Brendan Gulick and Spencer German give their thoughts and reactions to Deshaun Watson's season ending shoulder injury.
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00:08 >> Well, hi everybody and welcome to Berea on a day that is not what anybody
00:13 hoped for.
00:14 That's probably the best way to describe what's going on here with
00:18 the Cleveland Browns.
00:19 Deshaun Watson is done for the season.
00:22 It's an injury unrelated to his previous shoulder injury and
00:26 it is certainly casting an otherwise dark cloud over Berea right now.
00:31 Not necessarily inside the locker room, I'll be clear about that, but
00:34 you can kind of sense the disappointment and the frustration.
00:38 With the Browns knowing they've got yet another piece of adversity
00:42 that they've got to deal with throughout the rest of the season.
00:45 And Spence, this stinks, this flat out stinks.
00:48 It doesn't mean the season's over.
00:49 The team's six and three, and
00:51 they are certainly still in the thick of a playoff race.
00:56 The report that we're hearing, although it's unconfirmed from the team,
00:59 is that Dorian Thompson Robinson is gonna be the starting quarterback on Sunday
01:02 against the Pittsburgh Steelers, not PJ Walker.
01:05 So we'll see how the week progresses, but that's what we're hearing.
01:09 In the meantime, what can you say?
01:12 I mean, this has just been kind of the story of the year for the Browns.
01:14 >> Yeah, it's certainly been an injury riddled season,
01:19 dating back to just week one.
01:20 Jack Conklin goes down, you lose Nick Chubb in week two.
01:22 And at the time, the Nick Chubb injury felt like the one that was gonna be
01:27 the devastating blow to the season, just what he means to this team,
01:32 face the franchise in a lot of ways.
01:34 The fan base obviously adores Nick Chubb.
01:36 Given the Sean Watson accusations, I think he was kind of always a rallying cry for
01:41 people like, well, that's still a guy I can root for on this team,
01:43 which it is what it is for some fans.
01:46 But they've survived everything to this point,
01:50 they've dealt with injury after injury.
01:52 This one feels like, you're right, like a devastating blow.
01:55 And I understand, you're in the locker room today,
01:58 the players are gonna give off that vibe.
02:00 They're gonna just keep saying we're gonna keep fighting, that's their job.
02:03 It's no rest for the weary in the NFL.
02:05 You go back out, you got a game next week against the Steelers,
02:08 that's a pretty big one.
02:08 So they're gonna keep playing, that's all they can do.
02:12 But from the outside looking in, man,
02:13 how do you not feel like this is a devastating blow?
02:15 Especially on the heels of that win on Sunday, which we've been talking about
02:21 being maybe one of the top five wins in franchise history since the team returned
02:24 in 99, and then this bomb sort of drops on you on Wednesday.
02:28 It's gotta be devastating for the fan base and on some level,
02:31 the organization too, even if they're not gonna say it publicly.
02:34 >> No, actually, I think Andrew Berry, who spoke earlier today, and
02:38 as we shoot this, Kevin Stefanski has not yet addressed the media before practice.
02:42 I actually think the organization is projecting optimism.
02:46 And I admire them for that, that the season's not over, guys.
02:50 Like, yeah, we lost our starting quarterback and that sucks.
02:52 Like, that's kind of the message.
02:54 But it's next man up, and as Anthony Walker said in the locker room, it's like,
02:59 look, we're professionals, we'll figure it out.
03:01 Like, the job is to go out and play football and to win.
03:05 And in this division in particular, and he said, as you get into December and
03:09 January, you gotta play defense and you gotta be able to run the ball.
03:13 And he said, that's two things we feel like we can do at a high level.
03:15 So the reality is, I think the Browns have a Super Bowl caliber defense, and
03:20 they have been able to figure it out enough offensively.
03:23 The reality is tough.
03:30 You lose your star running back, you lose not just your two starting offensive
03:34 tackles, but I don't know when DeJuan Jones will be back.
03:37 Maybe this week, who knows?
03:40 You've taken a lot of blows here on the offensive side of the ball.
03:46 And yet Kevin Stefanski is creative and has found ways to win games with guys that
03:50 you would normally say aren't your starters.
03:53 So I think the team is probably feeling like they got sucker punched here.
03:59 But after having spent the last 25 minutes in the locker room,
04:03 I can promise you that they don't feel like their season is over, that's for sure.
04:07 >> Yeah, you brought up Kevin Stefanski, I think it's a good point.
04:09 Like this eight game stretch, like the previous four week stretch,
04:15 or four game stretch, I should say, five weeks, four games.
04:17 Where you didn't have DeSean Watson with the other shoulder injury,
04:20 I think tested his resilience as a head coach and his creativity.
04:24 And he kept the guys afloat, he kept his team afloat.
04:27 That's gonna be tested down the stretch of the season.
04:28 I think we'll learn a lot about him.
04:30 And I think that is how you're gonna have to win games,
04:32 is just being creative offensively and finding ways to get the job done and
04:35 score and put up enough points to win week in and week out.
04:37 Almost in the ilk of, ironically, the team that you're playing this week, right?
04:42 Like their offense has been pretty miserable, and
04:44 they just find ways to win games.
04:47 Whether you wanna say it's Mike Tomlin or whatever,
04:48 it's the effect of the head coach.
04:50 Kevin Stefanski's gotta sort of bring a similar sort of feel to the table here,
04:54 too.
04:55 But yeah, it is just wild the number of injuries they've had to deal with,
05:01 a lot more than maybe most teams in the NFL.
05:03 And I know the team's not gonna look back, but I think between you and
05:09 me and fans on the outside looking in, you gotta wonder where this team would be
05:15 if they had just held on to Josh Dobbs at the end of the preseason.
05:18 And what that would mean for this team in terms of what that first stretch without
05:22 Deshaun looked like and what this upcoming stretch without him was gonna look like.
05:25 Or on the other side of that, if they made a deal at the deadline.
05:28 Which I think, honestly, Brendan, what's more egregious to me, and
05:31 I wanna be clear here cuz there's a lot of stuff being thrown out there on social
05:35 media about fire Andrew Barry and all this.
05:37 I don't think trading a back of quarterback is warranting firing Andrew Barry,
05:41 especially when you look at what he's brought to the table this year with
05:43 the team.
05:44 I mean, this team is really, really loaded, and they're six and three right now.
05:47 I can knock him for the trade, but I can't say it's fireable.
05:52 But I think what's maybe even more egregious is that they didn't then try to
05:56 make a move for a quarterback at the deadline.
05:58 Because they saw firsthand what this thing would look like without Deshaun.
06:02 And ultimately, they had that context of that and they still didn't do it.
06:07 But again, hindsight's on the 24.
06:08 >> I just don't know if I totally agree with that.
06:11 I think that's an easy thing to say, and I understand it.
06:15 I think two things can be true at the same time.
06:18 Josh Dobbs has been magical this year, both in Arizona and
06:22 certainly now what he's done in Minnesota.
06:26 While also being true that Deshaun Watson's shoulder injury with the rotator
06:30 cuff, we understand is unrelated to the fracture shoulder that he's now suffered.
06:37 It just happens to be in a similar place, but
06:39 the two injuries are supposedly not connected.
06:42 And so if you felt like Deshaun was gonna be healthy, and by the way,
06:46 even if it looked clunky, you won games without him with PJ Walker at quarterback.
06:53 I also don't want to pretend to know that Andrew Barry didn't try ever to go get
06:58 another quarterback at the deadline.
07:01 Maybe they tried, but they didn't have the capital, the draft capital or
07:05 the other assets that they wanted to part with.
07:07 And they feel good about the room that they've got.
07:09 So I am not gonna knock Andrew Barry for that at all.
07:12 If they would have lost every game without Deshaun on the field,
07:18 even with subpar quarterback play, maybe I would have a different opinion on that.
07:23 But ultimately, I think it's okay where they're at.
07:28 And while yes, it is true that this team is gonna add another quarterback at some
07:33 point here in the near future, I don't know that they're gonna add somebody that
07:37 they're going to suddenly insert right into the starting lineup either.
07:40 They want three quarterbacks on the roster.
07:42 Does Matt Ryan come out of the broadcast booth?
07:45 I don't know.
07:47 Does Carson Wentz come to Cleveland as a free agent?
07:50 Or do you just have another guy that you wanna plug in as a practice squad guy?
07:54 >> Well, I was gonna say Wentz got picked up.
07:56 >> Did he get picked up?
07:57 Okay. >> Where did he go last week?
07:59 I can't remember off the top of my head.
08:00 Somebody scooped him up last week.
08:02 But yeah, to your point, it's slim pickings is the kind of the bottom line here.
08:08 In terms of what you're gonna get on the veteran quarterback market,
08:10 the free agency market, it's either pulling a guy out of retirement or
08:14 scouring some team's practice squad or free agency of what's left and
08:19 trying to insert them.
08:21 But you're right, they're gonna have to put this thing together with rubber bands
08:24 and paper clips.
08:26 I look back a little bit, maybe you feel a little bit regrettable about the move
08:30 that was made with Dobbs or what moves weren't made at the deadline.
08:32 But all they can do at this point is move forward,
08:34 which as you said is the sort of the vibe within the locker room.
08:37 And I think that's probably the right mentality they have to have.
08:41 And we're just gonna have to see what they can kind of do from here,
08:43 whether it's Dorian Thompson Robinson, whether it's PJ Walker,
08:46 whether it's some veteran that they bring in.
08:48 They gotta hope their defense obviously kind of carries them,
08:50 which it has done for most of the season anyway.
08:54 And if they can do enough on offense, again,
08:56 that creativity from Kevin Sofanski will be huge.
08:59 Then maybe they can still make some noise and salvage what's left of the season.
09:03 But obviously a devastating blow.
09:04 So much like Brendan, I'll tell you this just for context for those watching.
09:08 I've gotten in the habit of taking my laptop with me in the car when I'm just
09:12 running out to do random things, just in case some news breaks.
09:16 When I was dropping my son off at daycare this morning,
09:18 I had no anticipation that anything was happening.
09:20 I was like, no, we're gonna be good.
09:22 It's just gonna be a normal Wednesday, big win on Sunday.
09:25 DeSean's good.
09:26 There's no more of this injury stuff we're worried about.
09:28 And then all of a sudden, this thing gets dropped as I'm in the car and
09:31 I had to pull over and write the whole story.
09:33 I was writing on my phone.
09:34 So that gives you some context as to how surprising I think it was for everybody.
09:38 And maybe even to the bronze organization to an extent.
09:41 But we'll see if they can weather the storm from here.
09:43 They've obviously done it to this point.
09:45 >> Yeah, they don't have a choice.
09:45 They gotta figure out a way to get through it, that's for sure.
09:47 So with all the latest news and info on the Cleveland Browns,
09:50 we've got you covered over at bronzedigest.com.
09:52 Certainly would appreciate it if you'd subscribe to our YouTube channel here.
09:55 We'd like to bring you video content just like this.
09:58 In addition to all of the press conferences with players and
10:01 coaches along the way.
10:02 We'll have some sound and some video for you coming up from the locker room
10:06 here in just a bit on the channel.
10:07 And Kevin Stefanski will talk at one o'clock.
10:10 So we'll have that for you as well.
10:11 For Spencer German, I'm Brendan Gulick.
10:12 Again, we'll see you soon, bronzedigest.com.
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