With the trade deadline quickly approaching on November 10th, we have already seen some massive trades around the league like Jefferey Simmons going to Chicago and Quenton Nelson shipped to Seattle.
In Cleveland, the Browns are in a tough spot of whether the team is buyers or sellers at the deadline as they sit at 5-3 and right outside of a playoff spot in the AFC. The idea of trading for a talented quarterback, who might command at minimum two first-round picks , has come into conversation along with trading for offensive line help.
There are some players however, who are also in the conversation of discarding before the deadline.
Anyone heard this one before? But seriously, Jeudy is the most expendable player on the Browns right now, and it's not completely his fault. Except it mostly is; his inconsistency last season on a team that lacked offensive weapons was a huge signal for Browns GM Andrew Berry to go out and get young receiver talent immediately.
And that receiver talent has been on full display through eight games this season; both Denzel Boston and KC Concepcion have doubled Jeudy's output of just 171 yards this season. Jeudy is still under contract next season for a cap hit of a little over $13 million; Cleveland would love to pawn that off to another franchise, but will definitely have to pitch in a draft pick for a team to take that on.
Harden continues to be the Browns starting slot corner despite below-average play, and that has been prevalent this season. Quarterbacks have a passer rating of 108.7 when targeting Harden, for reference, that's higher than the passer rating of Caleb Williams, Josh Allen, and Drake Maye this year.
Playing slot is a very tough position to play with all of the great slot receivers in the game right now like Jaxon Smith-Njiba, Amon-Ra St. Brown, Puka Nacua, and Cedee Lamb. The problem is that Cleveland hasn't played any of those guys this season, and while players like Zay Flowers and Parker Washington are close to that level, they weren't exactly locked down against the Browns.
The good thing about Harden is that he's cheap, he's making just over a million dollars this season and next. You can't rationalize keeping him as a starter just because he doesn't cost a lot of money when he has allowed the 8th-most receiving yards by a defensive back this season, though.
This article was originally published on www.si.com/nfl/browns/onsi as 2 Browns Players Who Could Be on the Trade Block Before the NFL Deadline .
