Dan Le Batard’s long time producer Mike Ryan has made secret of his Cleveland Browns fandom in the past. Earlier this year, the signing of DeShaun Watson put that loyalty to the test. On Monday, it wasn’t just fellow Browns’ fans but his colleagues in the sports media that broke him.
Ryan and the rest of the Dan Le Batard Show cast reacted to the six-game suspension handed down to Watson by Sue L. Robinson, the former US District Judge charged with determining the proper resolution. He noted that a lot of people are framing this as a win for Watson and the Browns and ignoring the fact that the core problems of the quarterback’s sexual misconduct with multiple women is not solved.
“The problems you had with DeShaun Watson entering this are not gone. They were confirmed by an independent arbiter, and yet it is framed as a win.”
Le Batard asked if anyone trusted NFL broadcasters to bring this up in ten weeks when Watson makes it on to the field. He described the situation as a win for the Browns and Watson but a loss for women and for the NFL.
Mike Ryan says he expects it to be brought up one time.
“They’ll talk about it on Monday Night Football when he comes back,” he said. “I think league broadcast partners have shown you they aren’t that interested in applying that kind of context. Look at the celebration of Ben Roethlisberger’s career that ESPN threw on his final home game.”
At one point, DeShaun Watson faced civil lawsuits from 24 different women. Robinson found enough credible evidence to determine that Watson was not innocent. Yet, according to Ryan, that has been completely forgotten in how both local and national media handled the news on Monday.
“Right now it disappoints me that on Cleveland radio you have people celebrating this. You have people analyzing this on ESPN. ‘What does this mean for the Browns. Only one division game. Wow! They got a lucky break for the schedule.’ All of it to me is very sad and pathetic.”
This is exactly why the NFL MUST appeal. They can get ahead of this by saying that they are doing this do show they care about the victims. They can say, We can not allow someone accused of 20+ counts of sexual misconduct toward women to only get a six games. They can hold the line that they will not allow this to go so lightly punished.