What is the NFL waiting for with Deshaun Watson?

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Visit us at capitalfinancialusa.com. This is the Adam Gold Show. Will Brinson will join us in seconds. I have this bit of news that is not yet official, but it is imminent. Rickie Fowler and Phil Mickelson will join Dustin Johnson and others on the Live Golf Series Tour. The Phil Mickelson thing we could see coming. There's really nowhere else for him to go right now. And the Rickie Fowler thing, it's one of the saddest things in the last three years of sports in the United States that Fowler, who used to be great, isn't anymore.

And is, I mean, desperately trying to hang on to relevance. And by the way, this won't help that, but it will pad his back again. I'm sure he's getting a lot of money up front to go play with Live, but we'll talk about that tomorrow more, even maybe a little bit more today. But Rich Lerner of Golf Channel is going to join us tomorrow. Will Brinson, senior NFL writer, CBSSports.com, Pick 6 Podcast moderator joins us on the Adam Gold Show. Mr. Brinson, how are you, sir?

I'm doing well. You know, the live thing is funny, right? Like, I mean, it's not funny. It is like, well, I mean, some of these dudes are getting like Kevin Na got a $40 million check. Sure. To go play on the live tour. I mean, I think is a, you know, I mean, Kevin Na, just Kevin, Kevin Na, Kevin Na.

How is he supposed to walk away from that? Like, I don't want to say I don't blame these guys. Okay. I said this the other day, and I don't want to extend this conversation any longer than it has to be. I said this the other day that if we substituted the Saudi royal family, you take cross that out and write, you know, South American drug cartel. It would it would it would appear different to a lot of people. But yeah, right.

But now, you know, at the same time, you know, you don't want me. We don't want you to say that, like, there are a lot of sponsors of American athletics. And I'm not saying like the same thing.

I'm just saying, you know, like, dive into the morale. No, wait, there's total there is total hypocrisy all over the place. The PGA Tour has a PGA Tour China, right? I would argue that the two regimes are probably not identical, but it's still bad.

I'm not and there's no way I'm going to say otherwise. China's not trying to destroy the PGA Tour live through Greg Norman is trying to destroy the PGA Tour. I am most interested in what their reaction will be the tours as well as the U.S. opens.

All right, let's get to and the Masters really holds the biggest trump card here, but we'll get to that a little bit later on. Will Brinson, senior NFL writer, CBS Sports.com. I want to ask this about the NFL and their really non reaction.

They don't even say anything about what to do with Deshaun Watson. The 23rd woman came out as though it matters. We've already had 22. A 23rd probably doesn't mean anything in the grand scheme of things. How does the how does the NFL not have any idea what they're going to do at this point?

Or maybe they do and they're just waiting. I think that the NFL is going to I think they're I think what they're going to do one of two things. They're either going to issue a lengthy discipline for Deshaun Watson ahead of the 2022 NFL season, or they're going to give a part one discipline out of the 2022 NFL season with like, more discipline TVD or available for before head of the 2023 NFL season.

In other words, you know, like this has gotten to the point where, you know, it just it's, you know, even though they're continuing to investigate, they're going to push it off as long as they can. I think they're going to try to get, you know, to basically they want to they're going to drop something in training camp would be my guess. Like what like they will they will do in the preseason or training camp and they will announce it. And why Watson suspension will be X number of games from 2022 depending on what they feel that they found and or they'll say, all right, we're going to do this for 2022.

But we're also going to issue, you know, we're going to we're going to let him know that he is subject to further discipline depending on the resolution of these cases and any further investigative findings in the head of the 2023 NFL season. Adam Gold here from my man, Coach Pete DeRuta with the Capital Financial Advisory Group. We are talking retirement. All right, Coach, simple.

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All you got is call or you can text Adam to 21000 for Coach Pete DeRuta. We've heard so many things. First of all, including the potential of settling lawsuits. What I had read was that he had offered each of the 22 women $100,000, which doesn't seem like it would really solve the problems individually. I understand it adds up to a lot of money from Deshaun Watson going out, but with 22 it just doesn't seem like that would sway me one way or the other. I almost think the numbers should be, oh, five times that if I were one of the women. Look, I'm not saying that they deserve to make money or don't deserve.

It's just it's a bizarre situation. But what I don't understand is why the NFL hasn't done anything now. And for those people who think that, well, he's already missed a year. He got paid for the entire year.

He got paid. Yeah. Oh, yeah.

Yeah. He was on the he wasn't even on the exemplars. No, he was active. The Texans played a one man down basically by having Deshaun Watson active for the course of the 2020 NFL season. Or 2021 NFL season.

Excuse me. So I do not that is not there is absolutely zero quote unquote time served that Deshaun Watson is eligible for based on missing, quote unquote, missing all of last year because he was basically just a really, really expensive third string quarterback who was active on game days. I mean, it is crazy that Texas did that. I could put them at a huge competitive disadvantage to have somebody they knew they wouldn't play who they were paying a lot of money to.

And who was active for the course of the entire season. Like, no surprise. They ended up with a high pick. Right. I think for for the NFL, the reason that they they just have the NFL has the NFL doesn't have to do anything right now. And I think that's the key point.

They don't want to issue. So you remember the Ray Rice stuff, right? And I know that the NFL deservedly caught so much flak for how they handle that.

Yes. But when they issued the two game suspension for Ray Rice, they weren't aware of the videotape. Right.

And I'm not I'm not saying that I'm not trying to justify it. I'm just trying to try to get in the head of these the people making the decisions for the NFL. If they make a decision now, let's say Deshaun Watson spent six games and that is the finality of the decision. And that is the end of it. And then it comes out that there's like twenty two more women. Right.

I mean, just hypothetically or, you know, 10 more women, whatever you want to do. And then all of a sudden they have to they can't go back on. So for the NFL, I think what they want to do is push it out as far as they can ahead of the season. And then if they feel like they've got enough, you know, enough uncovered in their evidence to justify a lengthy suspension, like a full year, then maybe they'll do that.

If they feel like they don't have enough. I could see them suspending him six games or eight games and letting him try to appeal back to four or back to six, whatever it is. And then saying, you are subject again, like like they have the they want the ability to come back and discipline him further for the 2023 NFL season. So that way they don't look like they're taking a soft approach here, particularly in light of what MLB did to Trevor Bauer, giving him a two year suspension. That's and with Major League Baseball, they didn't even credit him for time served. I know, I know, I know.

It's crazy. I had heard something that like they tried to do a time served thing and he refused. Maybe it was a little more animosity between Manfred and Trevor Bauer. I really don't know what happened.

Like, I really don't know what happened with the Trevor Bauer thing. But I thought my read on it is that this is essentially just he's got a kink. He found some women who also have a similar kink. I mean, it's just a weird thing. If you read into the story, you go, I don't know. It's a very, very bizarre. It's it's an adult story.

It's an adult story. All right. And look, I'm just saying that when I use the Bauer thing, I'm not it's more of a PR comparison. Right.

No, I get it. That that if the NFL is like Sean Watson gets two games suspension, then you're like, well, Trevor Bauer got two years. The NFL is kudos, you know, today.

It's just a fine line to walk because if you suspend a guy six games without any criminal conviction, like you're hammered in pretty good relative, you know, well, they don't need criminal conviction to to to suspend. Right. I know.

Of course not. Right. Yeah. I mean, Big Ben, you know, I'm just saying like you're let's say you spend eight games. That's half a season.

Yeah. Like that's a it's a you know, it's a it's a lengthy amount of time. I mean, I don't think it should go undersold, but I also think that the NFL doesn't want to suspend eight games. And then, you know, more information comes out and it's worse than they thought. And then they get blasted for not doing their investigation correctly. So they I think they prefer the ability to defer additional punishment down the road.

That's their preference. Well, they mean they could just levy a punishment and say at the end of their punishment, we reserve the right to extend if more information becomes available. But, you know, maybe let's not forget to the Browns. The Browns did that whole thing with his salary.

It's like one million dollars this year. Yeah, I know the NFL may want to try and get him on that for next year as well, because knowing they may just issue some massive fine to play this year and suspend him next year. That would be hysterical.

I don't think that's off the table. I also don't think the NFL wants to just go through a full season of Watson playing, you know, without, you know, under the specter of this looming investigation. And by the way, look at the schedule. The Browns have two primetime games. I think it's like week four and week six. Maybe I could be wrong on that.

Jacoby percent, man. Yeah, they're like, you know, Amazon's like, hey, you know, like if you need to like everybody, you need to issue this thing for six games before the season because nobody wants to have this conversation. All right. Let me you're right. Like on TV, nobody wants to be talking about that.

All right. The contract that Deshaun Watson received from the Browns, which completely 100 percent unjustified based on performance. Forget about the transgressions based on his performance. Completely unjustified contract. Fully guaranteed. Two hundred and thirty million dollar deal from the Browns. But that impacts other contracts, meaning.

Yes. We've got Kyler Murray wants his money. Lamar Jackson is waiting this out. But, you know, he wants his money. How do you assess these two situations? For me, Lamar gets paid before Kyler a hundred times in a row. But how do you see these two things playing out?

All right. You throw Justin Herbert and Joe Burr there as well. True. And this season they'll both be eligible. And the reason I mentioned I'm going to talk Kyler and Lamar that I'll circle back to her real quickly. But Lamar is this is like really. So he doesn't have an agent. Right.

And it's great. Oh, no, we lost them. We lost them. If we can hook back up, let's do it. And if not, we have we actually could grab him on the other side if he can't hook right back up.

So, yes, if you if you were not aware. Lamar Jackson doesn't have an agent, which in this case, he could simply take a copy of Deshaun Watson's contract, walk into the Baltimore Ravens offices and put it in front of whoever's running the Ravens now and say, cross out Deshaun Watson and write Lamar Jackson. Just I kind of finished the thought. Lamar Jackson doesn't have an agent. Well, yeah, but the issue is he's like he's not reaching out to Eric DaCosta, the GM, to negotiate like DaCosta. This is the owner said he's like, look, Eric can only call Lamar so many times. Right. We're just going to like an expert like Lamar's not even like trying to have conversations about extension.

It's very bizarre. He's going to wait till the end. Sure. He's right now.

Go for Kirk Cousins. Absolutely. Oh, right. Well, you know, I mean, these teams don't want to put two hundred thirty million dollars into escrow. That's a lot of money.

It's like half of Mark Davis's net worth. You know, it's like you look at the Chargers and the Bengals, two teams that aren't, you know, we're not talking, you know, sixteen billion dollar owners. That's a tough scene for them. So that'll be interesting to see how that plays out.

Yeah, I don't I don't know how it's all going to work out and we're kind of out of time. So we'll talk about Herbert and and Joe Burrow. And real quick, if Aaron Donald is going to float the possibility of retiring, would you advise him to show up to minicamp? No, I'd never show up to minicamp if I was Aaron Donald. I mean, he's he's killing his own leverage if he shows up to minicamp.

Yep, absolutely. I mean, I'm listening to him go. I might retire. I might retire my and he floated this out before the Super Bowl and now he's going to show up to minicamp. He wants to get paid. He should get paid and he should get paid a lot more than the fifteen million dollars.

I believe he's getting he's that is coming to him. He should be the highest paid defensive player in the sport. And I don't care who's making the most defensively. He should make it because he's the best defensive player. Honestly, he's the best defensive player I've seen since Lawrence Taylor. Agreed completely. I mean, he's unbelievable. He's just unstoppable.

And there's no reason that he's going to get whatever money he wants to get based on the fact that he's threatening to retire because they wouldn't they need to bring him back. No question about it. Will Brinson. Be well. Talk to you later. Appreciate your time, as always. All right, buddy. See you.

You got it. There's so many more things I wanted to talk to Will Brinson about, but the Deshaun Watson thing is fascinating. It impacts a lot of you know, not only does it impact Jacoby Brissett, it impacts Baker Mayfield, which it's just a domino effect. Plus the contract impacts so many other things. There's a lot of a lot of news about quarterbacks around the NFL.

And there are still some pretty sweet remaining free agents out there. Well, I'll I'll point out a couple of those things and ESPN might have gotten a little premature with burying the two time Stanley Cup champions next. June 19th, 2006. But it all started May 6, 1997, with the announcement that the Hartford Whalers were coming to North Carolina.

It's a story of transition, of heartbreak, of figuring it out on the fly. The Canes Corner look at the 25th anniversary of the move presented by the Aluminum Company of North Carolina. Listen now. Find Canes 25th anniversary wherever you get your podcast. So the Tampa Bay Lightning not dead. Period scoreless yesterday. Game three. Rangers won games one and two. Scored a bunch of goals on the Lightning. And oh, what's wrong with Andre Vasilevski? And blah, blah, blah. And Adam Fox out playing Victor Headman. He can't do this.

He can't. Like. I'm glad that ESPN has hockey. I'm really glad they have hockey because they're paying attention to it. Right. And when ESPN pays attention to it, by the way, television ratings bear this out. So. Hockey ratings this year are up. Why? Because ESPN has it.

It ain't that hard. So. I assume ESPN was paying attention to like the Canes and the Bruins. To like the Canes and the Rangers.

And. Like 13 straight home teams won those two particular series until the Rangers won game seven. I don't know why it's foreign to them that the Lightning might actually have something in game three. Now, I will say that it does appear to me that the Rangers might be the better team. But it's two one.

And the better team doesn't always win. But it was it was baffling. They were, I believe, stunned yesterday. Nothing that we watched should shock you. Nothing. Vasilevski was great.

Yeah. I have a question for the people at Emily Arena in Tampa. So Nikita Kucherov scores the first goal that makes it to one power play goal. First four goals are all power play goals. Rangers scored two, then Tampa scored two. Kucherov on a one timer from below the right face off circle. He scores to make it to one. Stephen Stampko's midway through the third period.

One timer at the left face off circle to make it to two. That was a direct pass from Kucherov. So Kucherov has the first goal. Then he has the primary assist on the second goal. And then did you see the pass to Andre Palat on the goal with 42 seconds left? It was sublime.

Yeah. It was one of those passes that make you go, Oh, my God, what a pass. Forget about the goal.

Like, I'm not saying it was easy for Andre Palat. It wasn't an easy shot at all. He actually looked like it glanced off the glove of Shostakin.

But my gosh, what a pass. And that was Kucherov again. How does that guy not get one of the three stars? A goal, two assists and a 3-2 game. How does that guy not get one of the... Like, I don't know if he was the best player on the ice. It was probably Vasilevski.

He was probably the best player on the ice for the Lightning. I mean, Shostakin did make 49 saves yesterday. Yeah, but all three stars should come from the winning team. Always. Should always come from the winning team. Sorry. It ain't that big a deal. We're not adding up points at the end of the year.

We should make a FedEx cup for stars. Exactly. Exactly.

My gosh. Kucherov was amazing yesterday. Real quick, you mentioned Shostakin. So Corey Perry slashes him in the second period. Easy call. Easy. Easy call. But Shostakin launched himself, threw his stick. Like, Perry didn't hit him that hard. He just didn't.

He slashed him. Easy call. Easy penalty. I don't know what we need to get an embellishment call.

I don't... It was so blatant. It was so obvious what Shostakin was doing.

And they just let it go. So by the way, the Rangers did score their first power play goal on that penalty. It should have been four on four because that was embellishing.

There's no question it was embellishment. Like when Truba got bumped by, what was it, Ian Cole? Oh, yes. Yes.

Actually, much worse than that, in my opinion. This is the Adam Gold Show. Off with a crossbar, and the Hurricanes have won the Stanley Cup. June 19th, 2006, but it all started May 6th, 1997, with the announcement that the Hartford Whalers were coming to North Carolina. It's a story of transition, of heartbreak, of figuring it out on the fly. The Canes Corner look at the 25th anniversary of the move. Presented by the Aluminum Company of North Carolina, listen now. Find Canes' 25th anniversary wherever you get your podcasts.