He almost has me changing my MVP thinking. Tom Brady has Randy Moss and Wes Welker and Donte Stallworth, and the NFL's fourth-rated defense. Anderson plays on the same team as the league's 32nd-ranked defense. He is carrying the Cleveland Browns.

Anderson has 20 touchdowns, fourth in the NFL. He has 2,231 yards, which gives him a shot to break Brian Sipe's team record of 4,132 in a season. He's 5-3 as the starter, and the Browns are averaging 31 points per game with him at the helm.

This from a guy who started the season on the bench, a tenuous spot between Charlie Frye and first-round draft choice Brady Quinn.

This for a team that was 40-88 and had one winning season in the previous eight seasons since it returned as an expansion team.

"I don't think it's me just by myself," Anderson told The (Cleveland) Plain Dealer. "It's the whole deal."

In the season opener against the Steelers, Frye was sacked five times and completed only 4 of 10 passes for 34 yards with an interception and a 41.2 passer rating before he was pulled with 6:34 left in the first half. He was traded to the Seattle Seahawks a few days later.

The Browns became Anderson's team, and fans and the media immediately began speculating when Quinn would start his first game.

Who could have predicted the Browns' quarterback of the future might be their quarterback of the present?

At Oregon State, Anderson was intercepted 57 times. He was a sixth-round choice of the Baltimore Ravens, who waived him after two regular-season games — and no game experience — in 2005. Anderson played last season but only because of a wrist injury to Frye. He threw eight interceptions, five TDs, and the Browns went 0-3.

In an open competition for the starting job during training camp, Anderson led the team to no touchdowns. Thus, Frye was named the opening-day starter.

If anyone had shown interest in Anderson, he likely would have been traded.

Instead, the Browns, who haven't had Quinn take a snap yet, now have to decide who is their long-term quarterback.

Anderson is in the final year of his rookie contract, making the minimum $435,000 for a third-year player. He becomes a restricted free agent in April. The Browns can protect themselves from losing Anderson for the 2008 season, but, if Cleveland doesn't sign him to a long-term deal, Anderson is eligible for unrestricted free agency in 2009.

Neither Anderson nor Quinn, who signed a five-year, $20.2 million rookie deal, wants to stay in Cleveland as a backup.

Although Quinn has sold more jerseys, Browns fans' favorite quarterback currently is Anderson.

Even though the Browns lost to the Steelers, 31-28, on Sunday, Anderson put Cleveland in position to win. He completed 10 of 16 passes for 80 yards, three touchdowns and a 114.6 passer rating in the first half, when the Browns jumped out to a 21-9 lead. He was only 6-for-19 for 43 yards in the second half, but, in the closing seconds, he drove the Browns to the Pittsburgh 35, where Phil Dawson's game-tying, 52-yard field-goal try was short.

Anderson is ruining next April's draft for the Cowboys. Dallas had traded the 22nd pick to the Browns, so they could draft Quinn, for Cleveland's first-round pick in 2008. At the time, it appeared a certain top-10 choice. The Browns, after all, have drafted in the top 10 in six of nine drafts since returning to the NFL in 1999.

This season, though, the Browns appear headed for the playoffs. The schedule is favorable with games left at Baltimore (4-5), vs. Houston (4-5), vs. Arizona (4-5), at the Jets (1-8), Buffalo (5-4), at Cincinnati (3-6) and vs. San Francisco (2-7).