I don’t think the salary is the problem. The Browns have the second most cap space of any team with Baker on the books. They don’t need to trade Baker. If they ate 15 mil of his salary they go up to #1 in cap space. Salary is not the problem.
The hold up is that no one is willing to trade [what the Browns think is] the equal value to Baker. There’s also likely internal politics at work too.
“We used the number 1 overall pick on this guy and we can’t get a 3rd?”
The Browns probably are willing to eat salary to increase the value of the pick, but no team is going to trade for Baker when the league knows he’s likely to be cut. And even if he wasn’t, why would they want to give up anything for Baker on a one year deal coming off injury and his worst season ever? I
Not to mention you have Jimmy G on the block too. Maybe Tannehill given some of the news out of Tennessee.
Baker is probably better than Lock/Geno. But is he 18mil and a draft pick better? No.