The Cleveland Browns and visiting Arizona Cardinals went nearly all of the past week before finally settling on starting quarterbacks in advance of a matchup Sunday.
Browns coach Kevin Stefanski announced Friday that Deshaun Watson is ready to return. He has missed three full games and left early Oct. 22 against the Indianapolis Colts while battling a rotator cuff injury. The Browns (4-3) have won two of their last four games.
“He’s comfortable,” Stefanski said. “He looks good.”
Backup P.J. Walker has thrown five interceptions in only 97 pass attempts and has a passer rating of 51.8. Fifth-round pick Dorian Thompson-Robinson started one game and had three interceptions.
“All of those turnovers are costly, and that’s frustrating,” Stefanski said. “We lead the league in giveaways right now with 17, and it’s hard. It’s hard to win in the NFL, period. It’s hard to win when you turn the ball over.
“So, we have to really, really commit ourselves as an offense not to give that thing away. Obviously, it’s a team stat in terms of takeaways. That can happen on defense and special teams. But first things first, we have to take care of that football.”
The Cardinals (1-7) reportedly have selected rookie Clayton Tune to start Sunday’s game at quarterback, although Kyler Murray was in consideration to make his season debut.
Joshua Dobbs played all 535 offensive snaps in the first eight games, with the team’s only win coming in Week 3 against the Dallas Cowboys. Dobbs coincidentally was acquired from the Browns on Aug. 24 and started the season opener 17 days later.
Dobbs was on the move again Tuesday when he was traded to the Minnesota Vikings, which lost quarterback Kirk Cousins for the season Sunday. The trade left the Cardinals to decide between Tune and Murray in order to put an end to a five-game losing streak.
Murray, who tore his ACL on Dec. 12 last season, is in his third week of practice and had been upgraded to questionable on the injury report Friday. He traveled with the team to Cleveland.
The move to start Tune meant Murray did not meet all the criteria to start as set out by head coach Jonathan Gannon, who had one major requirement for his two-time Pro Bowl selection to return to a starting role.
“I want Kyler to feel extremely, 100 percent comfortable with what he’s doing,” said Gannon, whose standard apparently was not reached.
Tune has just one pass attempt this season, a completion on a fourth-down play Oct. 22 against the Seattle Seahawks, but the 4-yard gain was short of the first down.
Now comes a matchup for the Houston product against a Browns defense ranked first in the NFL in total yards and passing yards allowed.
Despite that ranking, the Browns have had only 10 takeaways, and only 11 NFL teams have fewer.
The Browns had 18 players listed on Friday’s injury report, with eight listed as full or limited. Of those players, three already have been ruled out this week: wide receiver David Bell (knee), cornerback Greg Newsome II (groin) and defensive end Alex Wright (knee). Tackle Dawand Jones was listed as questionable.
For the Cardinals, starters guard Trystan Colon (calf) and running back Emari Demercado (toe) have been ruled out.
