2018 Daily Norseman Community Mock Draft: Cleveland Browns, Pick #4

The first three picks of our Daily Norseman Community Mock Draft are officially in the books, ladies and gentlemen. If you want to review the results, you can take a look back at our stream for the entire Community Mock to see who has been selected thus far.

Now, for the second time in this Community Mock, we have a selection for the Cleveland Browns. This is the pick they acquired from the Houston Texans last season when Houston traded up to draft quarterback Deshaun Watson. Thanks in large part to an injury to Watson (along with numerous other injuries), the Texans were bad enough where the Browns wound up netting two top four picks in this year’s selection process.

I’m not going to recycle all of the info on the Browns as far as acquisitions and losses and team needs and things of that nature. If you’d like to review those, you can go back to the post I did when they picked at #1 overall. I’m also going to take the very, very bold step of assuming that the Browns are not going to select quarterbacks at both #1 and #4, which is going to limit our options this time around a little bit. As a matter of fact, I can only see three realistic options for Cleveland’s pick this time around, given the talent on the board as far as guys that are actually likely to go at #4 in this scenario.

Options

Bradley Chubb, DE, North Carolina State - The Browns already have two very capable edge rushers in Emmanuel Ogbah and last year’s #1 overall pick, Myles Garrett. Still, in today’s NFL, you can never have too much pass rush, and having Chubb to rotate in with Garrett and Ogbah would give the Browns’ defense a great deal of flexibility. I’m not entirely sure who would slot where in Cleveland’s defense if Chubb was the selection, but you could argue that he’s the best player left on the board at this point.

Minkah Fitzpatrick, DB, Alabama - As mentioned in the description of Fitzpatrick that we did for the Jets’ pick at #3, he could add a great deal of flexibility to the Cleveland secondary. He could team with Jabrill Peppers, a first-round pick of the Browns last year, to give them a talented young safety combo. He could also move around to various other places in the Browns’ defensive backfield as well. Fitzpatrick is head and shoulders above the rest of the defensive back prospects in this draft.

Quenton Nelson, G, Notre Dame - The Browns selected USC quarterback Sam Darnold with their first pick in this draft, so their next order of business should probably be to build up the offensive line to keep him upright. If Chubb isn’t the best overall talent left on the board at this point, then Nelson probably is. He’s a guy that could plug into the offensive line immediately and be an All-Pro for the next eight to ten years, and Cleveland could certainly use the help up front.

(Also, my apologies to Mr. Nelson for spelling his name incorrectly the first two times I listed him as an option.)

Again, I just don’t see any other potential options for the Browns’ pick at #4. There aren’t any other running backs worth this pick with Saquon Barkley off the board, and the Browns don’t need receiver help (not with a top three of Josh Gordon, Corey Coleman, and the newly-acquired Jarvis Landry). No other offensive or defensive linemen are worth this pick, either. So, while it may seem strange to only have three options for the Browns for this pick, frankly they’re the only realistic options out there, in my opinion.

So, that’s the situation for the Browns at #4. Tomorrow, we move on to the Denver Broncos, who signed an old friend of ours to play quarterback, but have plenty of other needs as well.