Deshaun Watson’s return to a regular-season field did not last long before the old problems showed up again.
On Sunday at EverBank Stadium, the Cleveland Browns opened their Week 1 game against the Jacksonville Jaguars with the ball, moved it across midfield, and then watched the drive die on a throw Watson never got to Jerry Jeudy. Jaguars linebacker Foyesade Oluokun read it, jumped the route, and took the interception 22 yards back to the Jacksonville 41. From there, the Jaguars quickly turned the mistake into points.
Cleveland had won the toss and got a helpful start from Dylan Sampson’s kickoff return, which put the Browns at their own 40 on a steamy Florida afternoon, according to News 5 Cleveland. Watson then connected with tight end Blake Whiteheart for 14 yards, Quinshon Judkins picked up 4 on the ground, and rookie wideout KC Concepcion added a 9-yard catch to move Cleveland to the Jacksonville 33. The next snap is the one that changed everything.
Watson’s short pass to the left was undercut by Oluokun, with DaVon Hamilton credited with pressure in the ESPN play-by-play. The linebacker was sitting right where the throw landed. Watson never seemed to account for him, and the ball didn’t come close to reaching Jeudy’s body.
The result looked awfully familiar to anyone who watched Browns camp.
The Athletic’s Zac Jackson, who covered Watson through August, immediately connected the play to what he saw all month. He posted on X: “The same pick he threw in practice four times a week”
The same pick he threw in practice four times a week for the entire month of August.
- Zac Jackson (@AkronJackson) September 13, 2026
That was Jackson’s observation, not a formal diagnosis, but it lined up with the kind of throw Watson kept making in camp: late, short, and vulnerable to a defender waiting in a zone window. OutKick described the sequence as two early completions followed by a drop-back in which Watson never located the linebacker.
The Browns made their call on Watson well before Sunday. Todd Monken named him the Week 1 starter over Shedeur Sanders on Aug. 24 after a full-camp competition, according to the team and NFL.com.
Monken said the decision was based on the complete body of work and was not intended to be week-to-week. Two days earlier, Watson had been booed at home in the preseason.
Then the first live series of 2026 put the whole choice back under the microscope.
Jacksonville wasted no time cashing in. NBC Sports reported that Trevor Lawrence hit Parker Washington for a 30-yard touchdown on a diving catch, pushing the Jaguars ahead 7-0.
The Jaguars then kept rolling. Lawrence later found Josh Cameron for a 4-yard touchdown before the first quarter ended, and by early in the second quarter Jacksonville had stretched the lead to 24-0.
The ESPN box score snapshot at that point had Lawrence at 13-of-18 for 166 yards and three touchdowns. Watson was 4-of-6 for 28 yards with one interception, two sacks and a 37.5 rating. The game was still in progress.
Watson had not started a game since Oct. 20, 2024, before a ruptured Achilles ended that season, per CBS Sports. He missed all of 2025 while rehabbing the injury. Sunday was his first regular-season start since then and his 20th as a Brown.
Cleveland came in having won its last three meetings with Jacksonville, and Watson also owned a strong career record against the Jaguars as a starter, per CBS Sports. None of that mattered on the opening drive. The Browns never settled after the interception, and the heat at EverBank was already forcing sideline substitutions later in the half, as Jackson noted.
Sanders remained the backup, and Monken had not made any change official. The first quarter did not produce a benching. It did, though, leave one question hanging over the rest of the afternoon: was this just rust after 693 days without a regular-season game, or was it the same mistake Watson kept making all through August?
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The contrast at quarterback was a big part of it, as Deshaun Watson struggled to keep Cleveland afloat while Lawrence helped Jacksonville stay in control. The Jaguars also got encouraging signs elsewhere, with Bhayshul Tuten and Chris Rodriguez sharing the workload in the backfield and Parker Washington emerging as the teams leading receiver before a teammates injury changed the picture. For a team trying to build early momentum, it was about as clean a first-half snapshot as they could have asked for. [Read more 🡒]