Newly named Cleveland Browns quarterback Deshaun Watson was launched on Friday throughout a press convention in Berea, Ohio.
Reporters met the polemic Watson — amid an investigation taking a look at 22 separate accounts of sexual harassment filed in opposition to Watson— with loads of questions awaiting the QB over his ongoing authorized points and a seemingly new begin in Cleveland.
“I do know these allegations [are] very, very critical. However I’ve by no means assaulted any girl. I by no means disrespected any girl.” Watson informed reporters, as relayed by ESPN.
“I by no means assaulted, I by no means disrespected and I by no means harassed any girl in my life,” Watson added,
“I wasn’t raised that approach. My mother and my aunties didn’t elevate me that approach over the course of my life. That’s not in my DNA. So far as the main points of the issues that they’re alleging, I can’t converse on that as a result of there’s an ongoing investigation. However sooner or later, as soon as all the pieces’s resolved, I might sit down and love to speak about it.”
Browns supervisor Andrew Berry attended the press convention and supported his new quarterback in opposition to the questions over a still-uncertain future within the NFL.
“I’ll say the investigators that we employed had been capable of get a full perspective of all of the instances,” Berry mentioned. “I’m not going to enter essentially the main points of all the pieces the investigators did, however they received a full perspective for all of the prison and civil instances.”
Essentially the most placing element from Friday’s presser was the absence of Cleveland Browns possession.
Each Jimmy and Dee Haslam determined to skip the in-person session and go for a Zoom presser following Watson’s time on the mic.
The Haslams had been extremely receptive to Watson’s arrival in Cleveland and even commented on earlier starter Baker Mayfield’s future with the workforce.
“We expect extremely of Baker and didn’t get down on him,” they responded. “I do know there’s a press release that we would have liked an grownup within the room and Baker felt that got here from possession. That’s not true. No one can query the 4 years he gave … we want him nothing however the very best of luck.”
“Nobody from the Browns group reached out to me or my purchasers,” mentioned lawyer Tony Buzbee, who represents the 22 girls looking for litigation in opposition to Watson. “I didn’t count on them to. I might have actually talked to them had they requested to speak to any of my purchasers and had the purchasers needed to take action I might have allowed that to occur.
“Every of those girls has been fairly assured, fairly constant about what has occurred to them.”
Comply with alongside on Twitter: @AlejandroAveela