Is Cleveland Browns quarterback Deshaun Watson the most unpopular player in the NFL? Considering social media is always going after him – especially now as he catches strays during the 49ers scandal – and his own fans seem to enjoy booing him anytime he’s out on the field, I feel comfortable answering that question with a “Yes.”
NFL fans would be hard pressed to find a team as dysfunctional as the Cleveland Browns. They are famously a dumpster fire, and they added fuel to the burning trash heap when they signed Deshaun Watson to what is widely considering to be worst contract in the history of the NFL.
Watson’s career as of late has been plagued with scandal and injury. He’s been accused of sexual assault 27 separate times, and for some reason, can’t get over why fans of the Browns would be upset that he was recently named Cleveland’s starting quarterback. When the team last took the field during the preseason, fans booed Watson, and he talked about how it impacted him after the contest:
That was bad on it’s own… and then the news about Jed York broke, and Deshaun Watson got dragged into that too (even thought he technically has nothing to do with it).
York has been the 49ers team president since 2008, and stands as the majority owner of the franchise. You may not have known his name before, but like many others this week… you do now. That’s because Jed York was far from San Francisco when he got arrested on suspicions of engaging in prostitution in the small town of East Palestine, Ohio.
The police report from the arrest states that the East Palestine Police Department assisted the Mahoning Valley Human Trafficking Task Force with the arrest of John “Jed” York, and that the arrest took place at 9:35 in the morning on Sunday at the Wheat Hill Mobile Home Community. The 49ers owner allegedly arranged to exchange $140 for sex at the trailer park after responding to an ad on a known prostitution website.
When he got there, he was immediately arrested, and was booked in the Columbiana County Jail. Later, York posted his $5,000 bond. The 49ers owner’s cell phone was returned to him, and $160 that was seized during the arrest was forfeited to Mahoning Valley Human Trafficking Task Force.
Because all of it strangely went down in Ohio (that’s actually where York was born and raised), social media wasted no time cracking jokes at the expense of Deshaun Watson, who happens to play professional football up the road:
Imagine your favorite team’s NFL quarterback catching strays anytime a story about sexual assault or prostitution pops up in the news. Safe to say the Browns are in a really bad place, and they are going to lose some fans – those that are left anyway – if they don’t move on from Deshaun.
And while we are on the topic, I have to mention another entertaining aspect of the Jed York story. According to Pro Football Talk, the trailer park that has been mentioned and connected in the prostitution sting has been trying to say the 49ers owner wasn’t actually going there for the… $140 service:
“The owner of the trailer park at which Jed York was arrested wants it to be known that York simply pulled over there, and that it wasn’t his destination.”
Yeah… I don’t buy that for a minute.
When a trailer park is doing PR crisis management to try and distance themselves from someone, you know it’s an ugly situation all the way around.
