The Cleveland Browns are breaking new ground in terms of how bad a contract can look, courtesy, naturally, of Deshaun Watson.
The mud they dug up Thursday: a contract restructure that will convert $44.79 million of his cap space this season into a signing bonus, giving the team $35.83 million in new cap space according to ESPN’s Field Yates.
The move reportedly leaves Cleveland with more than $62 million in cap space, by far the most in the NFL. Obviously, it’s a bit late for them to fill that space, so they’ll instead carry it over to next year, where they’re currently $66 million over the salary cap, according to About the capOnly the New Orleans Saints ($94 million) have it worse.
Meanwhile, Watson’s salary numbers have become even more eye-catching — an accomplishment when the original bill was an unprecedented, fully guaranteed $230 million deal for a player facing suspension over numerous sexual assault allegations. The Browns had already restructured the contract last year, and doing so again leaves Watson with a $72.9 million cap hit. for the 2025 and 2026 seasonsplus $26.9 million in void dead cap for 2027.
The NFL has never seen a disaster like the Deshaun Watson contract
If all this seems unsustainable to you, then your ears are not mistaken.
Financial Armageddon is looming for the Browns, who face a $172 million salary-cap hit if they cut him in 2025 and $99 million in 2026. Considering the record for most dead money incurred is the $85 million the Denver Broncos ate up to release Russell Wilson, that’s an accomplishment in itself.
All of this would be fine if Watson was the missing piece for the long-awaited Super Bowl, but so far he hasn’t looked anywhere close to making it happen. He missed 11 games of his first season in 2022 due to the aforementioned suspension, then looked terrible upon his return.
The Browns at least posted a 5-1 record in the games he played last year, but his stats were again mediocre and injuries sidelined him for most of the season while Joe Flacco became a folk hero.
Now entering his third season with the team, Watson is dealing with a shoulder issue after receiving lukewarm reviews during training camp. He simply hasn’t fit well into Browns head coach Kevin Stefanski’s system at times when he’s healthy, but the team is determined to keep him.
So they’ll move on, hoping the player who starred for the Houston Texans is still there somewhere.