Shedeur Sanders won his first career regular-season start on Sunday, leading the Browns to a 24-10 win over the Raiders. He played well enough that coach Kevin Stefanski elected to keep Sanders under center as the starter for next week’s game against the 49ers even though Dillon Gabriel was healthy and ready to go. Thus, Sanders’s NFL career feels officially underway as the former Colorado standout works to show everybody that the hype surrounding his game entering the draft was warranted.
On Wednesday Sanders stood in front of reporters and took questions about his next start. One reporter decided to ask the young quarterback about his relationship with his head coach, Kevin Stefanski. The way in which he asked the question elicited a rather frank response from Sanders.
The reporter began his question by bringing up one of the more conspiracy-focused talking points after Sanders’s first taste of action in Week 11—that Stefanski is not invested in his success and in fact is “sabotaging” the first season of his NFL career. Sanders did not seem to appreciate that angle very much and asked if the reporter was trying to “start trouble.” Then the reporter got to his actual question of Sanders’s relationship with Stefanski.
“Not from you, but a lot of your supporters out there say that Kevin Stefanski was sabotaging you,” the reporter started.
“So you just wanna start trouble, huh?” Sanders replied frankly.
“No. I want to ask you what your relationship with him is,” the reporter clarified.
“Yeah. Well, what people do outside the building isn’t really in my control, it’s not in my power,” Sanders answered. “You act like I can go out there and tell them to do whatever. That’s not nothing I can control or nothing I can do. Overall, I’m just happy to be here. Coach Stefanski been coaching since I got here and he’s been doing a very great job with everything that’s going on.”
When pressed again for a description of the two’s relationship, Sanders said it was growing and he’s thankful to be in this position.
Shedeur Sanders: “So you just wanna start trouble, huh? 😐” pic.twitter.com/N6C7HQsq0X
— Kimberley A. Martin (@ByKimberleyA) November 26, 2025
The concept that Stefanski was in any way hindering Sanders’s development was a theory kept in the dark corners of the fandom until recently. When Sanders wound up playing quarterback due to Gabriel’s concussion against the Ravens, that changed. He played quite poorly— as one might expect from a fifth-round rookie backup suddenly getting thrust into the game.
But Stefanski’s admission that Sanders hadn’t taken first-team reps since getting drafted led to many open questions about whether he was indeed setting his young quarterback up for success. It wasn’t just in the comment section of social media, either. Cam Newton gave an entire spiel on ESPN suggesting Stefanski wasn’t invested in Sanders’s success.
Now it’s beginning to leak into team press conferences. The Browns can’t be pleased about that. Sanders didn’t seem particularly thrilled, either.
The Browns beating the Raiders on Sunday apparently didn’t nip this narrative in the bud. If Sanders plays well enough to win again this week against a good 49ers team, perhaps that will shift the tides.
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