The Cleveland Browns signed Deshaun Watson to what is widely regarded as one of the worst contracts ever (it’s probably No. 1). Many local media and fans, myself included, didn’t foresee how terrible of an idea that was originally.

We got it as wrong as tartar sauce on cereal. But as bad as all the figures look on paper, there are a few bright spots if we know where to look.

NFL teams frequently insure player contracts as a safeguard against guaranteed money being owed to someone who can’t play. The Browns are one of the organizations that do this. And they had the good sense to do so with the Watson pact.

The insurance specifics aren’t as widespread publicly as other details of contracts, but Spotrac shows the figure $58.1 million associated with 2024 and 2025. Not all of that would be reimbursable because he was available for seven weeks this season.

But if that number is divided equally across both years, and if Watson were to miss 2025 before being fully recovered from the ruptured Achilles, the recompensable portion of his note would figure to be around $46.8 million.

So if there wasn’t already enough incentive for the organization to want the team insulated from him, the hope upstairs should be for Watson to fail every physical and be unable to receive medical clearance to return from the PUP list for the first half of next season until the nine-week window to begin practicing closes. At that point he’d finish 2025 on reserve.

He wouldn’t have to be around the team, he wouldn’t be taking up a 53-man roster spot and the club would recoup a significant chunk of their cap space. That’s how the Browns can make lemonade from the river of excreta that has been the Deshaun Watson experiment in Cleveland.

—@PoisonPill4