Report: Cleveland Brown restructure Deshaun Watson contract, create nearly $36 million cap space

The Cleveland Browns have been restrained to an extent over the past few seasons with the contract of QB Deshaun Watson. They’ll reportedly be freeing themselves up, though, when it comes to their cap space.

Per Field Yates at ESPN, the Browns have restructured their deal with Watson. With that, Cleveland has opened up over $35 million in cap space for themselves for next season.

“The Browns have restructured the contract of QB Deshaun Watson, creating nearly $36M in 2025 cap space,” Yates tweeted on Thursday morning.

Tom Pelissero of the NFL Network has since provided further details on the restructure by Cleveland. This move has the Browns having paid most of the deal to this point. Now, over the next two years, Watson will make a minimum in 2025 while going back up to a salary of $46 million in 2026.

This comes after there had been a reported restructure per Ian Rapoport at the NFL Network back towards the end of December. That one spread out the hit that his deal would take on their cap until the final year of it in 2026.

All in all, almost nothing has gone right for the two sides here since Cleveland acquired Watson in March of 2022. That’s already after Watson had sat out for the entirety of his final year with the Houston Texans in 2021.

Upon his arrival with the Browns, Watson received the five-year deal worth a fully-guaranteed total of $230 million. He has not had that value since as he has appeared in only 19 games for the franchise over the last three years where Watson has completed 61.2% of his passes for 177.1 yards, 19 total passing touchdowns, and a dozen picks. He’s also had a fraction of what he used to be as a runner with only 499 yards and three scores on the ground.

Injuries also limited Watson the last two years. A pair of shoulder injuries cost him a few weeks in the middle of the season before eventually shutting him down in 2023. Then, in 2024, a torn Achilles in October ended his season with Watson having since ruptured it again in January.

That’s just the issues on the field for Watson. That doesn’t include the multiple off-field allegations against him, of sexual misconduct and assault, that have followed him since his trade to Cleveland. The NFL has since closed their investigation of him back in December after settlements and suspensions of him because of them over the last three years.

This restructure should now help out both sides going into the next two seasons. Watson can get his compensation while rehabbing over the coming year while the Browns can use that additional space to make moves to better position the team over that span.