The News Herald (Willoughby, OH)
Browns are big on ‘D’ but still short at QB
Garrett was No. 1 pick all the way; Peppers drafted after trade down
The happiest man in Browns headquarters today has to be defensive coordinator Gregg Williams.
Choosing to ignore quarterback in the first round again, the Browns chose defensive end Myles Garrett from Texas A&M with the first pick April 27 and then, after trading down with Houston for the 25th pick, they drafted safety Jabrill Peppers from Michigan.
“Gregg is probably in the swimming pool right now,” joked head coach Hue Jackson.
The Browns ranked 31st in the league defensively last year.
The Browns also drafted tight end David Njoku from Miami of Florida with the 29th pick after trading picks 33 and 108 to Houston.
Peppers had a diluted urine sample at the NFL Scouting Combine. The league considers that a failed drug test.
“We’re satisfied with our background check,” Executive Vice President Sashi Brown.
Peppers will be a defensive back with the Browns.
“They’ll get more than 200 percent effort out of me,” Peppers said in a conference call. “I’m going to show these guys what I can do. This is the best day of my life.”
Garrett has been determined for months to prove his ranking as the best player in the draft was justified. Then last week Warren Sapp blasted him, saying in an interview with ESPN: “I watch the tape and he disappears. I watch the tape, and he absolutely disappears.”
Garrett, during a conference call with media covering the Browns, said he will be motivated to prove Sapp wrong.
The knock by Sapp, who had a Hall of Fame career as a defensive lineman with Tampa Bay and Oakland, followed the criticism that Garrett takes plays off.
“It adds more fuel to the fire; it’s burning hot right now,” Garrett said. “If anybody counts me out, that’s not true for either of those statements. It doesn’t matter what they say. It matters what the pads say, what the grind says. I just want to be the best from Day One.”
Taking Garrett was no surprise at all, but then the Browns pulled a stunner. Instead of trading up for a quarterback, they traded the 12th pick to Houston for the 25th this year and the Texans’ first-round pick next year.
The Browns now have two first-round picks and three second-round picks in 2018 — but still no franchise quarterback.
Houston used the pick acquired from the Browns on quarterback Deshaun Watson. Two picks earlier, the Chiefs moved up from 27 to 10 to draft quarterback Patrick Mahomes from Texas Tech. Quarterback Mitchell Trubisky was taken by the Bears with the second pick.
Garrett, 6-foot-4, 272 pounds, had 32.5 sacks and 48.5 tackles for loss in three years at Texas A&M.
“Myles is a tremendous
teammate,” Texas A&M coach Kevin Sumlin said in a statement. “A great example of his perseverance and willingness to compete was after he was injured in our Arkansas game. He could have shut it down the rest of the season, but he worked hard to get back on the field. Even though he wasn’t 100 percent, he gave everything he had the remainder of the season, including the bowl game.”
The Browns finished 31st defensively in 2016, 30th in points allowed and 29th in sacks per pass play.
Reports from the national media repeatedly said the Browns were deciding between taking Garrett or Trubisky with the first pick. Any chance of taking Trubisky vanished when the Bears moved from third to second to take the quarterback from Mentor High School and North Carolina.
But Garrett said Browns head coach Hue Jackson assured him he would be the first pick all along.
“I believed him,” Garrett said. “I don’t have any reason to think that he would do me wrong. I just believed in what he was saying.
“He said I was his guy after we had dinner and that he wasn’t going to guarantee anything, but he said, ‘If you do the right things, you have a great chance of being a Brown.’ That’s what I’ve been looking forward to, and I’m ready to go.”
This was the first time since 2000 the Browns had the first pick. That year they selected defensive end Courtney Brown from Penn State. Brown started 47 games in five seasons for the Browns.