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00:00We knew today would be a split reps day.
00:01We did not know who was going to start out.
00:04Obviously, first reps then ended up going to Deshaun.
00:06Coach Riz says that he had a great day.
00:08Deshaun Watson did today.
00:09And so I would imagine, and what I love checking in with Coach Riz on is that he is just,
00:14he just calls it how he sees it.
00:16The man has zero agenda.
00:17He's got maybe a little with Dylan Gabriel, but he's got zero agenda.
00:21I like that you noticed that.
00:22I got that, I'm sure, the exact same text.
00:24And there was just, Dylan's best day at camp.
00:26He wants Dylan to be great in a way that I'm just not comfortable with, if we can be honest.
00:31But one thing that does make me feel like, okay, I get it.
00:36It's because I trust, Coach just only sees what's on the field.
00:39He's not like me and you in that respect where we have our blinders up
00:42and we have our certain people that we root for and certain things.
00:45That's just not who he is.
00:47And so when he comes out and says Deshaun had a great day today,
00:50I tend to believe Deshaun did, in fact, have a pretty good day, all things considered.
00:54Yeah, and I mean, listen, I think the one thing, because the thing with Coach is always that
00:58I also think that he's an optimist.
01:01He is.
01:01He is.
01:02He tends to find the good in quarterbacks more so than the bad.
01:05I've told you before, there's certain people on that beat that they haven't seen a good
01:09Browns practice in 15 years.
01:10Now, they would argue there hasn't been a good one in 15 years, and that's fair.
01:13But Coach is not that way.
01:15Coach is going to find the good.
01:17Yeah, so listen, when Coach tells me that both quarterbacks looked really good,
01:21one, he's a man who's played the positioning coach for a very long time, so I trust him
01:24that both of the quarterbacks, like, more than anybody else really on the beat, I can
01:28look at it and go, okay, you've seen quarterbacks play, you understand, you've been around the
01:31game a long time, you know what to look for, more than anybody else that's probably covering
01:34the game right now.
01:37I also can take it at face value, no doubt, where if he says Deshaun looks better than
01:41Shador, I trust the idea that Deshaun looked better than Shador, and I don't think that's
01:45a crazy thought, right?
01:46Like, we expect days where Deshaun looks better than Shador, there's going to be the
01:50back and forth, there's a reason we are in a quarterback battle that is considered, you
01:54know, tightly contested, you're going to have days where it flips back and forth, even if
01:58you don't want it to, it makes sense that, you know, I think the first two days were definitely
02:02Shador days, third day is a Deshaun day, that it resembles exactly what Todd Munkin and
02:07everybody else is telling us right now about the battle.
02:09Yeah, and now, I mean, there's a part of my brain that thinks to myself, like, all right,
02:13well, how much of that is because the Browns wanted to make sure today was a good Deshaun
02:16day, you know, and I'm not saying they're trying to, we're not at Chauncey's poker
02:19table, I don't think this thing is rigged, but also, within these setups, Deshaun looked
02:23really awful in many respects over the past couple days, I mean, you guys heard what Daryl
02:27said with us last night at 6 o'clock, the amount of bad throws, and that one to Ronnie
02:32Hickman was, I think Daryl said, oof, bad, right?
02:35Yeah, I think that's the word.
02:36Like, I don't know, and it's one of those things where it's like, I don't know, maybe
02:39did they set it up for him to look a little bit better today?
02:41Zero part of me was shocked he looked better today, and maybe this is just how this is supposed
02:45to work, a couple bad days, he's not going to have three bad days in a row, so then all
02:49of a sudden, this final day ends up looking good, but if you give him the first opportunity
02:52and the first crack with the ones, I would think part of that is, and part of that thinking
02:56is, you wanted to make sure Deshaun didn't just sink out there.
02:59Yeah, and I mean, listen, there is also, this is where I think everybody kind of misses,
03:04and it's everybody under the sun, you don't know what the practice plan is, right?
03:07Yeah, zero idea.
03:08Like, what if yesterday was just things that Deshaun right now is not comfortable doing, or just
03:12not good, like, that's not his strength as a quarterback right now, and today, lined up
03:16more with everything they were doing, are the things that he's really comfortable with,
03:19and the things that he's strong in right now in his game.
03:21I know, well, you see the rock and the hard place that I'm stuck in, and we're all kind
03:24of stuck in in that regard, right?
03:25We want info, we want to know who's got the lead, we want to know what's happening, but
03:29also the people that are theirs who are relying on, and they're just as good as what our eyes
03:34could tell us, because what do we know at this point?
03:35I mean, but, you know, we don't know what they're working on.
03:42We don't know what they're trying to accomplish.
03:44We don't know what they're being honest with and not honest with, and what they're trying
03:47to do and pull off, and so, like, there's a part of me that just wants to burn it all
03:50and say we can't trust any of it, and there's another part of me, the content side of me,
03:54that is like, well, let's really dive into this and see what happens, and now I just got
03:58to be honest, it's June 11th, we're going to dive into it, because that's how this works,
04:01okay, we have six more weeks of no football until we get training camp, but so is the
04:06reality kind of sitting somewhere in the middle?
04:08If Deshaun has a bad day, is it because he just can't throw a football anymore?
04:11Probably not.
04:12If Deshaun has a great day, is it because he's fixed and it's going to be the 2020 Deshaun?
04:16Also, probably not as well.
04:17Yeah, I mean, I don't, it's probably, it's definitely somewhere in the middle.
04:20I do think, though, we look at Deshaun get the first reps today, like, could it be nothing?
04:25Absolutely, it could.
04:26It could have just been, oh, we're splitting them 50-50, flip a coin, it's Deshaun's dad.
04:29Could have legitimately just flipped a coin at somewhere in Berea and just been like,
04:33all right, this is what I've decided.
04:35More than fair if that would have happened.
04:36I think it's also reasonable to deduct the fact that, what quarterback do you feel more
04:40comfortable right now?
04:41That's the guy I put out with the ones first.
04:43Let's go see what Deshaun has.
04:45You do read something into the idea that Deshaun got the first reps here.
04:47Maybe a little bit.
04:48I mean, I don't think it's a mistake.
04:49You're putting the best guy out there at the very first chance that you get to see him,
04:53whatever guy you're more comfortable with.
04:55I think there's a chance that you might feel more comfortable with Deshaun Watson if you're,
04:58and listen, it makes sense.
04:59Again, we just iterated, it's June 11th.
05:01All of the behind the scenes, learning the playbook stuff, we all agree Deshaun should
05:06have been ahead in that, probably still should be ahead in that department.
05:08He's done this for a decade.
05:10If you still feel comfortable with him, I mean, they were talking about, I know coach
05:14sent us today the idea that they're still working on, you know, quarterbacks are handling
05:18protections, they're handling the run pass options.
05:20Like, I don't think it's crazy to think that Deshaun's ahead, especially in that type of
05:23department.
05:25Shador didn't have to do that in college.
05:26He's had one year where he's had to sort of do it in the NFL.
05:29Like, while we had Ethan Posick healthy, he was still handling the protection.
05:33So, it's still a learning process for Shador early on in this, too.
05:37Yeah, well, acknowledging that it feels like we're all playing at the blackjack table,
05:40but a part of that is we're all playing different hands here.
05:43My different hand is I definitely am, I'm not rooting for Deshaun to be great.
05:47I'm rooting for Shador to have the opportunity.
05:48And a lot of that is built into the idea that I don't think Deshaun's going to be good at
05:51football
05:52anymore because he wasted four years of our lives telling me that he wasn't good at football
05:56anymore.
05:56But, in that understanding, I don't think it's more about that being a leg up necessarily
06:01for one quarterback or another.
06:03I tend to have a different viewpoint on it that I'm sure there's a lot of people that
06:07will just flat out disagree.
06:08I look at it as Deshaun really struggled over those two days.
06:12Shador really looked good over the previous two days.
06:15And so, today was about making sure Deshaun left the six weeks feeling good about himself
06:20and had a better chance.
06:21And so, in order to do that, they had to put him with the ones.
06:24You put him with the ones, you give him a chance to rebound a little bit, and by all
06:27accounts, it seems like he did.
06:28And so, now, for the next six weeks, you have both quarterbacks feeling like they had a pretty
06:33good three days or at least showed themselves in some reputable way.
06:36They get fired up, and then they enter training camp and we get underway.
06:39Even with your bias, so you admit if you were a coach running a quarterback competition,
06:42this is the type of thing you would probably do, right?
06:44If I'm deciding between guys one and two, I think that they're somewhere near even.
06:48If I thought Deshaun, in this case, had a bad couple of days, well, I want to see him
06:53have a good day.
06:53I want him to be confident heading into training camp.
06:55Yeah, that's what I'm doing is I'm putting myself in Munkin's shoes, and I'm thinking
06:58to myself, would I value the idea of almost tipping my hand for who I think is going to
07:02be the number one, or would I just try to make sure the guy that struggled the most over
07:06the past couple of days had the best chance to make sure that day three went better?
07:10And that's how I look at it.
07:11And if it was me, if I was coaching these guys, I'd say, Deshaun, you really didn't
07:16play great over the previous couple of days.
07:18You need to look better in day three.
07:19You're not going to look better trying to throw shots to Jack Stoll like you did yesterday.
07:24So we're going to give you with the number ones, and we'll give you with these wide receivers
07:27that look really good.
07:28And we're going to build your confidence back up just a little bit, and then let you go
07:32through this six-week break where you know what you have to work on, but you're going
07:34to feel better than you had to have, at least over the past couple of days.
07:37Because Deshaun, I mean, Jake, after what Daryl was telling us last night, how Deshaun
07:42looked over these two days, the first two days of this camp, Deshaun might have thought
07:46he was cooked after these three days if he came out and looked this bad again today.
07:50Yeah, I mean, it definitely wouldn't have been a good sign for him.
07:52Now, I think the Jack Stoll throw, actually, oddly enough, was with the ones.
07:56Jack Stoll with the ones.
07:56Very odd.
07:57That is odd.
07:58But not the point.
07:59I mean, yeah.
08:00Listen, I think they can approach it from multiple views, and this is where it's difficult.
08:03You know, I don't know that they asked the question of Todd today.
08:07I don't believe they did on why Deshaun got the start with the ones.
08:09I'm sure he probably would have just chalked it up to, I mean, I got two guys, I got even
08:14reps.
08:14Like, what do you want?
08:15Yeah, yeah.
08:16All right, you had a theory off of something we didn't get to yesterday with Deshaun Watson.
08:19We do have a couple things from Deshaun and Chador speaking yesterday we didn't quite
08:22get to.
08:23But this was Deshaun talking about whether or not he's fully healthy now.
08:27Here we go.
08:27I can say that now I'm fully healthy.
08:30I'm ready to go.
08:32This last year I was able to conquer that.
08:34And then I just say I haven't really been, I haven't been 100% since that Tennessee game
08:39in 23.
08:40So, I mean, he lays it out right there.
08:432023, quite some time ago, even for Deshaun in the entire aspect of this.
08:48So that's going back to, I mean, his second year with the Browns.
08:51So that is like the first full season.
08:52This is the Ravens season where he had the incredible second half comeback.
08:56It was not that incredible of a second half comeback.
09:00Everyone makes it seem like that game was awesome.
09:02Go look at the box score.
09:03He finished throwing over under 200 yards in one touchdown pass.
09:06It blows my mind.
09:07I think he threw for like 183 in that game for one touchdown pass.
09:10And people like myself, we held on to it because we wanted to make Deshaun seem better than
09:14he was.
09:14He really wasn't even that good in that game.
09:16It was the best game he's played in the Cleveland Browns uniform by far.
09:18I know the bar is low.
09:20Yeah, but again, like, you know, I mean, it's like 185, 183, I think is the number for
09:25one touchdown.
09:25Okay.
09:26All right.
09:27It's still an all right game.
09:28I mean, listen, you walked away with a win of a division rival.
09:31I'm taking it for what it's worth, but it was a good game.
09:33But you take it, I mean, 2023, that means he played, he's saying all the way up to that
09:38moment.
09:38Obviously that's the game where he had the shoulder injury, then came back in 24, was
09:42never healthy in 24 until he had the Achilles tear where he really wasn't healthy.
09:46I mean, is this not like a repeat Baker Mayfield situation where we go into Baker's last year,
09:52knowing there's a shoulder injury, letting Baker play through it, not looking good.
09:56But like, this is a $230 million quarterback in the Browns eyes.
09:59This is a guy they went out and traded for his first full season that he had an opportunity
10:03to play.
10:04He gets hurt in week three and they're like, well, we really need you to go back out there.
10:08Go like, aren't you protecting a little bit of the asset that you just went out and got
10:11like, isn't it also partially your responsibility?
10:14The same way we talked about with Baker to ensure that your quarterback's going to be
10:17healthy moving forward.
10:19Yeah.
10:19So he has spoke, by the way, he spoke previously about this being when it happened.
10:22I believe it was with something, something involving Mary Kay is sticking out to me where
10:26I was like, oh, wow.
10:27He says all the way since the Titans.
10:28I, and this is him, by the way, rewriting his own history on this.
10:32So like you get to rewrite it whatever way you want to, I think in regards to Baker, I think
10:36one of the problems Baker has continuously had in his career is he does play through injuries.
10:39I think that's why he looks awesome in certain stretches and then looks very mediocre in
10:43others.
10:44I think it's because when he's playing through, it's very hard for him to do.
10:47I think that's what happened last year for being truthful about it.
10:50But I hear what you're saying.
10:52I don't see how the Browns are held responsible for this though.
10:55At that point, he had to play through whatever he needed to play through.
10:59Same thing with 2024 until obviously he didn't.
11:01If the argument that Deshaun is trying to build up though, while acknowledging that he's
11:05not ever going to be the same Deshaun that existed in Houston is that he's
11:09just was never healthy here, it's not a bad route to go.
11:14I just am tired of hearing it.
11:16And like on top of that, if health is part of the reason why I can't buy into you to
11:20begin with anyway, then I'm sorry.
11:22This doesn't do anything to help out that case either.
11:25Like I'm not even saying the Browns are fully to blame because I feel the same way
11:28with Baker.
11:28Like you're the one with the shoulder injury.
11:30You're the one who has to address it with the team and probably have the
11:33wherewithal to sit yourself down for a second and realize health is important and
11:36you're helping the team by taking a few weeks off, getting healthy so you can actually make
11:40a comeback later in the year and play out a good year of football and hopefully make
11:44the playoffs.
11:44But I do think there is some responsibility.
11:48A part of that lies on the Browns to also be like, I mean, clearly Deshaun wasn't healthy.
11:53This makes sense to me, by the way, because this is right before the Colts game where
11:56he leaves very early on in that game and he threw like five passes and never played
12:00again and then came back.
12:01I think it was the following week, but don't you hold some responsibility to also protect
12:06your player from themselves?
12:07Like we talk about Baker's going out there because he's the all-time competitor.
12:10He wants to be out there.
12:11You think this is on the Browns?
12:12A little bit.
12:13I mean, I think they hold some responsibility in this.
12:15Should they have like John Taffer style shut it down the moment that it happened with
12:18the Titans?
12:19At that point, that would have been tough because you would have been, you basically would
12:22have been saying the season was done and the season was going to be over and it just
12:28was what it was that early into it off of a, just a not good 22.
12:33That would have been, that would have been a real tough.
12:35I mean, I don't know that you have to shut him down for the year, right?
12:37I don't know what the injury is in Tennessee.
12:39Is it the same injury as Baltimore?
12:40We got, we got to a spot where it didn't matter anyway.
12:42I mean, we got to where they ended up shutting him down and it was what it was, but like
12:46I,
12:46that would have been really tough that early on in the season.
12:49Now, now this year, what an interesting question off this is if he shows any signs of injury
12:52or any signs of anything, how quick would they be if he does win the starting job to pull him?
12:56I would hope they'd be very quick too, because if his whole idea is he's played through injuries
13:01the entire time, well, guess what?
13:02I've seen you play with, then if you want to call it injuries, okay, you stink with injuries.
13:06You're not good.
13:07Same way I'll say Baker wasn't good with injuries.
13:09I can make the case, Deshaun Watson, if your whole claim is that a healthy Deshaun Watson
13:13is the only thing that's been keeping you back here, all right, but the moment you get
13:17injured, then you're riding the pine because I've watched too much injured Deshaun to know
13:21that that's just not going to work.
13:23It's so tough to look at 2023 because I don't think he was good in that season, but you do
13:27go
13:27back and look at the results and the offense was, I mean, certainly much more effective than it was
13:31the last couple of years.
13:32Those are, you know, three straight games of 20 plus points, 24, 22, 27, and that's apparently
13:38when the injury occurs.
13:39Now the scoring kept up after that while Deshaun was still playing, they were still scoring points,
13:43but then you look at where it was last year, like it lines up.
13:46And again, it can be a Deshaun spin and it is a great spin by him if it's the case
13:50because
13:51everything else was disastrous.
13:53But I mean, if that ends up being the case, like it does make sense.
13:56Those were two of his best games, the loss against Pittsburgh, the statistically his best
14:00games where he throws for 235 yards against Pittsburgh and then 289 against Tennessee.
14:06Like that's where he looked his best in the injury.
14:08He never really looked the same after it.
14:11Injured player tells me he was injured.
14:13I got it.
14:14I got the, I got the memo.
14:15I, I, it's not breaking anything to me.
14:17Uh, but I, as far as if the Browns hold any responsibility for it, I, I just, I think this
14:21is what they do with guys.
14:22I just, I think they let the quarterbacks decide and then they go from there.
14:25Maybe there needs to be a little bit more protection on that.
14:27So I can understand that.
14:29But I, if you're Deshaun, I don't think you can look back and say the Browns, like Baker's
14:32got a legitimate case that if somebody had just protected him in some sort of way,
14:36he never would have allowed it, but if someone had protected him in a certain way, maybe
14:40his career and maybe his time with the Browns would have gone drastically different.
14:44And I think that might be true.
14:45I just can't hear it from Deshaun.
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