Four games out, minimum
Cleveland’s running back room was two deep on Sunday. By Tuesday it was down to one.
The Browns placed Dylan Sampson on injured reserve with a knee injury, a move the club announced Tuesday. The rule sets the floor at four missed games, which puts his earliest return at the Week 6 home date against Baltimore. Jaleel McLaughlin came up from the practice squad to fill the open spot on the 53-man roster.
The injury did not happen on a carry. Sampson was hurt returning a kickoff in the season-opening loss to Jacksonville, one of the jobs that kept him active on a thin depth chart in the first place.
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A fourth-round pick carrying two jobs
Sampson arrived in the fourth round of the 2025 draft and opened this season behind Quinshon Judkins, while also ranking among Cleveland’s better options on kick returns. Young backs often carry both roles, and that is precisely why losing one of them costs a team in two phases at once rather than one.
Raheim Sanders, the only other running back left on the active roster, absorbed the work on offense and special teams once Sampson went down in Jacksonville. The second-year player inherits it for at least a month now, unless Cleveland adds another body before Sunday.
A month to fill
The schedule gives the Browns no room to sit on the problem. Tampa Bay comes next, and the plan at running back reduces to Judkins, Sanders and whatever McLaughlin can offer. McLaughlin has been a practice-squad option rather than a rotation piece, and call-ups of this kind usually start with special teams before they touch the offense.
Sampson’s timeline is the optimistic reading. Four games is the minimum the designation allows, not a projection, and knee injuries picked up on kickoff coverage have a habit of running longer than the paperwork suggests. Cleveland lost its opener and now loses a rotation back and a returner in the same transaction.
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