Baker Mayfield may not start at quarterback for the Cleveland Browns come Week 1 of the 2018 season, but he’s already showing signs for the future.
By all accounts, it will be Tyrod Taylor taking up the helm of the Cleveland Browns offense to start the 2018 season as opposed to rookie Baker Mayfield. For once, the Browns are afforded the luxury of having a stopgap to let a young player develop behind. Perhaps that in itself is enough to inspire confidence that their long-lasting quarterback woes have finally subsided.
Or perhaps Mayfield himself is enough to make you believe that.
Yes, the selection of the former Sooner at No. 1 overall turned heads in the 2018 NFL Draft. Many experts did not have Mayfield pegged as the best quarterback — or player for that matter — in the class. However, the Browns saw something in the young man that made them confident in his ability to be the leader of the franchise.
It seems that his new teammates in Cleveland too. In the midst of OTAs, NFL Draft Insider Jared Tokarz dropped this nugget about how Mayfield’s teammates are reacting to the new signal-caller in town:
Therein lies one of the major things that makes Baker Mayfield special. Personally, I also believe that his accuracy and tools on the field also set him apart, despite the issues that some have with his height and/or size. However, one thing that Mayfield blows every other quarterback in the 2018 class away with is his charisma in leadership.
Throughout the draft process, there were people trying to call the character of Mayfield into question. In fairness to those people, his judgment on and off the field has not always been great. Having said that, there’s something valuable in having a fiery, confident and brazen player at the most important position on the field.
A quarterback is the man that the other 52 men on an NFL roster follow into battle on Sundays, Mondays and the occasional Thursday. They take his lead and go as he goes, in most cases at least. For a team like the Browns, that’s something that they’ve sorely been lacking for as long as they’ve been back in the league.
Next: NFL QB Power Rankings 2018: Pre-training camp
While Mayfield hasn’t played a single down and hasn’t yet even cracked the conversation about who’s starting for Cleveland, he appears to have the intangible tools to finally be that guy. He might ruffle some feathers, but it’s apparently already becoming clear that it works in the locker room. And if his teammates are gravitating towards him and getting behind him and that translates to success, the ruffling of feathers seems like a highly forgettable offense.