Browns still paying the price for Deshaun Watson trade

A few years ago the Cleveland Browns sold their future, if not their souls, by famously trading for Deshaun Watson. Given his history , it was a move that was greeted with derision and disgust, but the Browns went blithely about their business anyway. What could go wrong?

File this under It-Seemed-Like-A-Bad-Idea-At-The-Time.

The Browns bet the house on a deeply troubled man. Now it looks as if they will lose it all, and the only people who didn’t see it coming were the Browns. It was like buying Enron stock after the FBI opened the books.

To pull off the trade, the Browns gave away six draft picks (including three in the first round) to the Texans and a record $230 million guaranteed contract to Watson when he was up to his eyeballs in 27 lawsuits related to sexual misconduct.

There’s a certain symmetry to the way it has all worked out. The Browns are 1-4, the Texans 4-1. Watson is flopping — he has completed more lawsuits (27) than touchdown passes (19) after two-plus years in Cleveland. C.J. Stroud, his replacement in Texas, is the best young quarterback in football.

Last season he took the Texans to the playoffs, where they won their first-round game 45-15 — against the Browns.

If the Browns decide to bench Watson, they would turn to his backup, Jameis Winston. Yeah, that guy. He has his own history of sexual assault .

The Browns sure can pick ‘em.

Cleveland is the only town where you can’t even root for the backup quarterback.

It gets better (or worse?). To accommodate Watson, the Browns jettisoned Baker Mayfield four years after they made him the No. 1 overall pick of the 2018 draft. Mayfield is thriving in Tampa Bay.

(The Browns, like the Jets , have never been able to develop quarterbacks. From 1999 through 2023, the team has had 38 players start at quarterback — the most of any team in that span.)

Anyway, the Texans fleeced the Browns, with the full cooperation of the Browns. It was the most lopsided deal since the sale of Manhattan. It’s difficult to imagine how a group of adults sat in a conference room and decided this was a good idea. In the history of bad decisions, it rates somewhere between Decca refusing to sign the Beatles and the Donner Party choosing the shortcut.

Someone in the Browns organization essentially said, “I know! Let’s stake our future on a quarterback who has been accused by more than two dozen women of sexual misconduct and harassment and has missed an entire season of play and still faces another suspension. And while we’re at it, let’s give him the biggest guaranteed contract in league history!”

It’s thinking like this that has made the Browns THE BROWNS. It’s why they have the worst record in the NFL since 1980. And 1990. And 2000. It’s why they’ve never been to a Super Bowl. It’s why they haven’t won a championship since 1964. The Browns have made failure an art form. They can’t get out of their own way. If you dropped them into the middle of the Antarctic, they’d organize a traffic jam.

Let’s go back to the beginning. On March 18, 2022, the Browns arranged a trade for Watson (the Texans probably could barely conceal their glee). Watson was fighting multiple accusations of rape and assault , and had sat out the entire 2021 season and still faced suspension for part of the 2022 season.

At this point, we should remind you that this is the same team that, just years earlier, chose Johnny Manziel in the first round of the draft. He lasted two seasons before he was out of the league, having made just four starts. The Browns hadn’t done their homework, ignoring signs from Manziel’s college days that this was a troubled man.

Anyway, you’d think the Browns would have learned their lesson and done their homework when the Texans tried to unload Watson. All they had to do was read the newspaper or turn on the TV. Since then, Watson has been dealing with numerous court cases, completing the latest settlement this month .

Watson was a bad bet at any price, yet the Browns went all in. Ignoring the moral considerations of hiring a man with Watson’s history, let’s look at the football side of the equation. To get Watson, the Browns gave the Texans the following:

• A 2022 first-round pick (13th overall)
• A 2022 fourth-round pick (104th)
• A 2023 first-round pick (12th)
• A 2023 third-round pick (73rd)
• A 2024 first-round pick (23rd)
• A 2024 fourth-round pick (123rd)
• A record $230 million dollars over five years, guaranteed

The net result of that trade:

Since arriving in Cleveland in time for the 2022 season, Watson has played in only 17 games and won nine of them. So far this season Watson ranks 25th in the league in passing yards, 32nd in yards per attempt at 4.8 (the most important of passing stats), and 28th in passer rating, 74.8.

Now let’s see what the trade did for the Texans. After winning just 11 games the previous three years while trying to overcome the Watson mess, the Texans have won 14 of their last 22. They used the Browns draft picks — some of which they parlayed into more picks by trading them to other teams — to acquire:

• Running back Dameon Price, who has 1,637 yards and seven touchdowns rushing and receiving the last two seasons
• Defensive end Will Anderson, the 2023 NFL Defensive Rookie of the Year
• Receiver Tank Dell, who has 60 catches, 846 yards and seven touchdowns after 15 games
• Starting left guard Kenyon Green
• Starting free safety Calen Bullock
• Starting cornerback Kamari Lassiter
• Wide receiver John Metchie III
• Linebacker Christian Harris
• Linebacker Jamal Hill
• Tight end Cade Stover
• A 2025 second-round pick via the Vikings via the Browns

The Texans also used the second overall pick of the 2023 draft to replace Watson. He was named the NFL Offensive Rookie of the Year.

The Texans won the AFC South Division in 2023 thanks to the Browns’ foolishness. Hannah McNair, the wife of Houston owner Cal McNair, has mocked the Browns on podcasts, telling fans, “Thank a Brown. Have you thanked a Brown lately? I thank them for all of our players.”

The Browns have continued to start Watson rather than bench him. They are falling into the trap of the sunk-cost fallacy — deciding to continue with a plan simply because they’ve invested so much time and money in it, even when it clearly is failing and it would be better to move on. The money they spent on Watson is going, going, gone, and the team is not going to recover for years to come.

The Browns should follow the Broncos’ lead. In 2023, the Broncos signed Seattle Seahawks veteran Russell Wilson to a five-year, $242.5 million contract, with $124M guaranteed. After watching Wilson flail away for one season, they cut him and ate the money. Wilson signed with the Steelers, but the Broncos are still paying the bill. They are on the hook for $85 million in dead money over two years, but they’ve moved on.

The Browns are going to have to do the same thing with Watson. They might as well begin the rebuild sooner rather than later.