Don’t Fall For The Mirage of Malik
Few teams have gotten more wrong at the quarterback position than Cleveland. The ones they have gotten right, Tim Couch and Baker Mayfield are probably the only two that list, were run out of town before they were able to fully mature. ((You could make the argument Baker needed to leave to do the maturing but that’s fine.)) You can’t even say it’s been hit or miss because the Battleship board is blank over here. And when you are as thirsty as the Browns are for even league average quarterback player, aghast in a desert sea of mediocre and downright bad options, the mirages start to look that much more real. Which brings me to Malik “Mirage” Willis. ((Nickname given by me. Feel free to update his pro-football-reference page.))
The Browns aren’t the only team parched for performance from passers, the entire NFL is looking at this year’s crop and seeing the lean cows that Joseph interpreted in the book of Genesis. The most attractive QB on the market is Willis, hands down, because you would either need to trade for mostly-unproven Mac Jones, failed-at-their-first-spot retreads like Kyler Murray or Tua Tagovailoa, or sign not-ready-to-hang-them-up guys like Kirk Cousins or Russell Wilson.
Willis has been good in Green Bay, I can admit that. But it’s been three starts in two years with a team many thought could make the playoffs, if not the NFC Championship game, in the preseason of 2025. And again…it’s been good production in those games! Across the 11 games he’s appeared in, his completion percentage is 78.6%, 972 yards, with six tudders and no picks. The no picks in 11 games alone is drool-worthy for Browns fans that have watched QBs throw INT after INT after pick-six. I think Shedeur might have just thrown one now at the combine…and he’s not even supposed to be there! And what Willis has that many others don’t is his ability outside of the pocket and on the run. In the last two seasons, he has three touchdowns, 15 first downs, and 261 yards on the ground, with a 63.6% success rate in 2025. ((Success rate is calculated by how many yards you get in certain situations: 40% of the yards required on 1st down, 60% on 2nd, 100% on 3rd or 4th. It’s a cool stat.)) For reference on other mobile QBs, Josh Allen’s success rate was 58% in 2025, Lamar Jackson’s 47.8%, Jalen Hurts’s 53.3, and Drake Maye’s 47.6.
Willis has the chance to be a good quarterback in the NFL. The tools are there for him to do it, and if he finds a system similar to what Green Bay ran, one built around him, that would be fantastic. However, I am not ready to commit big salary numbers to a guy who has such a small track record after being as bad as he was in Tennessee. In 2022, the only season he got meaningful snaps, eight appearances with three starts, he had a 50.8% completion percentage with three interceptions, no touchdowns, and a more league-average rushing success rate in 44.4%. Yes, players change and develop non-linearly. But I’m not willing to go out on a limb and bring Willis into the Cleveland QB room that’s already filled with Sanders, Deshaun Watson, and the ghosts of past passers laid to rest, especially for the reported $30m per year he wants. This team and roster are not one piece away. I hope general manager Andrew Berry is able to crawl past the mirage of Malik.
