Insider debunks wild theory about draft slide of Browns' Shedeur Sanders

During a Wednesday appearance on Los Angeles radio station AM 570 LA Sports, Hall of Famer Eric Dickerson raised eyebrows  when he claimed that he heard from "a very good source" that Shedeur Sanders slid to the fifth round of the 2025 NFL Draft because the NFL told teams not to select the current Cleveland Browns quarterback.

"They were forced into drafting him because somebody made a call," Dickerson added about the Browns trading up to grab Sanders with overall pick No. 144 . "This is an NFL-side source for sure." 

Well-known league insider Albert Breer of Sports Illustrated later poured cold water over Dickerson's claim.

"I always think these sorts of conspiracies are a little overdone," Breer said during a Thursday appearance on "The Dan Patrick Show," as shared by Paul Kasabian of Bleacher Report. "I don't think there was any conspiracy here. I think it's relatively simple what happened. I think the great majority of NFL teams did not view [Sanders] as a first-round prospect, contrary to what had been out there for the year previous. And then I think what happens is once you get past the first round, you look at the history over the years, not a lot of quarterbacks go in the second or third rounds."

It was reported shortly before the draft got underway that one "longtime NFL assistant coach" said that Sanders completed "the worst formal interview I've ever been in in my life" during the predraft process. A different story suggested that Sanders essentially bombed a predraft visit wit h New York Giants head coach Brian Daboll.

Additionally, media personality Skip Bayless repeatedly insisted during the spring that he knows Las Vegas Raiders minority owner Tom Brady "told the Raiders not to take Shedeur." 

People within the Browns have made it clear since they drafted quarterback Dillon Gabriel in the third round of this year's player-selection process that they prefer Gabriel over Sanders. Cleveland's unofficial depth charts since the start of springtime workouts have led some to assume that Browns owner Jimmy Haslam was at least somewhat responsible for Sanders ending up with the AFC North club.

Back on July 29, Haslam said that Browns general manager Andrew Berry was responsible for the Sanders pick. 

Whatever did and/or didn't happen behind the scenes earlier this year, it now seems Sanders will enter Cleveland's regular-season opener against the Cincinnati Bengals on Sept. 7 as his club's third- or fourth-choice option at the position. It remains to be seen if he can play well enough in Saturday's preseason finale versus the Los Angeles Rams to leapfrog at least Gabriel on the depth chart. 

Veteran Joe Flacco is on track to serve as the Browns' QB1 until further notice.