CLEVELAND, Ohio — Myles Garrett called out Browns fans for cheering Deshaun Watson while he was down on the field with his head in his hands, crying over what’s believed to be a season-ending torn Achilles, and Jameis Winston got emotional reprimanding fans for the cheering during the 21-14 loss to the Bengas.
Many Browns players were upset by the cheering, and Ogbo Okoronkwo was “disgusted.”
“It was harder (to see him go down) with the reaction that the fans gave,” Garrett said. “Whether it’s an opponent that goes down or one of our own, we don’t boo the guys that are injured on the field, especially when the cart comes out. We should be ashamed of ourselves as Browns and as fans to boo anyone and their downfall. To be season-altering, career-altering injury. Man’s not perfect. He doesn’t need to be.
“None of us are expected to be perfect. Can’t judge him for what he does off the field or on the field because I can’t throw stones from my glass house. But we need to do better. We need to do better on the football field and we need to do better as fans for having some empathy for a man who’s doing the best he can and did the best he can up to this point and we have to be better.”
At first, fans booed Watson because he lost yardage on the draw play at the end of the half. But when it became apparent that he was seriously hurt, some fans cheered, even as he knelt on the field with his helmet buried in the turf and his hands clutching it as he cried, obviously in emotional and physical pain over knowing his season was over for the second straight year.
Watson had been loudly booed during pre-game introductions, with some fans giving him the thumbs down.
After he was loaded onto the cart and driven to the locker room with a towel over his head and wiping away tears, the cheering grew louder, but some fans may have been cheering out of support. Others perhaps not so much.
“Ultimately everyone’s human and they’re disappointed just like we are, but we have to be better than that as people,” Garrett said. “There’s levels to this. At the end of the day, it’s just a game and you don’t boo anybody being injured and you don’t celebrate anyone’s downfall.”
Garrett, who’s been supportive of Watson all season, hurt for his teammate after the non-contact injury, in which his Achilles visibly snapped and popped as he started to run up the middle.
“No one deserves that,” Garrett said of the cheering. “I’ve seen him work his ass off to get back in here and put a smile on his face and try to put everything that’s outside the facility behind him. Death threats, people coming to his house, going after his family. Like I said, no one deserves that and I hate using the word deserves. I’m usually pretty consistent saying earned. He hadn’t earned it and he doesn’t deserve it. Man does pretty much everything right.
“He’s been a model citizen through college and most of the pros. He plays the game as hard as anyone I’ve seen, puts everything on the line, willing to throw his body out there and he plays the game at a hundred miles per hour and there’s a risk of being injured and he took that risk. But we have to be there for him as a team, as an organization. We can’t look down on the guy because of any mistakes on the field or anything off the field. We don’t have anything. We don’t have any moral high ground to look down on the guy.”
Winston’s voice shook and he almost came to tears defending his close friend.
“I’m going to look into this camera right here,” he said firmly and deliberately. “The way I was raised, I was taught to love no matter the circumstances, especially for people who do right by you. I’m grateful that I had a chance to serve Deshaun, but I’m very upset with the reaction to a man that has had the world against him for the past four years, and he put his body and life on the line for this city every single day. Regardless of your perception, regardless of what you thought should happen with him, he committed every single day that I’ve been here to be the best that he can be for this team.
“And I know, I come from the deep south — Birmingham, Alabama, Bessemer, Alabama — so I know the standard that hungry fans want. But the way I was raised, I will never, I will never, pull on a man when he’s down, but I will be the person to lift him up.”
Winston has been Watson’s confidante and mentor, helping him through the whole NFL calling for his benching this season, and helping him work through another civil suit this season alleging sexual assault. Watson settled the suit two weeks ago, but the NFL is still reviewing the case under the Personal Conduct Policy to determine if he deserve further sanctions. He was suspended 11 games in 2022 for sexual misconduct, and fined $5 million.
“All of us have unique experiences,” Winston said. “All of us have circumstances, conditions, and facts that we face every single day. And I pride myself in being a man of increase and being a man that wants the best out of everybody. I tell myself every morning what I want for myself, I want for everyone, and I do not want the treatment that Deshaun Watson has received from these passionate fans. I know you love this game.
“When I first got here, I knew these were some amazing fans, but Deshaun was treated badly and now he has to overcome another obstacle. So I’m going to support him, I’m going to lift him up, and I’m going to be there for him, because I see the way he fights, I see the way that he works, and I know who he is as a person and as an NFL quarterback. And that’s all I have to say to address him. I’m sending up my prayers. I already prayed for his leg and I will continue.”
Winston, who might step in as the starter with Dorian Thompson-Robinson suffering a finger injury late in the game, is up for the challenge of pulling together this fractured offense.
“I’m extremely grateful for the opportunity that lies ahead,” Winston said. “I just was disturbed, because I’ve seen a man put in day in and day out for this organization and for this city, and the way that he was treated in a time where he really needed support.”
Defensive Ogbo Okoronkwo made some of the strongest statements in the locker room.
“I was disgusted,” Okoronkwo said. “The guys, regardless of how you feel about him and how he’s playing, he’s a human, he has a family, he has loved ones, he has people he loves, he’s going out here playing a game he loves and he got hurt. and he can’t get up on his own will and people are cheering. I can’t find an excuse for that. It’s disgusting behavior. It’s really a privilege every time with step on the field because the game is so dangerous.
“When somebody gets hurts, it’s really heartbreaking because a lot of work goes into it. So when you hear fans from your own team cheering and then even cheering louder when he got on the cart, it just broke my heart, and it was really disgusting. I hope that isn’t the behavior of our fans moving forward if we want to turn this thing around. We have to do this together but like I said, that was (expletive) and it didn’t sit right with me. It left a really bad taste in my mouth. Nobody probably cares how I feel about it, but we’ve got to do better. We’re all humans.”
Kevin Stefanski was equally disturbed.
“I don’t think it’s ever okay to cheer when someone’s injured,” Stefanski said. “I’m sure it’s not every person in that building doing that, but that’s disappointing.”
Left guard Joel Bitonio has also been supportive of Watson all season, believing that he’d play better when things around him improved.
“Anytime someone gets hurt in this league home or away, people don’t cheer for that,” he said. “So it was a little bit disheartening to see the fans cheering when a guy gets hurt and, like I said, he puts his body in line every week. He goes out there every time he plays. Their guy got hurt late in the game. You’re not cheering for that. So it’s one of those things that I think the nature of the sport, it’s kind of an unwritten rule to, you don’t cheer those injuries, so you didn’t want to see that reaction.”
Bitonio had lamented Watson getting sacked 33 times this season, and not having much time to run the new scheme. It was one of the many things wrong with this dysfunctional offense.
“Every time he went out on the field, he was getting hit,” Bitonio said. “He was trying to make plays. He fought through it. He obviously cared if he’s going out there every week. In the NFL, you can find a way out if you want injuries-wise or things like that. There’s ways to make a way out, and he was out there every week trying to get us to win. Obviously, we weren’t very successful this year, but it’s not all on him. It’s on the whole team, and so it’s disappointing to see a guy go down like that.”
Bitonio still believes Watson can play winning ball for the Browns when he recovers from the injury.
“I’ve said this all year, we have to perform better as a group,” he said. “Like penalties, protections, routes, getting plays in, all that stuff adds up. You can’t just point at one person for the inept of the offense, so you can’t get a fair picture of what truly has happened. And Deshaun’s obviously our quarterback and so we’ve got his back.”
Cornerback Greg Newsome II used an expletive to describe the fan reaction.
“That was (expletive),” Newsome said. “I noticed it right away. No matter what you feel about a player, performance-wise or not, you don’t boo a guy that’s down, that can’t get up by himself. So yeah that was (expletive). So any fan that said anything, it’s (expletive), that simple. You don’t do that. Whether a guy’s playing well or not, whether you’re a fan favorite, whether you’re anything, you don’t boo a guy who’s down. That’s (expletive).”
Will Watson’s last act as a Cleveland Brown be getting cheered while he was injured? His teammates certainly hope not.