5 Months Ago, Deshaun Watson Sure Was Thankful To Be In Houston With A Fat Contract

It has been five months since Deshaun Watson fired up his social media channels to announce how thankful he was to Houston and the Texans ownership who had just given him the second-highest contract guarantee in NFL history. The McNair family had just given their franchise quarterback $111 million in guarantees and a total contract value of $177.54 million over four years.

"As a child growing up in Georgia, it was always my dream to play in the NFL. Today, I couldn't be more honored and humbled to sign a long-term deal in Houston, the city that I've grown to love so much and now call my home," Watson (or his PR team) wrote.

Nearly six months before Watson signed his massive contract extension, Texans general manager/head coach Bill O'Brien traded away DeAndre Hopkins to the Cardinals in exchange for running back David Johnson.

Still, in his new contract 'thank you', Watson had high praise for his bosses: "Thanks to Cal (McNair), Janice (McNair), the entire McNair family, Coach O'Brien, Jack Easterby (Texans executive vice president of football operations) and the whole Texans' organization for helping to make my dream a reality."

Fast forward to January 2021. Watson now wants out of what many considered to already be a dumpster fire of an organization. Bill O'Brien had been bashed all summer for the Hopkins trade. The McNairs have taken a beating from the media for years. The Undefeateds of the world destroyed the late Bob McNair for saying in 2017, “We can’t have the inmates running the prison.”

Deshaun Watson was a member of that 2017 team. He started six games. He knew Bob McNair, had done business with Bob McNair and had likely been told by his agent about McNair.

Now Watson's acting like he's stuck in this terrible situation with a terrible franchise run by terrible people.

So what changed over the last five months that triggered the trade request? Was it the fact that the Texans were a disaster on the field? Was it the fact that the Texans didn't hire the general manager that Watson wanted, as some have reported?

“I've come to understand that it's been reported that Deshaun feels left out of the process, but he and I had several visits and I understood his point of view before meeting with candidates," McNair said in early January. "I've reached out to Deshaun about Nick's hire, and I look forward to him getting back to me when he returns from his vacation."

Now Watson wants to be traded, and it appears he's crossed over the point of no return. He has a no-trade clause that will allow him to determine where he'd be traded.

How does this end? Denver. Mark it down. Broncos ownership is watching the Chiefs pull away with a quarterback who is going to dominate for the next 20 years. If you're going to lose, you might as well go down with your guns blazing. Watch for Denver to get desperate.

The Texans, who'll be way over the salary cap (projected to be $17 million over in 2021 even if they don't trade their QB) after trading Watson, will go into a full suck mode and be stuck there for the next decade.