Shedeur Sanders’ Bold Request: Why He Wanted Kevin Stefanski to Command Browns’ Final Drive

The Cleveland quarterback looked back on a sour end to his preseason.

Shedeur Sanders endured a rough preseason outing Saturday. / Ken Blaze-Imagn Images

On Saturday, the Browns’ never-ending quarterback saga took yet another turn as Cleveland quarterback Shedeur Sanders—the only one of the team’s gunslingers to truly struggle—unsuccessfully pled with coach Kevin Stefanski to let him lead the team’s last drive against the Rams.

Stefanski rebuffed Sanders’s request, but brushed off the moment after the game as the natural activity of a competitor. Sanders, talking with reporters postgame, did likewise.

“In the heart of competition, that’s what you ask for,” Sanders said via Mary Kay Cabot of cleveland.com. “That’s what you asked for within the game. If I could go back and do anything, I mean it’s always everything in life if you had that chance, but we don’t have the luxury to travel back in time.”

Sanders noted that part of the reason for his confusion came from his belief he would go back in while riding an exercise bike—and expressed that he had no regrets reacting the way he did. Ultimately, quarterback Tyler Huntley polished off the Browns’ 19–17 win.

“In the heat of the battle, you want to be that alpha. You want to be that dog. You want to be out there in that final two-minute drive,” Sanders said. “So of course, small things, of course frustrate, but that’s what happens when you want to be a player to be able to change a franchise.”