Andrew Berry denies having age guardrail for prospects

Cleveland Browns GM Andrew Berry spoke to the media at the NFL combine in Indianapolis on the first day of the 2023 event. During that time, Berry talked about a number of topics including his past decisions, the upcoming class and more.

One area that we covered in the past is that during Berry’s first three draft classes, he has not drafted a player older than 22 years of age despite a lot of players 23 plus being drafted by other teams.

In fact, Berry has only drafted three players that were 23 years old at the time of the draft. As you can see by all of the grey dots over the line for 23, Berry is somewhat unique:

During his combine time. Berry denied the guardrail although it is very clear he is aware of the perception of the team:

For some fans and media, Cleveland’s struggles with players’ development, some maturity issues and making mistakes can be pointed back to a number of things including the overall youth of the team.

Despite his answer, given the team’s history it would be a surprise if any player over the age of 21 was the team’s selection in the second round and one or fewer will already be 23 years of age. Going into year four and with added pressures to win after two years of missing the playoffs, perhaps Berry will look for more certainty with his draft picks than in years past.

Until we see it, we will assume that you can cross older prospects off the Browns list for the 2023 NFL draft.