s that’s going to be a huge weapon for him. it has been in his career and as long as he’s healthy it will continue to be a weapon for >> let’s be crystal clear in a quarterback competition and make no mistake this is a competition whether the team admits it or not it has to be about who can throw
the football with the most accuracy it has to be about who has the fastest processing speed it has to be about the tangibles and right now according to the very coaches who are grading the film those tangibles belong to Shadur Coach Mike is in the room talking about foot speed and information processing. He is highlighting the very things that make a quarterback elite.
Shadurer has those things. Deshun Watson in his current form just doesn’t. That isn’t an attack. It’s an observation of the feedback we are getting from the building. The coaches are telling us exactly what they see. When it’s Shedure, it’s about mechanics. When it’s Watson, it’s about a mood. One is a business report, the other is a greeting card.
>> Um, what is it? 10 or 12 weeks, whatever it’s been, he’s done a great job of of defining his footwork, playing with a base, uh, learning the offense, working his butt off to, you know, to to really master his craft. And it’s been fun to watch Sean. He’s done a really good job. He’s gone like that. He’s getting through progressions.
getting through progressions faster uh and his feet are matching. >> And in the NFL business reports win championships. We saw the reports. We saw the QB tracker. We saw the short game drills where the ball had to be out in under two seconds. And we saw who excelled. We saw the signals at the line.
We saw the smoke that Shadur was so eager to embrace. You cannot demand to be the starter based on your past success if the current tape shows someone else is processing the game at a higher level. That is like a CEO demanding a bonus for a company that is losing market share just because he used to be successful a decade ago. It doesn’t work that way.
The irony is that while the media wants to focus on Watson’s return to form, the coaching staff is inadvertently creating a blueprint for why Shadur should be the man. They are praising his tangibles while offering excitement as a substitute for Watson’s performance. But you can’t pay the bills with excitement. You can’t move the sticks with a desire to come back.
The fans work hard for their money. They understand basic logic. They know that if you have two people doing a job and one is being praised for his technical proficiency and speed while the other is being praised for his enthusiasm, the first person is the one you want on the job when the pressure is on. And yet here we are heading into a six-w week break with this narrative hovering over the team.
The owners and the coaches are looking at the math and the math is starting to point in a very specific direction. They are looking at the disparity in the room. They are looking at the fact that Sheeter Sanders had the better camp. He had the biggest plays. He lit it up. I guarantee you there are conversations happening in those offices right now that would make the Watson camp very nervous.
Because when the excitement wears off and the training camp heat kicks in, the only thing that is going to matter is who can get the ball to the receiver on a slant route against a pressman corner. The only thing that is going to matter is whose feet are fast enough to escape the rush and whose brain is fast enough to find the open man.
The coaches have already told us who has that smoke. They’ve already told us who has the mechanics. The Ferrari fallacy in this situation is the belief that because Watson has the contract and the history, he is the better investment. But a Ferrari with a stalled engine is just a very expensive paperwe. Meanwhile, you have a high performance machine in Shedder Sanders that is already humming, already signaling at the line, and already processing information at a level that has the offensive coordinator using words like wanting the smoke. So, what happens now?
We wait. We wait 6 weeks for the reporting date of NFL training camp. But don’t let the silence fool you. The narrative has already been set. The technical evaluation has already begun. And if Watson doesn’t start showing more than just excitement to be back, the collision between his past reputation and Shadur’s current reality is going to be deafening.
I’m telling you right now, pay attention to the details. Listen to the way Monkin describes the short game and the ball out fast requirements. That wasn’t a random drill. That was a diagnostic test. And Shadur Sanders passed it with flying colors. It is time for the conversation to move past the story lines and start looking at the stick moving.
It is time to stop looking at the names and start looking at the foot speed because the coaches are already doing it. They are already telling us who the better quarterback is through the vocabulary they choose to use. One guy is processing information. The other guy is excited. One guy is moving the sticks. The other guy wants to get back. One guy has the tangibles.
The other guy has the narrative. I know which one I’m betting on when the season starts. The deadline for potential has passed. We are now in the era of performance. And as we head into this break, remember that the smoke isn’t just a catchphrase. It’s a requirement. If you can’t handle it, if you can’t process it, and if you can’t execute through it, you are going to be left in the dust.
Shadier Sanders is walking up to the line. He’s making the signals. He’s changing the play. He’s getting the ball out fast. He is doing everything the coaches have asked for. And he is doing it better than anyone else in that facility. That is the news. That is the reality. The rest is just noise. Make sure you hit that like button, subscribe to the channel, and turn on the notifications because when we come back in six weeks, the smoke is going to be even thicker and the excitement isn’t going to be enough to hide the truth.
We are going to be here covering every snap of the Shedder Sanders development because he is the story of this camp whether people are ready to admit it or not. I’m out. But before I go, just ask yourself this. When the game is on the line, do you want the guy the coaches say is excited or do you want the guy the coaches say is processing the information? The answer is obvious.
The numbers are in. The tape is clear. Shedder Sanders has the keys. He has the engine running. And he definitely wants the smoke. Peace.
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