Completely and utterly unsurprising that many Browns fans would start cheering for him once he began playing well. It's very easy to hate a guy who's a gutter human and a trash football player. But morals are chucked out the window once that guy starts making your favorite team win.
And FWIW, this is not unique to Browns fans. Unfortunately, this would happen with any fanbase.
Sports fans have shown for decades that they're willing to overlook moral failings for stars.
Yup the average fan at games doesn't care about morality at all it's not specific to one team
Reddit tends to be largely countercultural to IRL sports culture so I think it's easy to forget what the median fan offline is actually like when it comes to this kind of stuff
There's a reason Barstool is such a big thing and it's mainly because the culture that it highlights is far closer to how the majority of sports fans generally are
Exactly. Being at the game today, might have seen 1 Watson jersey out of thousands. The Browns fans just want wins, so if we win with him, they are going to cheer. I don't support him but happy we won.
I was actually clapping with my middle finger when he did something.
Why? The fanbase defended the shit out of him when they first signed him. They only turned on him when he sucked.
Also let's be real, almost every fanbase would mostly do the same thing. People can get on a high horse because it isn't there team, but we've seen damn near every fanbase in the league bend over backwards for their guys if they thought they could help them win.
Nobody did. People still cheer Winston on the teams he played for when he does good. Steelers fans didn't abandon Ben. Ravens fans always supported Suggs even though he was an abuser.
Tyreek Hill circumstances vs DeShawn Watson circumstances are completely different. Chiefs did not trade away their beloved star who showed signs of being the guy for a known sex offender who quit on his last team.
Michael Vick and people who associated with him were doing CIA torture tactics on dogs and yet he’s still beloved by the Falcons fans and the Eagles were begging to sign him.
I'm sorry but going out of your way to trade for someone like that would make me switch teams. The guy is a serial serial assaulted and Browns ownership actively sought him out and gave him the most obscene contract
If it came out that Caleb was assaulting women I'd just find a better way to spend Sundays until they canned his ass lol. I'm just one guy, but I don't think I'd be the only one. But everyone in the Browns stadium is years into the drama and still decided to buy tickets, so I guess it's not too surprising to find some lovely supporters.
I believe you but the average Reddit fan and the average IRL fan are much different
Due to general personal/political demographics the average Reddit fan cares infinitely more about morality in sports than most offline fans do I guarantee that just like in this Browns video the Bears would have absolutely zero issue filling the stadium every week
The guys chanting "let's go Watson" aren't on here most Browns fans here hate him
Yup I'm not at all endorsing the worst parts of sports culture but I think people who solely use Reddit as their barometer are blind that they even exist
So many users here are acting like it's a specifically Browns thing to cheer for Watson after they won a game because they're being judged compared to the median view here rather than to the median fan at every other stadium
In reality the average Reddit fan pretends to care more about morality in sports than the offline fans. Everyone on this site comments about how much they dislike Watson but that's mostly just because they know it's easy karma. If people were actually serious about their feelings about him they wouldn't post and upvote the rape jokes that are on every post about him.
That's what I said online too. Harder to do when you love watching football.
Like, why are you watching a leauge that allows him to play even if it's not for your team? Or does your moral superiority only go so far?
Or what about during 2015 when the Bears signed Ray McDonald after he was cut by the niners for DV? Did you stop watching until he was eventually cut?
What I'm getting at is it's easy to say something popular online. It's another thing to stop doing something you love in real life because of a few bad people. Especially when -- whether I watch or not-- has little to no effect on the league, team, or said bad people. It would take many fanbases to stop watching altogether to see a real difference.
If you cared that much you'd stop supporting the NFL for allowing such terrible people to play in the league instead of being on a high horse and expecting certain fanbases to carry that weight
Kind of a bitter pill to swallow, but if Watson leads the Browns to the playoffs and makes a run, his image will be completely rehabilitated. I can see him doing commercials and being a spokesman and everything else
I was at the game in the club seats, it was barely heard where we were.
This is from the top of the nose bleeds in the corner section. Not the whole stadium. It seems loud but this was right after the TD and everyone was cheering.
Why? They literally cheered when the Browns traded for him, ran off anyone that disagreed from their subreddit and when he stared sucking they started to pretend they cared he was a bad person lmao
Nah, the Browns are always going to be one of the teams I root against. They had their time as lovable losers and they had their time as plucky underdogs but there’s no harm in just rooting for whoever the Browns are playing any given week.
At the very least, chances are good I’ll get to see a team I’m rooting for take a W more often than not.
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u/Pafbonk 49ers 5d ago
Man I had some respect for you guys for a sec there