Photo by Michael Hickey/Getty Images
Step aside Hershel Walker.
It’s a great week for Minnesota Vikings fans. Not because of whatever will happen on Monday Night Football (presumably a Vikings loss), but because they might be bailed out in the annals of history. It’s fast approaching the point where the Browns’ trade for Deshaun Watson is the worst in the history of the NFL.
Up to this point there was seemingly nothing that could compare to the 1989 Hershel Walker trade. That’s when Minnesota, in their eternal football desperation, gave up five players, a host of draft picks for their “missing piece” in Walker, only to fail — and arguably help the Cowboys forge their early-90s dynasty with picks that resulted in Emmitt Smith, Darren Woodson and Russell Maryland.
Now there’s a chance the Deshaun Watson trade could be even worse. Couldn’t happen to a nicer guy.
Watson exited the game on Sunday vs. the Colts after taking a big hit that led to a test under the concussion protocol, and questions about the state of his shoulder. Browns’ coach Kevin Stefanski elected to keep Watson out of the game, citing an abundance of caution with his players, and reiterating that Watson is his starter of the future. That’s nice and all, but there’s not much reason to believe Watson should be starting at this point, other than his 5 year, $230M guaranteed contract which makes his role on the team as safe as any in the NFL — no matter how much he sucks.
And Deshaun Watson really sucks.
The answer to decades of quarterback woes in Cleveland, Watson has run out of excuses for being awful. Since the trade he’s been among the worst quarterbacks in the NFL.
10 games, 165-for-277 (59.6%), 1,939 passing yards, 11 TD, 8 INT — 82.09 passer rating
This season Watson is 30th in passer rating among quarterbacks who have started one game. He’s worse than Mac Jones, Kenny Pickett, and Joshua Dobbs — Watson barely clears Jordan Love, and ask Packers fans how they’re enjoying that experience.
The excuse in 2022 was that this was “rust.” Watson’s struggles were a product of being away from football for 18 months, and some of that was valid. The popular line was that a full preseason of preparation and new weapons on offense would lead to Watson returning to his form in Houston. That player who threw for 4,800 yards in 2020 feels like an eon ago, and you could make a pretty good argument that Watson starting actively hurts the Browns’ chances of winning, with his only convincing game since joining the team coming against the Titans in Week 3. The team’s best two wins this season have come in the last two weeks, when Watson hasn’t been on the field. Heck, before his injury on Sunday the quarterback for 1-for-5 for 5 yards and an interception.
To be clear: There is no chance in hell Watson gets benched. It’s a functional impossibility at this point. Cleveland committed too much guaranteed money and helped Watson by back-loading his contract that there’s no way to operate inside the cap and sign another top-tier QB.
It would be foolish to talk about how bad this all is without addressing a mammoth issue: Watson’s injuries piling up, and Cleveland’s desperation to put him on the field. The Browns have put themselves under enormous pressure to get Watson playing well quickly, so they’re forcing him back onto the field while hurt. It’s just stupid football to do this with a player you’ve committed that much money to long term, but nobody ever accused the Browns of being a smart football organization.
The most frustrating element of all this is how damn good this team is. They don’t need an elite quarterback to wins games, we’ve seen that. Their defense is good enough to put the screws to most teams in the NFL. All they need is a competent QB to be great, but instead they swung for the fences with Watson and it’s not working out.
In the end this team shot themselves in the foot, and it’s tough not to have some Deshaudenfreude about it all.
Winner: Lamar Jackson
What a damn game from Lamar Jackson. Performances like Sunday are too few and far between because of the Ravens’ inconsistent weapons, but every once in a while we see a game that reminds us just how damn good Jackson can be when things are ticking.
The Lions didn’t stand a chance, and they’re not just the class of the NFC North, but one of the best teams in the NFC as a whole. On Sunday there was absolutely nothing they could do to stop Jackson from racking up 393 yards of total offense and four touchdowns — all while doing it on a ludicrous 36 combines passing and rushing plays. That’s 10.9 yards per play generated from the QB alone, and nobody this weekend came close.
I’d like to say this felt like turning a page for Baltimore, but their weapons are too uneven to have any faith from week to week. Instead we’ll just enjoy games like this as they come.
Loser: Justin Fields
No, he didn’t play. Don’t rush to check the box scores here. The issue is that the Bears’ best win of the season against a competent opponent came without Fields playing.
It’s not like Tyson Bagent was some world-altering game-changer, but he took the normally putrid and inconsistent Bears offense and turned them into consistently mediocre. That’s a major step forward.
If you’re running an organization facing down a decision whether to take a quarterback in the 2024 NFL Draft or keep rolling with Fields, games like this are ones you circle and could make your decisions for you when April rolls around.
Winner: Sean Desai
Eagles defensive coordinator Sean Desai did something on Sunday night that nobody else has: Break the Dolphins. Miami’s offense has been the most phenomenal unit in the NFL this season, but Desai drew up the perfect plan to remove the Dolphins’ best weapons and when paired with the Eagles’ incredible defensive talent it proved to be too much.
Everything Miami does is predicated on speed off the run game, and that phase of the offense never got going. Mike McDaniel’s team finished with just 45 yards on the ground and stuffed any ability for gadget plays off the edge with Tyreek Hill.
It’s not every week that holding a team to 244 yards of offense would be considered a “win,” but this is a unit that racks up over 400 yards on the regular. A lot of teams are going to be watching game film from Sunday night when it comes to the Dolphins and seeing if they can apply some of the same principles.
Loser: Buffalo Bills
We close out this week with the Bills, who were easily the biggest team loser this week. It’s one thing to drop a game, but Buffalo is far too good to be beaten by the likes of the Patriots — who really had no business being in this game, let alone winning it.
This year’s iteration of the Bills seem miles apart from the past few years. They’re not as crisp in any phase of the game, and the offense is asking Josh Allen to play hero ball far too much. It’s not like everything is collapsing at 4-3, but things are not well at Orchard Park and this doesn’t feel like an elite team right now.
