A shorter practice on Wednesday afternoon sets the stage for the Cleveland Browns pivotal joint practice with the Buffalo Bills on Thursday. 

Keep tabs on each day of training camp with our daily recaps from Berea.

Not much has changed regarding the quarterback play on a day-to-day basis. Neither signal-caller has done much to truly run away with the competition. 

That continued on Wednesday, where Watson had a better day overall throwing the football, with more impressive throws and three touchdown passes to Deshaun Watson's one. His best session was easily the red zone 7-on-7 and 11-on-11 work, where those three touchdowns came. 

Both quarterbacks had an opportunity to execute a drive with 1:20 to go in the game and the offense down 24-22. Sanders' drive with the ones stalled our short of a game-winning field goal attempt. Denzel Boston was ruled to have been tackled in bounds on a stop route near the sideline and as Sanders raced the group up to the line to spike the ball there was a false start which would have resulted in a 10-second runoff and the game ending. 

Watson had better success finishing his drive with a field goal thanks to a DPI-aided drive. That was the best phase of practice for Watson overall. Otherwise, he tossed two more picks and just looked off the mark most of the day. The inconsistencies continued for him. 

Dillon Gabriel saw limited reps in the red zone 7-on-7 session and an 11-on-11 session. He finished with only two completions and nearly threw an interception. 

There has been a lot of shuffling in the trenches this week for both the first and second teams, but the projected starting o-line was back together on Wednesday. 

Tytus Howard at RT, Teven Jenkins at RG, Elgton Jenkins at C, Zion Johnson at LG, Spencer Fano at LT.

Luke Wypler was still rotating in at center, though, during practice, sharing those reps. He also split some time with the second team. That group featured: 

Dawand Jones at RT, Austin Barber at RG, Wypler/Kingsley Eguakum at C, Zak Zinter at LG and KT Leveston at LT. 

Leveston has now spent back-to-back days getting run at both tackle spots. 

Get these out of the way first, still no Joe Royer and DT Maliek Collins is still on the PUP list. 

After spending some time with the trainers on Tuesday, C Elgton Jenkins was back participating in practice on Wednesday. So was Tytus Howard who was a non-participant Tuesday, and KT Leveston, who left Day 15 early with trainers.

There was a very notable new addition to the absentee list in the form of star RB Quinshon Judkins with a minor tweak of some sort. 

The rest of the list of guys not practicing included: Carson Schwesinger, Cedric Tillman, D’Angelo Ross, Michael Burton, Parker Brailsford, Isaiah McGuire (who also left Tuesday's session early), Jack Stoll, Sam Kamara, Kalia Davis, Dae’Quan Wright and Tyreak Sapp. Jeadyn Lucas was also not out there, but that's because he was waived after practice so the team could sign DE Jamil Muhammad. 

In general, Wednesday was a very light practice with the guys in just helmets and shorts. It was also a shorter practice, running just 90 minutes in length.

Meanwhile, notable starters like Jared Verse and Denzel Ward took zero team reps on Day 16, with Monken clearly prioritizing tomorrow's joint practice with the Buffalo Bills. Cleveland even stayed off the main practice fields to ensure they're in better shape for Buffalo's visit. 

Defense gets the shine today for the play of the day and player of the day. This one came during the first round of full-speed 11-on-11s. Watson threw up a 50-50 shot to Tylan Wallace on a corner route, and Tre Avery wound up coming down with it, despite Wallace's best efforts to wrestle it away from him. 

Twice in one week, Michael Coats Jr. gets the nod. He continues to make his case for being part of the final 53 after another strong day that was headlined by a diving interception of Watson during red-zone 11-on-11 work. He also broke up a pass later in practice, as well. 

Now he did draw a DPI call during the hurry-up 11-on-11 session at the end of practice, but because he's had a strong week overall, we can overlook that one at least a little. 

In the aftermath of the fight that broke out between the Cowboys and Saints during joint practices this week, Monken was asked how to prevent those types of situations ahead of the Browns joint practice with the Bills. As candidly as ever, Monken admitted, he didn't even know. 

“I have no idea, because everybody says the exact same thing. To think that (Brian) Schottenheimer and Kellen Moore, or whoever was practicing together, that they didn’t tell their teams absolutely no fighting. I mean, they know each other. Absolutely, we’re going to say the exact same things, that it’s silly to do it, and threaten whatever it is, and you’re competitive. I don’t know, we’re going to say the exact same things. 'You’re going to get kicked out if you fight or if you weren’t going to play, you’re going to play, or if you were going to play, you’re not going to play.' Hell, I don’t know. In that moment, when you get hijacked, it happens, and you don’t want it to happen, and that’s why you’ve gone to one practice, and hopefully our guys understand that, we understand that. I’m not saying that’s what I want, that’s not what I’m saying. We’re going to do everything within our power to not put ourselves at risk. But I don’t have the answer. The players are the ones that have to have the answer. They’re the ones that are out there doing it. They’re the ones that, in that moment, have to make that decision.”

Thursday will be the long-awaited joint practice with the Bills, which will serve as a final litmus test for who the starting QB will be and for guys on the roster bubble looking to make a statement.