Stephen A. Smith is putting Deshaun Watson in the Comeback Player of the Year conversation, and he’s not backing off the take.
Seven weeks into the season, the Browns are sitting on top of the AFC North at 5-2, and Watson has been central to that surge after missing all of last season. In a clip shared on Tuesday, Smith said Watson is the NFL’s current frontrunner for the award, even as ESPN colleague Chris Canty noted how awkward that sounds because of the quarterback’s off-field history.
Smith didn’t dodge that part. He called it “very uncomfortable” before making the argument anyway.
Watson’s path back has been anything but simple. He hadn’t played a regular-season snap since October 2024, when he tore his Achilles in a 21-14 loss to the Cincinnati Bengals that dropped Cleveland to 1-6. He then re-ruptured the same Achilles in January 2025, which kept him out for the entire 2025 season.
There’s also the baggage that followed him into Cleveland. The NFL suspended Watson for 11 games and fined him $5 million in 2022 after two dozen women accused him of sexual misconduct during massage sessions. Watson has denied wrongdoing throughout.
Even before this season, he hadn’t exactly been a sure thing for the Browns, and he was even booed by the home crowd during a preseason game.
But first-year coach Todd Monken rolled with Watson as his starter, and so far the decision has worked. Cleveland’s latest win came Sunday, a 27-24 victory over the Tennessee Titans. Watson threw for 308 yards, ran for a go-ahead touchdown and helped set up Andre Szmyt’s 32-yard field goal as time expired.
The Browns have leaned on Watson in a very specific way: he’s now guided game-winning drives in all five of Cleveland’s wins. That makes him just the third quarterback since the AFL-NFL merger to do that in his team’s first five victories of a season, joining Troy Aikman in 1990 and Matthew Stafford in 2016.
Smith pointed to that production when he made his case.
“Deshaun Watson right now is the Comeback Player of the Year. Right now, Comeback Player,” Smith said in a clip shared by Awful Announcing.
“That’s uncomfortable to even say. It’s uncomfortable,” Canty said.
“Very uncomfortable to say it, but it’s true. It’s true,” Smith responded.
“Five wins, first place in the division. All five wins were come-from-behind victories in the fourth quarter, led by him.”
Sunday’s Titans game was tied when Watson got the ball back with 58 seconds left, but Smith’s larger point was clear. After everything that came before, Watson has been one of the Browns’ biggest reasons for being where they are.
“Considering where he was, how bad he looked on the football field, to what he has looked,” Smith added.
Smith also singled out Monken for praise.
“Him, as far as I’m concerned, [Monken] is one of the top Coach of the Year candidates,” Smith said.
For now, the discomfort around Watson’s story is real. So is the production.
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Harold Fannin also chipped in with yards after the catch, even if a fumble kept the afternoon from being completely clean. The production was encouraging for a team trying to identify what its offense can become, but it also left a bigger question hanging over the unit: with so many young contributors flashing at once, who actually becomes the focal point when the Browns need the offense to carry a game? [Read more 🡒]