The Josh Innes Show - Dumb Deshaun Watson Story

Episode Date: April 14, 2025

Mike Freeman of USA Today has written a very dull, lazy story about the importance of draft picks. This story uses the Browns trading for Deshaun Watson as a cautionary tale. Yes, draft picks are important. But, I still don't think that was a bad trade. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The following was recorded from inside an ice plunge. Ah! Woo! Okay. All right. When a Coors Light is cold enough, the mountains on the can turn blue. So the next time you want a cold lager, cold filter, cold package Coors Light, just wait until those glorious mountains on the can turn blue.

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Yes. Get almost, almost anything delivered with Uber Eats. Order now. Alcohol and select markets. See app for details. Headline reads, USA Today, 10 days to the NFL draft. Deshaun Watson remains a draft cautionary tale. Now, what could this story mean?

Because, honestly, he's not a draft cautionary tale at all. There's nothing about Deshaun Watson that is a draft cautionary tale. The Texans drafted Deshaun Watson, and Deshaun Watson was really freaking good for the Texans until he got caught forcing his butthole into the air, forcing people's fingers into his anus, or whatever the fuck it was, right? Like, there's nothing about Deshaun Watson that I would consider to be a draft cautionary tale. But let's read the story from Mike Freeman here. And let's see what Mike Freeman has to say. Why does he feel that Deshaun Watson is a draft cautionary tale?

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slash promos. All right so Mike Freeman USA Today, draft cautionary tale to Sean Watson. Three years ago was the start of a lesson. It was a long lesson. It took years to learn, but it may have finally sunk in. The lesson was that a team needs to be careful with its draft picks. All right, so this sounds like this is not going to be a story about drafting to Sean Watson because obviously he wasn't drafted three years ago. So this sounds like it's shaping up to be a story about why you have to be cautious about the draft picks you trade away for star players is where this seems like it's going.

It needs to understand their value. They are a form of currency. They are the future. They are not to be trifled with. Wow, Mike Freeman, congratulations for knowing something or stating something that people that play Madden or video games or 10-year-old boys have known. Draft picks have value. Congratulations, Mike Freeman. This sounds like it's going to be compelling shit. The Cleveland Browns have learned this lesson in the most painful of ways, the most humiliating, the ugliest of ways.

That lesson is particularly relevant now because we can officially say now, though unofficially before, that the team's trade for Deshaun Watson is among the worst trades in the history of American sports. The Browns got Watson in a 2024 sixth-round pick. The Texans got a 2022 first-round pick, a 2023 and 2024 first-round pick, a 2022 fourth-rounder, a third-round pick in 2023, and a fourth-rounder in 2024. Quote, we spent a tremendous amount of time exploring and investigating the opportunity to trade for Deshaun Watson, Brown's owners Dee

and Jimmy Haslam said in a statement in March 2022. We are acutely aware and emphatic to the highly personal sentiments expressed about this decision. Our team's comprehensive evaluation process was of utmost importance due to the sensitive nature of his situation and the complex factors involved. We also stand there are some legal proceedings that are ongoing and we will respect due process. So those quotes really don't matter. That's just to add words to the story. We'll continue the story in a second, but let's go back to the fact that they traded those picks for Deshaun Watson. So the overarching theme of this story is you gotta be careful and respect your draft picks because if you're not, you could end up like the Browns.

Well, no. Like today, if you would offer that exact same package for Josh Allen, that exact same package for, let's see, Joe Burrow, if you were to offer that same package for Patrick Mahomes, Lamar, guys who are proven successful guys and talented guys, and guys who presumably don't go out and force massage therapists to diddle their buttholes, then maybe that's actually a good deal. Like, I hate stories like this. I hate when people take one example, the shitty Cleveland Browns who have never done anything right. The Cleveland Browns who again, on paper, this was not a bad trade. If you mean to tell me that you get a franchise quarterback and really what you gave up is three first round picks to get a franchise quarterback. You take that. They gave him a shitload of money. It turns out that he just sucks now.

And you know what? You didn't know he was gonna suck when you did it. You know that he was in a bunch of legal issues. You know that it was a mess, but you also knew that the guy was a massive talent and the guy had been great for the Texans. Not good, he was great for the Texans. He was one of those guys that when he got the ball late in the game

and you knew there was a chance to go down and win it, you knew you had a chance with Deshaun Watson. Super talented guy. So you go back and look at that trade and you're like, oh my God, you gave up three first-round picks and this and this. Yes, for a dude still young, dude in his 20s, and a guy who was arguably top five six seven quarterbacks in the league when he was at his best at the most important position in the game let's continue this

now then there's god damn oh jesus this whole story like what a lazy story. So not only do you get a lazy take and a lazy, tired topic, which is draft picks are valuable. Well, no shit, Mike Freeman. Now I'm just getting tons of quotes from the Browns when they traded for the Deshaun Watson. Let's skip past that. Let's see. At the time, there were people inside the league who liked the trade. However, suffice to say, there were a number of team officials who believe the Browns are making a huge mistake in giving up so much

draft capital the primary mistake the Browns made yes there were several was overvaluing Watson's worth duh the other was not respecting the value of such high draft picks it's true you can find Hall of Fame players in the lower rounds of the draft. Tom Brady was a late round pick. No shit, boy. This is just lazy. It's just a lazy, pointless story. Those first rounders, however, can be the warp core of your franchise. If you hit on them, things can change generationally.

It's difficult to hit on them, but a franchise needs to at least give itself a chance to do so. Yes, but if you have a chance to get an all-world quarterback, the number of picks you trade doesn't fucking matter if the quarterback is worth a shit. Like, people live in this world where it's either, like, it's got to be one or the other. Either you, like, it doesn't work that way. Like, this is one example of where trading draft picks was a mistake. Yes. It's obvious that if you fuck around with draft picks and you give up draft capital, it can kill you. But you know what else can kill you is going through years and years and years of having shitty quarterback play. Who's to say they would have

drafted anybody worth a shit with those picks anyway? How often do you see when dudes get drafted and they suck anyhow? Like, you could have made the wrong picks. It's quite possible. Look at the Browns. They've been trying to find a franchise quarterback for about as long as I've been alive. I mean, how many different starting quarterbacks have the Browns as a franchise had? Like, 30 in the last 20 years? Some ridiculous number.

So, like, the idea that, idea that like well this is a horrible idea and all this does is shows that you need to value draft picks and if you don't believe me look at what the Browns did if Deshaun Watson ends up being great the draft picks don't matter the problem is the player you traded for sucked if the player you trade for is outstanding no one's bitching about the number of picks you gave up because ultimately those are unknowns. They might be great and they're first round picks, but here's the thing. If he's as good as you think he's going to be, those first round picks are going to be late in the first round anyway. And you could always make

trades to get back into the first round. You could, there's a lot of shit you can do. It's not just absolute like A plus B type. That's not that. But the issue was not that they traded three first round picks for Deshaun Watson, who again was a top six, seven quarterback in the league and a dude who reinvigorated the Texans. The issue is that when he got to Cleveland, he fucking sucks. That's what this is. This dumb story continues. What did the Texans do with those picks? As an ESPN story from last year noted, the Texans didn't draft perfectly,

but they got some good players with those picks. Players like defensive end Will Anderson Jr., who was the defensive rookie of the year, and Tank Dell, a solid young receiver, although who knows if he's ever going to be good again with his busted up leg, but anyway. The NFL draft is an almost impossible thing for teams to decode. It becomes that much harder when you do what the Browns did. Hopefully, lesson learned. Like, did you just throw this shit into chat, GPT? Like, like, no offense, Mike Freeman, but this story, like, I guess they're forcing you to write shit, so you got to come up with something so you write this very kind of sterile, obvious story. This truly seems like this gentleman went out and just typed into chat GPT, please give me a draft story about how Deshaun Watson should be a cautionary tale. I mean, this is paint-by-. Bullshit is all this story is.

Every situation is unique. Like yes, draft picks have great value, but how many teams you see that draft? Well, pretty frequently, if they don't have a quarterback, it doesn't matter. Now there are examples of teams who draft well and are great and free agency and don't necessarily have a great quarterback. The Eagles are like that. The Eagles, like people don't want to hear that, but I do subscribe to this. If you took your quarterback, would you trade your quarterback for Jalen Hurts? And I'd say that there's a large number of teams in the NFL who would not. There's the obvious ones, but then there's even some other ones where they're probably like, yeah, we'd probably just roll with the guy we have and we'd be fine with it.

Jalen Hurts is an example of build a great team around a guy and let's see what happens. But most of the time in the NFL, you've got superstar quarterback, and that's how you're going to win or lose games. Josh Allen had one of the best seasons he's had. He had an MVP season this year, and that's after they got rid to win or lose games. Josh Allen had one of the best seasons he's had. He had an MVP season this year, and that's after they got rid of some of his key pieces. He's obviously a valuable piece. Today, if someone was like, listen,

if the Bills were like, we just can't afford Josh Allen, we'd like to trade Josh Allen, would you give us three first-round picks for Josh Allen? Every fucking team, for the most part, unless you've got Pat Mahomes, or you've got Pat Mahomes or you've got Lamar or you've got one of these superstar guys, you would trade, do that deal in a second. Oh, you need three first round picks

for the guy that just won league MVP? Sounds good to me. In a heartbeat, they would do that. So like this idea that because of the one example where they make a huge trade, because these kinds of trades don't happen in the NFL that often. It's very rare that you see something like this idea that because of the one example where they make a huge trade, because these kind of trades don't happen in the NFL that often. Like it's very rare that you see something like this. If you wanted to go back even further, you can go to the Ricky Williams trade where they trade the whole draft.

The Saints do and Ditka does for Ricky Williams. Like that was a different world where running backs mattered more than they do now. But you're taking this one bad example, which again, the idea of the deal was not a bad one. Other than the fact that this guy's a clusterfuck of a human, he was a superstar quarterback. He was a guy who won playoff games. He was a guy who reinvigorated the Texans franchise. As his former college coach Dabo called him, he's like, Michael Jordan, the dude was a baller. You do not know when you trade for him and you give up three first round picks that he's

going to just like turn into a pumpkin. You don't know that, but you take the chance. The bigger issue you have is you just paid him a shitload of money. So you're stuck with him. Like you, like you say, well, it sets the franchise back with draft picks. Well, guess what? You're going to have first round draft picks again soon. Like the world's going to keep spinning for you. You'll figure it out. There's always ways. So that's a lazy story from Mike Freeman, a chat GPT type

story that was a complete waste of time. Anyway, more to come.