Cleveland's backup quarterback hierarchy inverted over three August games. Dillon Gabriel, the Oregon transfer signed as an undrafted free agent in April, now sits second on the depth chart behind Deshaun Watson. Shedeur Sanders, the Colorado product selected 47th overall in April's draft, dropped to third after completing 31 of 52 attempts across three preseason appearances.
Gabriel completed 38 of 51 passes for 412 yards and three touchdowns in the same window, including a 127.4 passer rating against New England on Thursday. He threw zero interceptions. Sanders posted a 74.1 rating and was intercepted twice, once in traffic against Detroit and once on a forced throw in the 37-13 Patriots win. The coaching staff made the depth-chart adjustment official Monday morning, confirmed by offensive coordinator Ken Dorsey in a brief media session.
The inversion matters because Cleveland allocated $2.1 million in draft capital to Sanders—second-round pick, four-year rookie deal with offset language—while Gabriel carries a $2.52 million guarantee over three years, most of it workout bonuses. The franchise now holds a cheaper asset with better August film in the role that matters most if Watson misses time. Watson's $46 million fully guaranteed salary this season makes the backup calculus acute: if he's sidelined for any stretch, the Browns burn cash on the bench while trotting out the second-stringer. Gabriel's emergence means that second-stringer costs 40% less in cap space than Sanders would have, freeing room for in-season moves.
The personnel reversal also signals how Cleveland's front office weighs combine metrics against processing speed. Sanders ran a 4.89 forty-yard dash at the Combine and posted a 31 on the Wonderlic. Gabriel ran 4.78 and scored 28, but his college tape showed pre-snap recognition that translated cleanly to Dorsey's West Coast concepts. Dorsey, who coached Josh Allen in Buffalo, prioritizes pocket patience over arm talent in the backup role. Gabriel's 8.08 yards per attempt in preseason is the highest among Browns quarterbacks since 2019, when Baker Mayfield posted 8.2 in limited August reps.
Sanders' slide creates a roster-construction question for general manager Andrew Berry. The team has until August 29 to cut the roster to 53 players. Keeping three quarterbacks is standard, but Sanders' second-round pedigree makes him tradeable if a contender loses a backup in final cuts. Philadelphia, for instance, carries only Jalen Hurts and Tanner McKee after Kenny Pickett's June release. If Sanders moves, Cleveland recoups a late Day 3 pick and clears a roster spot for a developmental lineman. If he stays, the franchise holds a lottery ticket that may appreciate if Gabriel or Watson gets hurt—but the ticket cost $2.1 million in capital that could have gone elsewhere.
The Shedeur Sanders brand presents a secondary wrinkle. His father, Deion Sanders, coaches at Colorado and draws significant media oxygen. Cleveland's front office is notably press-averse; Berry has held four unscheduled media availabilities since taking the job in 2020. Shedeur's presence generates questions about playing time and development philosophy that the organization prefers not to answer. Gabriel, by contrast, has no famous relatives and no social-media following above 80,000 on any platform. He gives Cleveland the same insurance policy without the external noise.
Watch for roster moves before the August 29 deadline. If Sanders appears on the transaction wire, check which teams called. Philadelphia and Las Vegas both have thin quarterback rooms. If he stays, track his practice reps in September—Berry historically keeps high draft picks for at least one full season before evaluating trade value. The next data point arrives September 8, when Cleveland opens in Dallas. Watson starts, but the backup who warms up on the sideline will tell you which way the franchise is leaning on its $2.1 million question.
Gabriel signed autographs for 22 minutes after Thursday's win, longer than any other Browns player. Watson left the facility in six. Small detail, but the kind team sponsors notice when planning activation events.
The takeaway
Cleveland's backup QB hierarchy flipped after Gabriel outplayed second-round pick Sanders across three August games, creating a trade or roster-construction choice by August 29.
Want the 60-second program for your specific event?
Enter your event and email — we build it and send the branded proposal before lunch. No obligation.
The branded-identity layer Chiefs of Staff and heritage CMOs route through — your name imprinted on real authorized stock, your pick of 200+ brands and 70,000 products, shipped from one accountable house. Nine editorial desks publish the intelligence those operators read before they sign.
200+authorized brands
70,000products · virtual proof on each
9 deskspublishing daily
1997one house, since
70,000 SKUs · virtual proof in 60 seconds · no platform fee · blind-shipped · ASI #217876
Your next customer won't visit your website. Their AI will.
AI assistants have quietly taken over the first step of buying — they answer from catalogs they can read and shortlist whoever can actually ship. Two questions now decide whether you exist to that buyer: can a machine read your catalog, and can you fulfill the order. Most brands fail one or both and never find out why the orders went elsewhere. The winners of this shift aren't the loudest. They're the most readable. Build for the machine that's about to do the shopping.
Built by the craft floor — apparel, media, packaging, and secure print.
This trade runs on hands, not desks. Imprint manufacturing & Komori Press · Canon high-speed secure-media operations is a craft floor — genuine Six Sigma discipline applied to ink, thread, foil, and registration, where a hundredth of an inch is the difference between a brand that reads serious and one that reads cheap. POPS4 is built by exactly those operators: independent, boots-on-the-ground engineers who carry their own book, read a client in microseconds, and put their name on every run. Beyond our own Virginia Beach floor, we work with a vetted network of craft manufacturers across the US — each meeting the highest excellence in QC standards in the industry, each a specialist in its own discipline — so apparel, hard-goods imprinting, media manufacturing, packaging, and secure printing all go to the bench built for them, coordinated from one accountable hub. Short-run from twenty-five units, volume to five hundred thousand. Two hundred authorized national brands, seventy thousand SKUs with virtual proofing on every one. Art archived for instant reorders. Net-thirty corporate terms, NDA-standard white-label — your name on the work, or none at all.
Strategy, positioning, identity, creative, and messaging — wired into an AI system that publishes and distributes on its own. Nine editorial desks generate the authority, the production house ships the physical proof, and the attribution layer tells you which post sold which SKU. What you get is an operating layer — content, catalog, and order path under one roof — that keeps working whether or not you are in the room. Built for principals who would rather own the machine than rent the agency.
Named-account programs — one desk, quiet delivery, NDA-standard.
One point of contact who already knows the file, so nothing restarts from zero between engagements. The work ships blind, under NDA, with your name on it or none at all. Built for single-family offices, heritage-house CMOs, sports-ownership groups, and the agencies that white-label our production. The relationship is the product; the merch is the proof of it.
SFO · Chief of Staff desk. Principal household, properties, aircraft, yacht, calendar, philanthropy — one file.
Shop seventy thousand products. Virtual proof on every one. 24/7.
Drop your logo on any product and see the virtual proof before asking. Quote routes direct to the desk. MCP catalog for AI agents. Celeste for the fast conversation. Full self-service checkout in development.