Deshaun Watson’s 6-game suspension by NFL is a slap on the wrist and an affront to justice | Opinion
You could picture Cleveland Browns medical staff springing into action Monday morning at the team’s training camp in the western suburb of Berea, Ohio. They were running to the aid of quarterback Deshaun Watson. Poor guy had just been slapped on the wrist.
A six-game suspension. What a joke, except that none of it is funny. Instead, the NFL’s token six-game suspension announced Monday feels like the bare minimum. It also feels like an affront to the testimony of 25 female massage therapists who came forward with testimony in civil lawsuits alleging sexual misconduct by Watson during therapy sessions from 2020 to ‘21.
This mess became Cleveland’s in a March trade with the Houston Texans. It almost became Miami’s, as the Dolphins and owner Stephen Ross spent much of last season infatuated with Watson and angling to get him before ultimately bowing out because not all of the civil suits had been settled.
The NFL was pushing for a a harsher penalty, a minimum one-year suspension that should have been handed down if the league’s personal conduct policy had any backbone or any respect for the women in this sordid case.
In failed settlement talks between the league and the NFL Players Association representing Watson, the league was willing to go no less than a 12-game suspension and a sizable fine some reports put at $8 million.
Watson’s side would accept no less than a suspension in the six- to eight-game range. In other words, NFL disciplinary officer Sue L. Robinson, a former federal judge, on Monday handed down a punishment on the low side of what Team Watson would have agreed to.
Clearly, the six-game suspension is a guilty verdict against Watson, a firm indication the league believes he violated the personal conduct policy, which means it believed the women accusers. He is not exonerated.
Just as clearly, though, the mere six-game penalty suggests the league, or at least Robinson, just didn’t think the accusations were all that serious.
The two Texas grand juries that declined to pursue criminal charges against Watson certainly aided his case in terms of the NFL punishment.
For perspective, though, in 2017, Dallas Cowboys running back Ezekiel Elliott was given the same six-game suspension over a domestic abuse accusation in Ohio despite the Columbus City Attorney’s Office declining to pursue criminal charges due to “conflicting and inconsistent information.”
It was one woman accusing Elliott.
It was one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25 women accusing Watson — and not in a conflicting or inconsistent manner. The weight of their consensus of testimony was greater than Watson’s steadfast denials to a degree that merited more than six games.
One lawsuit was dropped. Twenty of the remaining 24 settled in June. Three of the last four unsettled cases settled Monday, leaving only one civil suit still set to go to trial. (A settled case, of course, does not mean the allegations were false, just that the accuser opted out of a courtroom trial.)
The two sides have three days to appeal the six-game ruling.
The NFLPA and Watson already have said they will not. And why would they, after getting off light?
The league and commissioner Roger Goodell could appeal for a longer suspension. They also could appeal for a fine big enough to matter to a man who signed a record five-year, $230 million contract with Cleveland in March — fully guaranteed.
The guess is Goodell will not appeal this and instead will want one of the most embarrassing scandals in NFL history finally over with so everyone can move on.
The damage is done, though.
The damage to the two dozen women who stepped forward as victims.
And the damage to Deshaun Watson’s name.
His vile behavior — if one believes the chorus of two dozen women — has been compounded by the lack of any admission of wrongdoing. Instead of expressing any regret the quarterback has, in effect, kept insisting that two dozen women who did not know each other, in different massage sessions over time, all were lying.
The NFL season will go on now.
After missing one-third of it suspended, Watson, rich forever, will resume his football career and be cheered by Browns fans desperate to matter again, to win big. And he might be great, too. He might deliver for Cleveland.
The man’s name has taken on a forever stain, though.
No matter how loud the cheering may get, this is nobody’s hero.
This story was originally published August 1, 2022 at 10:17 AM.
