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Holmgren Still Evaluating Quarterbacks
March 01, 2010 By Wire Reports
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Quarterbacks Derek Anderson and Brady Quinn continue to be on the roster, but team president Mike Holmgren has stated he doesn't expect both to be with the Browns come training camp.
"I haven't made any final decisions on the quarterbacks we have yet," said Holmgren. "It's a huge decision. I think it's the most important decision on the football team and the great teams have that guy. We're doing everything humanly possible to evaluate it. The new guys that came with me, that's their project. The current staff that was there, that's their project. I want reports from both people, both groups, telling me what they think. Eric, Tom Heckert, everybody. And eventually I'm just going to have to decide."
The decision will likely come in the next few weeks, as Anderson is due a $2 million roster bonus March 19.
"That's a deadline and that's one of the things negotiated into contracts to help the club make those decisions in a timely manner. IN our case, because of the competition and because how important it is, I wish it wasn't there, but it's there. So we'll have to make that decision before then."
--Like every other team in the NFL, the Browns this week are in Indianapolis at the NFL Scouting Combine, but unlike most as they take the next step in preparing for the draft they are assessing the combine invitees knowing they have 11 picks to spend in the draft in April.
Quarterback is one of the positions the Browns will be concentrating on heavily at the combine, but that does not mean they are committed to taking one with their first- or second-round pick.
Team president Mike Holmgren has not completed his evaluation of current Browns quarterbacks Derek Anderson and Brady Quinn and he said he won't complete his assessment before free agency gets under way on March 5.
"Deciding what we should do is huge; it's very important," Holmgren said. "Once we decide, we're all in. That's the only way it has a chance of working.
"When I watch Brady, he hasn't played very much. He's been here three years, but he's started (12) games. That isn't very much. I've always felt if you can keep a quarterback in the same system for two years with the same coach and he plays, at the beginning of Year Three, with two full seasons of screwing up and making mistakes, you absolutely know one way or the other. There hasn't been enough time here."
Holmgren is not writing off Anderson. He said Anderson has a good arm, but added he throws too many interceptions. Anderson threw three touchdowns and 10 interceptions in 2009. He did throw 29 touchdown passes in 2007, but he also threw 19 picks.
"I don't know them well enough yet," Holmgren said. "What we have to do is say, 'These are the guys that are here.' We have to know them.
"Then we have to say, 'Here are the guys that are free agents we can buy. Here are the guys we can draft. And here are potential trades.' So there are really four paths we can take."
Holmgren's reluctance to give up on Quinn, the 2007 first-round draft choice from Notre Dame, could be connected to his experience with Matt Hasselbeck.
The Packers took Hasselbeck in the sixth round in 1998, which turned out to be Holmgren's last year as head coach in Green Bay. Holmgren took over the Seahawks in 1999 and in 2001 traded the Seattle's first-round pick (10th overall) and their third-round pick for Hasselbeck and the Packers' first-round pick (17th), which the Seahawks used on guard Steve Hutchinson.
Hasselbeck went 5-7 starting in Seattle in 2001 -- his fourth year in the league. In his second straight year starting in Holmgren's system in Seattle, Hasselbeck was 5-5 in 2002. That's when the light came on; Hasselbeck was 10-6 in 2003 and made it to the Pro Bowl. In 2005 he was 13-3 and the Seahawks played in the Super Bowl.
Holmgren would not want to give up on Quinn and then see Quinn bloom late as Hasselbeck did.
