The Draw Play

Ah, how the wind changes. One Wednesday you make a comic about how the Browns are in hell, and the following Wednesday you make a comic about how happy everyone is. Did I kill Deshaun Watson by Draw Play cursing him? I’ll take the credit if no one else will. That comic actually will go down as possibly the actual, legitimate lowest point in New Browns history. After Sunday the light was seen once more.

Pretty much since the trade one of the most common phrases uttered around fandom circles regarding Deshaun Watson was thus: “I don’t cheer for injuries, but….“. Pretty sure I saw it many times in my own comments here. I don’t know if I ever said it, but I did know that if Watson went down I would not cry about it. When the moment came, I did not cheer, and I did not cry. I did laugh. Quite hard. My dog was confused as to why I was laughing so hard. I may have woken my neighbor’s newborn child when I realized the injury was quite serious on replay and loudly exclaimed “Oh Wow!” to my backyard. I then took another sip of Arizona Green Tea and laughed.

As it turns out much of the football world cheered, and that included some of the Browns fans in First Energy Stadium. Since the injury the cheering has become the debate du jour, because some people are really opposed to the idea of cheering for injury. The rest of us know who Deshaun Watson is. Like I said, I do not cheer for injury, I will likely never cheer for injury, but I have nothing against those who did, because of who that injury was to. Fuck Deshaun Watson. I’m glad his Achilles snapped after he spent half a season embarassing himself with some of the worst QB play in history. He’s a piece of shit and it warms my heart to know that while he was lying there on the field his entire stadium was raining cheers. I hope he thinks about it during every rehab session when a contractually obligated team-appointed male doctor works on his leg. I hope the cheers ring in his brain during every date he manages to get for the rest of his life. I hope, though I doubt it will as he’s shown no remorse as of yet, that it generates some sort of change and growth within him, and he becomes a better person.

The big cause of the discourse this time was two teammates. First was Myles Garrett, who basically came out and said the general expected response to such an event: cheering for injuries is sad, blah blah blah, we gotta be better than that, etc etc. Boilerplate teammate defending, tbh. Then, as if he wanted to get thrown under a bus, he called Deshaun a “Model Citizen through college and “most of the pros”. Most of the pros. Most of. I’m not sure the word “most” has ever been so load-bearing in history. The word Most in that sentence squats twice as much as anything Jalen Hurts has ever done.

I really can’t blame a player for defending a teammate or saying cheering for injuries is shitty, Watson or no. That’s kinda what you have to do. I’d have been more shocked if a Browns player came out like “yeah fuck that guy”. No matter what his teammates think of him defense was always the plan. But to go out of your way to call him a model citizen? for MOST of the pros? It shows you Garrett fully understands why the people are booing and said it anyway.

The much funnier defense came from Jameis Winston. Jameis got interviewed in the locker room and spat out the most Jameis Winston ass statement you could imagine. You could tell this motherfucker thought he was dropping some righteous truth with how he was enunciating every word with his big serious face. If this interview had been from any other player, about any other player, this would have been a killer promo. Instead it’s a sexual predator going to bat for a bigger sexual predator. It’s so funny to see Jameis go “THIS MAN HAS HAD THE ENTIRE WORLD AGAINST HIM FOR THE PAST 4 YEARS” like lmao my dude…why? Why has the world been against him for the past 4 years? As one of my followers made into a meme:

WHY, JAMEIS? WHY DOES EVERYONE HATE HIM? WHY ARE ALL OF YOU SO VAGUE WITH YOUR DESCRIPTIONS? SEEMS FISHY TO ME. I’d tell you to uber your drunk ass home Winston but I don’t think you’re allowed in Ubers anymore.

Fans can cheer his demise as much as they want. They didn’t sign him. They are allowed to be disgusted by his personal behaviors and his poor play. Don’t hold the contingent of cheering fans to higher moral standards than you hold Deshaun Watson. To get the kind of reaction this injury has generated, you gotta earn that kind of hate. It is extremely telling how none of the defenses of Watson or criticisms of the cheering ever seem to go into details about why people are cheering his demise. They all skirt around the actual reason why so many people were happy to see him suffer. Watson isn’t just a bad player that the fans were sick of and wanted benched. He’s worse than that, and every discussion of the cheers and boos should be required to bring it up. Watson was accused of sexual assault by over two dozen women. THAT’S WHY PEOPLE CHEERED. FUCKING SAY IT.

So from here out we have Predator 2 under center (Hydra Update coming this weekend!) and a wildcard of a team that is now starting fresh with Chubb back. Jameis at least good at giving his effort every play even when that effort is disaster so I expect the Browns to become far more entertaining. I don’t know if Watson will start a game for Cleveland ever again, but I think it’s strange how this moment is being treated like the de-facto end. He’s not going anywhere for two more years, if the Browns don’t pick up a new signal caller this offseason we might be back in this same situation a year from now.