Bears roll over a struggling Shedeur Sanders and the Browns, who still have a QB question to answer

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The Chicago Bears had very little issue shutting down Shedeur Sanders and the Cleveland Browns on Sunday afternoon.

The Bears rolled to a dominant 31-3 win at Soldier Field behind a very strong outing from Caleb Williams. The Bears now sit at 10-4 on the year after winning six of their last seven, and are very much on pace to make their first playoff appearance since 2020.

Sanders struggled to get much of anything going for the Browns on Sunday. He went just 18-of-35 for 177 yards in the loss, and threw two interceptions in the third quarter alone to allow the Bears to break the game wide open. The first pick came after D’Marco Jackson actually tipped a Sanders pass up in the air and then caught it himself deep in Cleveland territory.

While that’s not necessarily Sanders’ fault, it was in stark contrast to what Williams pulled off with DJ Moore just one play later.

Sanders threw another interception on their next drive, too, while trying to force a deep pass into Jerry Jeudy in the end zone. The Bears turned that into a touchdown, too, thanks to a 17-yard run from D’Andre Swift just nine plays later.

Sanders threw one final interception in the loss, this time midway through the fourth quarter. He tried to lob up a ball to Harold Fannin but just left it completely short — which allowed C.J. Gardner-Johnson to come up with the easy pick.

That led to a Bears field goal, and eventually, the 28-point win.

To his credit, Sanders did get the Browns into scoring position on their final drive of the game. He completed eight passes — one shy of half of what he completed for the entire game — and got them inside the 10 yard line. But the Bears sacked him twice to force the turnover and end the game.

Williams went 17-28 for 242 yards with two touchdowns in the win for Chicago. Swift had 98 yards and two scores on 18 carries, and Moore had two touchdowns and 69 yards on four catches. Sanders was the Browns' leading rusher, too, with 24 yards on two carries. Quinshon Judkins had 21 yards on 12 carries. Isaiah Bond had 89 yards on two catches.

The Browns, who have now lost three straight, will host the Buffalo Bills next weekend.

What do the Browns do at QB moving forward?

Browns head coach Kevin Stefanski already said that Sanders will start for the team for the rest of the season. Sunday’s loss dropped them to just 3-11, and they’ve already been eliminated from playoff contention for a second straight year. Keeping Sanders in there and getting him experience as a starting quarterback in the league can only help him as a player, and the team doesn't have much to lose at this point.

But the Browns will have a quarterback question to answer yet again in the coming months, and there’s no clear right answer.

While Sanders hasn’t been great — Sunday’s loss at Soldier Field was a good example of that — he has shown solid flashes. He threw for three touchdowns and more than 360 yards in last week’s game against the Tennessee Titans, for example, though the Browns still lost. But there are plenty of bad mistakes that he’s made and a true lack of consistency. And, perhaps more importantly, the Browns aren’t winning games under him.

The Browns could turn back to Deshaun Watson, who was designated to return to practice earlier this month after tearing his Achilles twice. He’s not played at all this season, and likely won’t. But Watson, who the Browns gave a fully guaranteed $230 million contract, was an elite quarterback in the past before the injuries and an 11-game suspension. If he can bounce back and have a late-career resurgence, it’s easy to see a world where he’s the Browns’ quarterback for the next few years, at a minimum.

Or, the Browns could simply go in a new direction and opt to select a quarterback again in the NFL Draft in April. At 3-11, the Browns are projected to have a very high draft pick once again. There are plenty of options for them in this next draft class, too.

Regardless of what route they take, it's clear that Sanders hasn’t done enough yet to prove he’s the future with the Browns. Unless something changes drastically over the next three weeks, the quarterback issue in Cleveland will be spilling over into next season.