With rookie safety Grant Delpit out for season, Browns may look at Earl Thomas and/or Logan Ryan
Cleveland has lost rookie safety Grant Delpit to a season-ending torn Achilles.
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The injury-plagued Cleveland Browns' training camp continued Monday when second-round pick Grant Delpit, a safety out of LSU who was projected to start, suffered what is being reported as a torn Achilles tendon that will end his season before it even started. Also Monday, SportsLine gave odds on which team would sign seven-time Pro Bowl safety Earl Thomas now that he was suddenly a free agent. Cleveland was a longer shot but that changes a bit now.
Delpit was the 2019 Thorpe Award winner, consensus All-American and first-team All-SEC last year for the national champion Tigers. He finished his career with 199 tackles, 17.5 tackles for loss, 7.0 sacks and 8 interceptions. The CBS Sports Big Board ranked him as the No. 23 overall player in the 2020 draft and No. 2 safety, so the Browns may have gotten a steal by getting him at No. 44 overall.
Delpit had been priced +3300 on the moneyline odds at William Hill sportsbook to win NFL Defensive Rookie of the Year. He wasn't even touched when he was injured Monday, participating in some interception drills when he went up for a pass and came down in obvious pain. He had to be carted off. Delpit could be the second projected Browns defender to miss the season as linebacker Mack Wilson suffered a hyperextended knee last week. The team is still waiting on a second opinion regarding season-ending surgery for Wilson.
While Thomas isn't what he used to be, he's a future Hall of Famer who was named to his seventh Pro Bowl a year ago. He can still help stack the box against the run, finishing with 49 tackles last season as well as two sacks and two picks. Salary cap space isn't a problem for Cleveland as it has the most in the NFL and Thomas probably would be thrilled to stay in the AFC North and play (i.e. stick it to) the Ravens twice after his surprising release by Baltimore on Sunday.
To make matters worse for the Browns, starting second-year cornerback Greedy Williams, Delpit's former LSU teammate (and a 2018 second-round pick), also left the field with a shoulder injury and didn't return Monday. The extent of his injury is unknown, but Williams was able to leave under his own power. The Browns also lost nickel cornerback Kevin Johnson to a lacerated liver last week, but he should be back fairly early in the season.
If Cleveland also is looking for cornerback help, former Patriots and Titans corner Logan Ryan remains on the free-agent market. Ryan, though, has said he wants teams to consider him as a safety. In 2019 with the Titans, Ryan became the first player since 2016 to record at least four interceptions, four sacks and four forced fumbles in the same season. It's a bit of a surprise the 29-year-old hasn't signed yet.
During the Titans' season-opening win in Cleveland last year, Ryan had beer poured on him during a celebration by a Browns fans. That fan was banned for life from home games, and Ryan – who had an interception and sack in the game -- said he had no issues with the "Dawg Pound."
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