Deshaun Watson and the Cleveland Browns were back on Prime Video this week for Thursday Night Football, and the streamer’s broadcast team again offered a simplistic take on the beleaguered quarterback’s comeback.

During the preseason, Prime’s Al Michaels and Kirk Herbstreit pressed for Watson’s “second chance.” The veteran Michaels described the nearly two dozen sexual misconduct lawsuits levied against Watson as Watson’s career getting “all turned around,” while Herbstreit emphasized the charitable giving and mutual aid work that Watson engaged in during his early years in Houston.

Two wins and a strong first half later, the TNF announcers — with a bigger regular-season audience — were back with a similar message on Watson this week.

“If you follow football, you know the story. We don’t have to go through the whole Deshaun Watson thing,” Michaels said, before breezing past the contents of the allegations that forced Watson to be sidelined for nearly a season-and-a-half earlier this decade.

“He’s got this career in Houston, it’s great, all of a sudden he’s got these issues. We all know what they were.”

Then, Michaels cited the familiar football phrase that “winning is the best deodorant,” before Herbstreit predicted that Browns fans would eventually embrace Watson after previously booing him in the preseason.

“You want the fans to get behind you, and that goes for pretty much any market,” Herbstreit said. “This is an extreme case because of what you laid out with Deshaun Watson, but if you convert on third downs, you hit passes, you lead this team to victories, those boos turn into cheers.”

‘TNF’ sums up Deshaun Watson’s season… 🏈 📺

Al Michaels: “If you follow football, you know the story … we don’t have to go through the whole Deshaun Watson thing.”

Kirk Herbstreit: “When you convert on 3rd downs, you hit passes, you lead this team to victories, those boos… pic.twitter.com/UVcgsCAaoK

— Awful Announcing (@awfulannouncing) October 2, 2026

Earlier in the TNF broadcast, Prime Video aired an interview between Watson and reporter Taylor Rooks. In the segment, Rooks pressed Watson on whether he could understand the “skepticism” and “apprehension” that Browns fans feel toward him after their team moved heaven and earth to acquire him while he was still navigating nearly two-dozen sexual misconduct allegations.

All 27 lawsuits filed against Watson have been either settled or dismissed. Some of the women were massage therapists who claimed Watson assaulted them after hiring them for sessions.

Not everyone will have the same opinion of how an NFL broadcast should address the years-old allegations against Watson. However, the last of the lawsuits was settled just this past February. In other instances, legendary and well-paid broadcasters like Michaels are expected to summarize complex ideas in tight windows.

And given that during the preseason, Michaels and Herbstreit actively advocated for the quarterback to be allowed to move forward, the depiction this week of the heinous allegations toward Watson as old news that can be resolved with strong play also seems like a purposeful push on Watson’s behalf.