Browns' Todd Monken Opens Up About Minkah Fitzpatrick's Hit On KC Concepcion

Cleveland Browns rookie WR KC Concepcion suffered a concussion in the first quarter of Week 5's loss against the New York Jets. 

The injury occurred on the Browns' second drive, when Concepcion took a helmet-to-helmet hit from Jets safety Minkah Fitzpatrick while trying to make a catch and hit his head on the turf at MetLife Stadium.  

Concepcion was on the ground for multiple minutes before being helped to his feet by Cleveland's medical staff. He immediately went to the locker room and was ruled out minutes later.

Fitzpatrick was penalized for a hit on a defenseless receiver.

"That's just a bang-bang play," Browns coach Todd Monken said after the game. "Minkah's been in this league a long time. I mean, he's not a dirty player. I've never seen that out of him. I mean, it's a bang-bang play. And unfortunately, it happened to our guy, and that's part of the league."

Entering Week 5, Concepcion, the No. 24 pick in the 2026 draft, was tied for first on the team in receptions (17) and was third with 144 receiving yards.

“I saw him after the game. He was in good spirits,” said Monken.

The Browns dropped to 3-2 after losing to the Jets. They face the Baltimore Ravens in Week 6. 

Fitzpatrick is already considered one of the biggest Cleveland sports villains for essentially ending Nick Chubb's career with the gruesome hit back in 2023 when he was with the Pittsburgh Steelers. 

It's safe to say that Browns fans will always hate Fitzpatrick. 

With Concepcion out, Denzel Boston should have been targeted more. However, entering the fourth quarter, Boston had only one catch for nine yards on two total targets. In the fourth quarter, Watson finally started looking the way of his No. 1 target more often and it paid off. 

Watson capped off the team's best drive of the game with a 29-yard bomb to the rookie with a little over six minutes left in the game to give the Browns a temporary 12-10 lead. He had another nice catch earlier in the drive as well. Good things tend to happen when he's getting targets. Watson and the offense have to find more ways to force-feed him the football. 

There was hope that this could be a week where the Brown got their run game on the right track, considering the Jets entered Sunday as the 25th ranked rushing defense in the NFL, yielding over 120 yards per game on average. That turned out to be nothing but wishful thinking. 

In the first half, Cleveland mustered only 39 rushing yards on 12 attempts, 21 of those came from Quinshon Judkins, who had seven carries. Judkins did break off his longest run of the season for 14 yards as part of that figure, but he continued to find very little room to run the football overall.

It didn't get much better in the second half. Judkins added 23 more yards to his total to finish with 44, and the team finished with only 96 total. 

Five weeks into the season, we can definitively say this is a glaring weakness for the Browns and one they need to get figured out.