Browns sign Grant Delpit running mate with 63 career starts

The Cleveland Browns are adding a former divisional rival to the team.

Veteran safety Damontae Kazee, who last played for the Pittsburgh Steelers, is reportedly signing with the Browns, per Mike Garafolo of the NFL Network.

“The #Browns are signing veteran S Damontae Kazee today, source says. After three years with the #Steelers, Kazee heads elsewhere in the AFC North,” Garafolo wrote in a post on X (formerly Twitter) on Monday.

Kazee is joining the Browns’ secondary that also features 2024 16-game starter defensive back Grant Delpit. In the 2024 NFL season, the Browns were last in the entire league with just a 0.78 percent defensive interception rate. They only had a total of four defensive interceptions, two from cornerback Denzel Ward and one each from linebacker Jeremiah Owusu-Koramoah and cornerback Greg Newsome II.

The 31-year-old Kazee, who will be turning 32 in June, spent his last three seasons in the NFL in a Steelers uniform. From the 2022 season to the 2024 campaign, the San Diego State Aztecs product had five interceptions, seven passes defended, two fumble recoveries and a total of 112 combined tackles through 38 games (14 starts) for the Steelers.

Before joining the Steelers in 2023, Kazee had a one-year stint in 2021 with the Dallas Cowboys. But his first team in the NFL was the Atlanta Falcons, who took him in the fifth round of the 2017 NFL draft as that year’s 149th pick overall. After a mediocre rookie season, Kazee turned plenty of heads with a seven-interception campaign in 2018 with Atlanta. He also had 10 passes defended and 82 combined tackles that season. Overall in his NFL career to date, Damontae Kazee has 17 interceptions through 107 appearances with 63 starts.

The Browns’ move on Kazee came after Cleveland spent zero picks in the 2025 NFL draft on a defensive back. The first two picks by the Browns in the draft were on a defensive tackle and a linebacker in Mason Graham and Carson Schwesinger, respectively, but they did not select another defensive player for the remainder of the event.