If Cleveland doesn’t want to give Mayfield a long-term deal it could look to the draft
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Baker Mayfield was pretty good in 2020, in part because he’s a good player, but also thanks to Kevin Stefanski’s system, which features one of the league’s best offensive lines and provides a nice balance of run and pass. There’s also that young, physical, fast defense that was only supposed to get better in ’21.
But injuries on both sides of the ball — starting with Mayfield — have sidetracked a promising start to the 2021 campaign and the Browns, who were 3-1 on Oct. 3 now find themselves 5-5 and in last place in the AFC North. Just so we’re clear: This isn’t all Mayfield’s fault, but he’s got one more year on his rookie deal (he’ll make more than $18 million in ’22) and if the team wants to re-sign him it’ll likely cost north of $35 million a year. That’s a hard figure to square with how he’s played this season, which is a long-winded way of saying: Maybe the Browns will look to the draft for his replacement.
Kenny Pickett has been the “from outta nowhere” story of the college football season, mirroring in some ways what we saw from Zach Wilson and Joe Burrow in previous years. The difference, and it’s something we’ve noted in recent weeks, is that we don’t have Pickett with a first-round grade (while Wilson and Burrow were first-rounders in our mind) but that doesn’t mean at least one NFL team feels differently, especially when you factor in the economics of a rookie contract versus franchise-QB money.
It’s just one of the many storylines to keep an eye on as we move through the pre-draft process.
Alright, keep reading to see how all 32 picks unfold.
One other thing, and this is important: now that we’re past the midway point of the season, we’re using the 2022 NFL Draft order (via tankathon, with results prior to Monday’s game) to determine selections 1-32 below.
