Cleveland Browns’ Glaring Problem Makes Life Difficult for Deshaun Watson

Cleveland Browns quarterback Deshaun Watson has had a rather unenviable start to the 2024 NFL season, and while he’s largely at fault, there’s plenty of blame to go around.

Bleacher Report’s Brad Gagnon lightly defended Watson, noting that he is the most pressured quarterback in the NFL through the Browns’ first two games of the year.

Given that Cleveland lost both of its starting tackles, Jack Conklin and Jedrick Wills, that’s not entirely shocking, but it does give some context to Watson’s early struggles.

Gagnon also notes that the Browns’ receivers lead the NFL in fumbled passes, which has also been a contributing factor.

But pressure is the biggest problem.

Perhaps this will all be rectified once Conklin and Wills are healthy, but for now, it’s definitely something to watch when evaluating Watson.

Watson has thrown for 355 yards, a touchdown and a pair of interceptions while completing just 58.2 percent of his passes and posting a passer rating of 63 so far.

He showed some improvement last weekend, completing 22 of 34 passes for 186 yards while scoring a touchdown in Cleveland’s win over the Jacksonville Jaguars, but those are obviously still not great numbers.

It doesn’t help Watson’s cause that he hasn’t been very good throughout his 14 starts with the Browns since arriving in 2022, as he has totaled 15 passing touchdowns and 11 interceptions.

We’ll see if Watson can start to turn things around against the New York Giants on Sunday.