After watching Deshaun Watson turn in one of the worst games of his NFL career, throwing the ball 28 times for 125 yards and a touchdown in a loss to the Washington Commanders, fans, insiders, and pundits took their shot at the veteran QB, including the master of the sports rant, Stephen A. Smith.
Committing nearly a quarter of an hour to his thoughts on the Browns quarterback on his flagship ESPN show First Take, Smith absolutely went off on Watson, noting that, after long being in his corner even when it was hard, he’s been thoroughly let down.
“I’m very disgusted with Deshaun Watson. Here’s why: Because I root for the brother. I want the man to succeed. I remember what I saw in Houston with the Texans. And before all of the salacious nonsense came out into the public eye, we looked at that brother in Houston, and even though they got romped in a playoff game against Kansas City when [Patrick] Mahomes and them scored like 41, 42 straight points on them or whatever, we saw a dude in Deshaun Watson that we said, ‘Other than Patrick Mahomes, who would you rather have?'” Smith asked rhetorically via Awful Announcing.
“I don’t know what the hell happened to him since that period of time. But the only thing we do know about him is that the cases against him went away, but so did his game. Because we ain’t seen that quarterback since he departed from Houston.”
Interesting stuff, right? Well, wait; it gets even better, as Smith and his guest, Elle Duncan, had plenty more to say on the subject.
Stephen A. Smith believes Deshaun Watson has become unplayable
After watching Watson boldly declare that he was a “throwing quarterback” during the week in the lead-up to the Commanders game, downplaying his need to contribute as a rusher, Duncan went off on the Browns signal-caller, blasting his arrogance in the face of being so darn unlikeable.
“The unmitigated gall for him to sit up there as incredulous as he was — ‘I’m a throwing quarterback’ — when you’re not doing that particularly well,” Duncan noted. “Based on how bad you are playing. Based on how unlikable you are right now with everything surrounding you, to sit there with that sort of arrogant ‘How dare you to expect me to be a different quarterback than what I am,’ you could have just not said the quiet part out loud.”
While plenty of fans dislike Watson for various reasons, namely his abuse allegations, Smith believes that his inability to get anything done on the field has grown that choir of dissenters, with very few fans left on his bandwagon.
“Obviously we all know what he was in the news for when he departed from Houston. We all understand that. Here’s the crime: no one’s been talking about that. They’ve been talking about his game,” Smith said. “Usually, everybody would bring that up all day, every day. When you bring up the unlikability portion of him, Elle, it’s been because of his lack of performance. In other words, considering all that you’ve been through, you should at least have the decency to be ready to ball.”
With Kevin Stefanski already saying that he won’t make a change at quarterback, the Browns may be stuck with Watsone for a few more weeks until a change has to happen. If he continues to play like he did in Week 5, however, it’s anyone’s guess how much longer Stefanski can keep going back to that well before he’s either required by management to make a swap or his players stage a mutiny.
