The Cleveland Browns made the decision to restructure the contract of star quarterback Deshaun Watson this week, freeing up a large chunk of salary cap space to give the team the most space on the cap of any team in the league. But that doesn’t necessarily mean that it puts the team in a good spot in the future.
As Mike Florio of Pro Football Talk explains, all of the money on Watson’s contract will still count against the team’s salary cap at some point, but the Browns have just decided to push that problem down the line and take big hits to their salary cap in the future – including after the contract expires.
“Those cap dollars don’t evaporate. They get deferred. To future contract years. Combined with his $46 million base salary each year and the consequences of a 2023 restructuring, Watson’s cap numbers for 2025 and 2026 have skyrocketed to $72.935 million,” Florio wrote for Pro Football Talk. “There’s also a $36.858 million dead-cap charge looming for 2027, the first year after the current deal expires.”
This also puts the Browns in a pretty difficult situation if they were to want to part ways with Watson before the end of his contract – which is not out of the question considering he has not exactly lived up to expectations.
“The bigger issue for the cap-rich Browns continues to be the $92 million Watson is owed for 2025 and 2026. If he doesn’t provide the Browns with a return on their investment (money and draft picks) in 2024, will they cut the cord and eat the cash, like the Broncos did with Russell Wilson?” Florio wrote.
Essentially, the Browns have put themselves in a situation where they either have to keep Watson as their starting quarterback for the next couple of years or they have to pay him a lot of money even if he isn’t on the roster.
Clearly, it’s a pretty terrible situation that the Browns have put themselves into with this contract, and it led to a lot of reactions on social media.
Karma my friends.
Watson has played 12 games in 2 years for the Browns, throwing 14 TDs and 9 INT's in that time. His yards per attempt are down from 8 as a Texan to 6.5. He's averaging under 200 yards passing a game. His dead cap the next 2 years? 173m and 100m. https://t.co/0wq06kV48C
— Matt Carstensen (@BearsNerd) August 29, 2024
Worst deal in the history of the NFL
AND it really gave The Browns a black eye spending all that money on a serial molester https://t.co/9JaTZ1jC2J— EvelDick (@EvelDick) August 29, 2024
Should have kept baker https://t.co/Sr2veSi7N8
— dave🦥 (@touque42) August 29, 2024
Apparently the sequel to Moneyball is #Moneybomb. 😬💰💣 https://t.co/dCFXBBoqo8
— EJ Snyder (@FootballEJ) August 29, 2024
Russell Wilson and Deshaun Watson dueling it out to be the biggest cap disasters in the history of the NFL. Wilson currently holds the belt but Watson is coming for it. Imagine if he flops this year and has a dead cap of $188 million.😂😂
— Tee (@kchawg) August 29, 2024
The worst trade in NFL history followed by the worst contract in NFL history. I hope they win in this window because they’re going to have to take their medicine at some point
— RJ (@rj_cle) August 29, 2024
We’ll have to see how this works out for the Browns.
