Damarious Randall Dealt to Cleveland Browns

Damarious Randall
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Damarious Randall and Adam Thielen

Well, that’s one way to shed some salary. The Green Bay Packers have reportedly dealt cornerback Damarious Randall to the Cleveland Browns.

The Browns also acquired receiver Jarvis Landry from the Miami Dolphins and quarterback Tyrod Taylor from the Buffalo Bills on Friday.

The Packers acquired quarterback DeShone Kizer, a 2017 second-round pick, who was pretty much a disaster for the Browns in year one. The Packers also swapped picks with the Browns in the fourth and fifth rounds, meaning, presumably, the Packers now pick at the top of those two rounds.

The other two deals featured mid-round pick. In the case of Landry, who led the NFL with 112 receptions in 2017, the cost was two mid-round picks. All we know is neither was higher than the third round.

When the day began, the Browns owned the most picks in the league, with 12. They had/have two firsts, three seconds, a third, two fourths, two fifths, a sixth and a seventh.

Randall was uneven for the Packers in 2017. He started slowly and then came on after being benched in September against the Bears. After that, he was the team’s best cornerback.

But let’s be honest, being the Packers’ best cornerback is like being the best-looking bum on Sunset Blvd.

Randall has a cap hit of slightly more than $2.5 million in 2018. Of course, only about $1.5 million of that comes in the form of salary and a roster bonus. When you factor in Kizer’s salary, you’re getting a savings of just around $700,000, which does nothing for the salary cap situation. As a former first-round pick, Randall also has a fifth-year team option, which hasn’t been decided upon yet. Now, the Browns will get to make that decision.

So now what do the Packers do at cornerback?

Well, second-year man Kevin King — who didn’t look very good playing through a shoulder injury as a rookie — will be expected to man one of the outside spots. The other, as well as the slot, appears to be totally up in the air at this point.

I guess let the Richard Sherman speculation go bonkers.

Ironic note as an aside: after the Packers played the Browns in 2017, Randall and receiver Josh Gordon went after each other on Twitter. Randall essentially shut Gordon down in that Packers’ win and he made sure everyone knew it. Gordon replied. Randall asked him if he was still on the drugs…

Talk about locker room chemistry!

About The Author

Mordecai is a writer living in Los Angeles. He primarily writes screenplays, but also does crap like this because GREEN BAY PACKERS, baby!

21 Comments on "Damarious Randall Dealt to Cleveland Browns"

    • Kato

      Lol. Kizer likely won’t see the field besides injury. Randall at worst was going to see snaps as a nickelback. I thought he wasn’t a good fit for Pettine’s defense but didn’t think he would be jettisoned for it. At least we won’t be horrified when the packers give him the 5th year option.

      There must have been more going on behind the scenes with Randall, and the benching against Chicago was only a snippet.

  4. Big B

    Now Packers are better,why?
    Secondary was a major weakness, so trade the “best” CB? For a backup QB?
    #Fire Gutekunst

  5. MJ

    A mediocre player for an outright bad player. Really? Weren’t there any better options for backup QB? Someone who can actually complete a pass, for instance. I know, anything is an upgrade if yoir starting point is Hundley, but Kizer was pretty awful as well. I hope those swapped picks yield us some sort of compensation.

  6. PF4L

    “Well, that’s one way to shed some salary.” – Mordi

    lmao…..Yea, now we can go nuts in free agency because we reduced our salary cap by $370,000.

    “Randall has a cap hit of slightly more than $2.5 million in 2018” – Mordi

    I’m not sure what world Mordi lives in, but it shouldn’t be in the football world.

  7. PF4L

    When i said….Gutenkunst had some really tough decisions to make, this never came to my mind….lol

  8. Bob

    All I can say is moving up 14 spots in the 4th and 5th rounds better yield some talent or this team is screwed. If not we will probably regret old frugal Ted stepping down.

  9. Capt. Fritter

    Finally! A goddam GM with some balls. Rattle a few cages. Welcome to Cleveland, Randall. Enjoy the bottom of the barrel. If you weren’t happy in Green Bay, see how things are run with a team with no chance of a Super Bowl.

  10. cz

    when Ted Thompson came in, he cleaned house and made it his team. Cant blame Gute for wanting to have his own roster

  11. Bob

    Well if AR goes down again and Kizers steps in we can hope the teams he has to play against does not have a defense that is better than the Packers. Kizers best game was against the Packers last year when he completed 70% of his passes. One can only hope.

  13. KILLER

    Hmm.

    Randall was a disastrous selection by TT. But he did have a knack for the big play. Granted, 4 out of 5 times for the opposing team but, still. Coming into this season if I was told a Packers CB made an interception my first guess would have been Randall. He definitely did improve last year… and who knows what he could do at his actual position of safety!

    Gute had a future problem here. Move Randall to safety where he belongs and admit the organizational mistake? Not pick up the 5th year option then Randall takes off and Gute looks like a fool? Or pick up the 5th year option and then Randall plays like he has in the past… thus making Gute look bad? To me this move looks like one made out of fear. Even the swapping around of picks to disguise the end result of the trade.

  14. KILLER

    This also makes clear something else:

    MM got rid of the offensive coordinator and the QB coach. Why? Not because of Rodgers, right? No, it was supposedly because they did not have Hundley ready to play. Well, if that was accurately the case then all that was needed were the new coaches, not a new QB. They did not trade a young #1 pick for Kizer to have him be the #3 QB.

    No, Hundley is a real problem. Which means those coaches were — as we already knew — just scapegoats thrown under the bus to take the blame for MM.

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