The Houston Texans have not yet decided to trade quarterback Deshaun Watson despite the fact that Watson has made it clear he doesn’t intend to be part of the organization any longer. The Denver Broncos are undoubtedly going to be keeping tabs on this situation.
According to a recent report from Mike Klis, the Denver Broncos’ next move after inquiring about Detroit Lions quarterback Matthew Stafford is going to be monitoring the Watson situation.
Klis told 104.3 The Fan in Denver that the Broncos will “be in on Watson” even if it seems the chances of the Texans actually trading him are remote at this point. At the very least, Klis said the Denver Broncos will be monitoring that situation.
As connected as Klis is, this is as close to confirmed interest from the Denver Broncos as we’re going to get at this point. So what about Watson and what he wants, because that’s what actually matters here?
Klis’ report also indicated that from what he had heard, the Broncos would be one of four or five teams that Watson would like to listen to.
Now, there is a video interview with Denver Broncos safety Kareem Jackson that has surfaced regarding Watson and his potential interest in joining the Broncos.
In the interview with TMZ, Jackson said that he’s had multiple conversations with Watson in which Watson indicated — in Jackson’s words — “Denver is a place that he’s interested in landing.”
The dots we can connect here lead to what appears to be confirmed mutual interest from Watson and another NFL team, specifically the Denver Broncos. This is huge.
Obviously, the Broncos cannot talk to Watson directly, but there are no rules against Kareem Jackson talking to him.
There was a report previously from Woody Paige in Denver that Watson had zero interest in the Broncos. Who knows what source gave him that information, but it would seem that Jackson’s source — Watson himself — is a fairly reliable one.
Ultimately, there is no guarantee that the Texans will trade Watson. They might make him sit out the season but they also might have an opportunity to get a ton of assets for him right now and with his cap figure going up substantially next year, they might have a tougher time getting the same kind of return as they would be getting in 2021.
Watson has a no-trade clause. He has a ton of guaranteed money in the bank already. He has all of the leverage here to hold out for a trade and ultimately, the Texans may have no choice but to oblige. The Texans don’t even have the leverage to be able to trade Watson wherever they would be getting the “best” return in a trade, either.
If Watson says he wants to go to Denver, he would need only to hold out until that happened. The Texans could not just agree to trade him to the Jets and Watson would have to be okay with it.
Although it’s likely Watson is keeping an open mind about other possible destinations (New York and Miami among others have been mentioned as potential options as well), there appears to be no doubt that the Denver Broncos would be in the mix.
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The next domino that must fall if this is going to go from more than just a rumor and intriguing offseason chatter is the Texans conceding defeat and actually agreeing to trade Watson.