Sometimes a blessing can be a curse and sometimes a curse can be a blessing. Every organization makes mistakes; the decisions made in the wake of failure determine the fortunes of a franchise. Deshaun Watson wasn’t able to find his footing in Cleveland even before the Achilles injury; we hope the Browns will be able to find theirs now.

I’ve been a proponent of Cam Ward rising to the top of the upcoming draft’s QB crop since week two of the college football season, as predicted here. That was back when Shedeur Sanders and Carson Beck were the consensus Nos. 1 and 2 quarterbacks on the board, Jalen Milroe was seen as a second-rounder, and Ward was viewed as not being even one of the top five signal-callers in the class.

Since then, Milroe has climbed into the top 10 overall and Ward has joined him there, surpassing all passers other than Sanders and becoming QB2 for the current draft. It’s hard to picture Ward or Sanders not being serviceable in the NFL at this point, though few pundits foresaw what’s happened so far with Bryce Young.

What is known is that the past two years, the team not drafting first has seemed to have better success by allowing the second quarterback to fall into their lap without much deliberation needed thereabout; C.J. Stroud and Jayden Daniels have been sensational compared to Young and Caleb Williams, at least by what we’ve seen to this point.

Even with nothing but losses, Cleveland’s current draft position has fallen from two to three in past weeks, as the Carolina Panthers have overtaken the No. 2 slot behind only the New England Patriots; all three clubs are 1-6. The Tennessee Titans are currently fourth at 1-5, having already had their bye in week five.

The above positioning (in terms of breaking the three-way tie) is based on the current records of all 17 of the teams’ opponents, even though all the games have yet to be played and opponents’ records are obviously going to change.

Cleveland is in a division though with three teams that would figure to have a better combined end-of-season record than one would get making the same calculation for the divisions of the Pats, Panthers, and Titans. This would engender an expectation that the Browns would probably draft last out of those four teams if they all finished with the same mark, given that weakness of schedule carries the day for draft-order tiebreakers. So if Browns fans needed another reason to cheer against their division rivals, there it is.

But if the Browns as an organization are indeed capable of self-evaluation to an extent sufficient to acknowledge their own mistakes (as discussed here), they almost certainly should be in the market to spend a high pick on a quarterback in 2025.

How high they draft and whether or not they’re finally ready to begin washing away the rotten residue of a blockbuster trade that fell flat faster than Blockbuster itself, still remain to be known. But at least there’s reason to be hopeful looking ahead.

—@PoisonPill4