Kenny Pickett is on the move once again.
Pickett was traded on Monday by the Cleveland Browns to the Las Vegas Raiders for a 5th-round pick. The Raiders were motivated to make the deal because their backup quarterback Aidan O’Connell fractured his wrist during the team’s preseason finale on Saturday. O’Connell is expected to miss 6-8 weeks, which is why the Raiders wanted some more help at quarterback behind Geno Smith.
The Browns trading Pickett makes sense too. It was always a stretch that the AFC North team would carry four quarterbacks, and now we’re seeing that they were willing to deal one of them.
Cleveland now has Joe Flacco as their starter, with rookies Dillon Gabriel and Shedeur Sanders competing for the backup job. By getting a 5th-round pick back for Pickett, the Browns are now even on him. They had traded a 5th-round pick plus quarterback Dorian Thompson-Robinson to the Philadelphia Eagles for Pickett in March. Pickett’s stint with the Browns was brief.
One Browns reporter called it in May that the team would likely trade one of its QBs, possibly Pickett.
Pickett had dealt with a hamstring injury that prevented him from appearing in any preseason games this year. He has gone 15-10 as an NFL starter, throwing for 4,765 yards, 15 touchdowns and 14 interceptions.
