The Cleveland Browns usually have players all over the field during their first rookie minicamp. From drafted players, undrafted players, and tryout players, minicamp can get quite crowded in Berea.
“Usually.”
This year, the Browns only had 18 players in for camp:
Drafted players: Greg Newsome II, Jeremiah Owusu-Koramoah, Anthony Schwartz, James Hudson, Tommy Togiai, Tony Fields II, Richard LeCounte III, and Demetric Felton
Undrafted players: Marvin Wilson, Romeo McKnight, Kondre Thomas, Emmanuel Rugamba, and Tre Harbison
Tryout players: Johnny Dizon, Josh Love, and Riley Neal
Already on roster players: Malik McDowell and Kyle Markway (since released and replaced by Connor Davis)
With such a small group of guys, the Browns had to get creative at times. As seen on Building the Browns, anyone available to take a snap was used at times including defensive coordinator Joe Woods playing quarterback.
While that doesn’t seem like a positive, the small numbers were mentioned as positive multiple times. From head coach Kevin Stefanski, Woods, Hudson, Newsome, and others have all noted the benefit of having one on one time with the coaches.
Hudson, in particular, is able to benefit from a lot of time with Bill Callahan and Scott Peters. The “Master Class” details shown in this week’s Building the Browns episode included keeping his ankle outside of his knee as he is kicking out and how to explode into an oncoming player.
As everyone is noting the positives of the smaller class, will the Browns go back to a larger group next year as, hopefully, the pandemic will no longer have a large impact or will this become the new normal?
The team will likely weigh the benefits of their drafted and undrafted players getting one on one time versus getting a chance to see a lot of tryout guys and field full-team drills. There are benefits to both but the amount of time spent lauding the amount of coaching that was able to happen could mean the Browns move in this direction in the future.