The Cleveland Browns welcome the Carolina Panthers to town for their home opener in Week 3 of the 2026 NFL season. A victory heading into Week 4’s “Rock & Roll” showdown with the Pittsburgh Steelers on Thursday Night Football would be huge for the Browns. Wednesday’s injury report presented a lot of concerns for the Panthers defense, a potential positive for QB Deshaun Watson, while Carolina also lost RB Jonathan Brooks to injured reserve
.For Cleveland to get a win on Sunday, the run game led by
Quinshon Judkins will need to get rolling. Judkins needs help from his offensive line, which has not been great in run blocking so far.
Judkins is among three Browns players who have been mostly disappointing so far this season and need to step up this week:
Quinshon Judkins lacks production
54 yards rushing in two games. Just 24 carries, while playing 72 snaps (66% of the offense’s). A paltry 2.3 yards per attempt.
Is it Judkins’ struggles to return from injury? The offensive line? Too much time in shotgun? All of the above? Hard to tell overall, but the Browns offense cannot sustain success without improvement from Judkins
Tytus Howard has shown why the Texans traded him away
When you combine these things: There are not a lot of good offensive linemen in the NFL, and the Houston Texans traded Howard away for a fifth-round pick; alarms should have been ringing about why. Through the first two games with Cleveland, Howard has shown why he was available for such a cheap trade price.
Week 2 was especially bad:
Howard was a liability for much of this game. The only thing the Browns have been able to count on him for through two weeks is jumping offsides in critical situations. He had a false start on third down for the second time in two games.
Howard gave up another sack when he gave up a soft edge to David Walker. It’s becoming more apparent why the Texans played him at guard.
The Browns need more from Howard than just a pretty good pregame speech:
Jared Verse needs to dominate, show versatility
Five tackles, two tackles for loss, one QB hit in two games. Playing 79 snaps (65% of the defense’s), Verse has not been able to make an impact after being the key piece of the Myles Garrett trade. Cleveland’s defense started to get pressure in Week 2, but Verse was rarely a part of that.
A power player, mostly, Verse hasn’t learned to set up his moves and countermoves, something that is just necessary at the NFL level. As LeCharles Bentley noted:
My concern is not that Verse failed to beat one of the best tackles of this generation. My concern is that I am not seeing him string his rushes together yet.
Verse is a power player. He plays hard, attacks with force and can collapse space. But power cannot live in isolation. It must set up the next rush.
As Bentley said, facing Tristan Wifs is rarely going to lead to impact stats, but failing to have a pass rush plan won’t work against even good tackles, much less elite ones:
Good pass rushers have moves. Elite pass rushers tell a story throughout the game. One rush in the first quarter creates the conditions for the next one they’re planning in the fourth quarter.
The Browns need more from Verse in Week 3 and beyond, or the defense will struggle to impact the game.
Are these 3 the players that need to step up the most for Cleveland? Which one(s) do you think will step up in Week 3 versus the Panthers?
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