Cleveland Browns

Fifty-three sacks. Cleveland's defense got home fifty-three times this year — top three in the league, ninety-fourth percentile — and that's the headline for a team that finished thirty-first in offensive expected points added. We're walking through how the defense smashed, how the quarterback room got muffed, and what Quinshon Judkins and Harold Fannin actually built in a lost year. Five and twelve. No playoffs. Sixth among the AFC's non-playoff teams. The defense gave Cleveland an identity. The offense gave them December.

Start with the team by the numbers, because the split is wild. On defense — and remember, a big negative number is elite — Cleveland's expected points added allowed finished at minus ninety-five point three. Fifth in the league, eighty-eighth percentile. On offense? Minus one hundred ninety-five point five. Thirty-first. Sixth percentile. One of the widest unit-to-unit gaps in football. Third downs tell the same story — thirty-four point five percent, twenty-ninth in the league. And the variance was real: a thirty-one to six smashing of the Dolphins in Week 7, a three to thirty-one no-show against the Bears in Week 15. Boom-or-bust offense, week to week. The defense kept them in games. The offense decided which ones.

Now let's talk about the passing offense, because this is where Cleveland got muffed. Total passing expected points added landed at minus one hundred seventy-five point one on six hundred eleven attempts — minus zero point two nine per dropback, dead last in the league. Add fifty-one sacks allowed on six hundred forty-one dropbacks — an eight percent sack rate — and you've got a passing game that couldn't stay on schedule or push the ball downfield. Shedeur Sanders started eight games and threw for fourteen hundred yards, seven touchdowns, ten interceptions, with a completion percentage three point six points below expectation — meaning he completed three point six percent fewer passes than an average quarterback would have in the same spots. Steady floor of struggle, low ceiling. The unit's leading receiver was a tight end — Harold Fannin caught seventy-two balls for seven hundred thirty-one yards and six scores. When your top target is a rookie tight end, you've got a wide receiver problem.

Now let's dig into the rushing offense, because this one was quietly below average. Cleveland ran for ninety-seven point one yards a game on three point nine a carry — twenty-seventh in the league, nineteenth percentile. Total rushing expected points added landed at minus twenty-two point one on four hundred twenty-three attempts. Not catastrophic. Just not enough to bail out the passing game. Quinshon Judkins carried the load — two hundred thirty carries, eight hundred twenty-seven yards, seven touchdowns, with rush yards over expected of plus sixty-eight point seven. That's a back creating yards his blocking didn't give him. The forty-six yard touchdown against the Dolphins in Week 7 — direct snap, right guard, gone — was the ceiling. The three point six a carry was the floor. Cleveland never found the in-between.

Next up, the pass defense, and this is where Cleveland actually smashed. Fifty-three sacks, third in the league. Passing expected points added allowed came in at minus seventy-one point zero. Eighty-fourth percentile pass defense, eighty-fourth percentile in quarterback hits, eighty-first percentile third-down stop rate. The takeaway number — eighteen total, eleven interceptions, seven fumble recoveries — was the soft spot at twenty-second in the league, but when they took the ball away, they took it in style. Week 1 against the Bengals, Devin Bush picked off Joe Burrow at the goal line and took it ninety-seven yards the other way — a swing of more than twelve expected points on a single snap. That was the identity all year. Get home, get off the field, occasionally take it to the house.

And the run defense matched it. Cleveland allowed one hundred seventeen point five rushing yards a game, but the efficiency number is what matters — minus zero point zero five expected points added allowed per carry, eighty-fourth percentile. A front that didn't get gashed, steady all year — there wasn't a week the run defense was the reason they lost. When the offense gave them anything at all, this group held up. There just weren't enough of those nights.

Welcome back to Muffed. The Cleveland Browns just walked out of the 2026 draft with ten picks, a top-ten swing on the trenches, and a class that leans so hard offensive it's practically tilted. Andrew Berry and Todd Monken stockpiled offensive talent like they were daring you to ask about the other side — then snuck in two defenders late. The headliner's a coin flip: Spencer Fano at nine or KC Concepcion at 24, with a sixth-round quarterback dart that might be the most fun bet of the weekend. Berry's own surprise of the class? Safety Emmanuel McNeil-Warren at 58. Let's get into it.

Start up front, because that's where Cleveland spent the premium capital. Utah tackle Spencer Fano came off the board at nine with a 9.77 Relative Athletic Score — a 0-to-10 grade against every tackle tested since 1987, putting Fano in the top 3 percent ever measured. Cleveland's 2025 protection absorbed 51 sacks and 134 quarterback hits; the answer at nine was to plant a top-decile athlete on the edge of the pocket. Then they doubled down. Florida's Austin Barber at pick 86 posted a 9.84 Relative Athletic Score — top 2 percent of tackles ever tested. At 146, Alabama center Parker Brailsford came in at 8.52. Berry invoked the JC Tretter and Tyler Linderbaum archetype — pivots who pull, climb, and stress the perimeter — saying Brailsford gives them "a lot of optionality in the run game." Asked if this was about Joel Bitonio's future, Berry pushed back: when this line was the best in the league, it was deep, not just good. Three offensive linemen, two inside the top 100, all three with strong testing. Smashed trenches weekend.

The passing-game investment is where this class shows its full hand. Cleveland's 2025 offense posted minus 175.52 total expected points added — minus 0.29 per play — with 16 touchdowns against 24 turnovers. Berry's answer: Texas A&M's KC Concepcion at 24, then Washington's Denzel Boston at 39. Boston's tape backs it — 62 catches, 881 yards, 11 touchdowns, with a plus 0.62 predicted points added per play for plus 45.44 on the season. Those 11 scores ranked 4th in the Big Ten, 13th nationally. At 170 they grabbed Cincinnati tight end Joe Royer — size, hands, in-line Y or flex F, plus 0.73 predicted points added per play, plus 26.36 total. Then in the seventh at 248, BYU's Carsen Ryan: 45 catches, 620 yards, plus 0.59 per play, and a 9.27 Relative Athletic Score — top 8 percent of tight ends ever tested. Two tight ends with elite efficiency profiles in the same class.

And then there's pick 182. Arkansas quarterback Taylen Green, and this is where Berry swung for the fence. The athletic case is loud: a 9.99 Relative Athletic Score. Essentially perfect. Berry compared the size-speed combination to Calvin Johnson territory. Production: 2,714 passing yards, 19 touchdowns, 11 picks, plus 779 rushing yards and 8 scores on 138 carries — plus 0.41 predicted points added per play, plus 170.54 on the season in the SEC. The honest tension is the turnover number — 37 across two seasons — and Berry addressed it head-on: high-volume dropback offense, brutal schedule, defense that couldn't get off the field. He invoked early-career Josh Allen: enough explosive plays to absorb the mistakes while the polish comes. Green is staying at quarterback. The pick is a developmental swing on rare physical tools, full stop.

Defense was lighter in volume but pointed. Cleveland's 2025 unit graded out reasonably — minus 71.01 passing expected points added allowed, 53 sacks delivered — but generated only 16 takeaways in 17 games and surrendered 1,998 rushing yards. Toledo safety Emmanuel McNeil-Warren went at 58: 77 tackles, 5.5 for loss, 6 pass breakups, and a 9.41 Relative Athletic Score — top 6 percent of free safeties ever measured. Berry called him "a DNA match for this defense" — speed, range, willing to trade a little size for it. At 149, Alabama linebacker Justin Jefferson: 79 tackles, 6.5 for loss, 3 sacks, 5 pass breakups, and a 9.23 Relative Athletic Score, with special-teams value baked in for a year-one floor. Two athletic testing monsters, both north of 9.2.

Pick of the draft. You can argue Concepcion in round one. The answer is Fano — and not just for the testing score. Cleveland spent five picks on the passing game, including a developmental quarterback whose entire path depends on clean pockets and a functional run game. None of those bets cash without the tackle position stabilizing first. Fano at nine, Barber at 86, Brailsford at 146 — that's the foundation everything else is built on. The receivers and tight ends and the swing on Green are the headlines. Fano is the load-bearing wall.

The 2026 question is whether the defensive math holds. This draft answered with exactly two defensive picks, both Day 2 or later, both leaning on testing over premium college production. McNeil-Warren had zero interceptions at Toledo despite the 6 pass breakups. Jefferson is a fifth-round linebacker whose path to snaps runs through special teams. If the offense doesn't come alive behind the rebuilt line and the receiver investment, the defense is being asked to carry heavier with very little fresh help. But the bet is clear: protect the quarterback, give the playmakers more playmakers, let the existing defensive core hold serve.