Let me preface this by saying that this information, or rumor, or whatever you want to call it, comes from a fan site message board. So take it for what it's worth. I will say that I do frequent said message board and I am familiar with the poster who is reporting this info, and he is someone with some cachet. This is also not an April Fools joke.
This is about Deshaun Watson, and why he turned on the Texans organization shortly after signing a huge multi-year, multi-million dollar contract, which was right before the start of the 2020 season (early September). At the end of that season, 4 months later, a season where the Texans went 4-12 and fired HC and GM Bill O'Brien after 4 games, rumors started coming out that CEO Cal McNair had promised Watson that he'd be apart of the Texans search for GM and HC. Not long after that, the rumors turned to Watson wanting out. That rumor became real in late January 2021, when it was announced that Watson was requesting a trade.
This poster, someone highly valued by the community there, claims to have sources inside the Texans organization. This source, or sources, have revealed to him that shortly after Watson signed his contract, Watson's agent, David Mulugheta, made some demands of the Texans. Mulugheta, a black man, steps in and demands that the Texans hire a black HC, and that they hire a black GM, along with an all black executive staff. Mulugheta also wanted a black OC and DC, AND if the Texans released any staff members, coaching or executive, that they be replaced by black hires. Wait, there's more. Mulugheta also wanted an all black QB room for the Texans, meaning Davis Mills, white guy, wouldn't have even been drafted had this played out.
This is about Deshaun Watson, and why he turned on the Texans organization shortly after signing a huge multi-year, multi-million dollar contract, which was right before the start of the 2020 season (early September). At the end of that season, 4 months later, a season where the Texans went 4-12 and fired HC and GM Bill O'Brien after 4 games, rumors started coming out that CEO Cal McNair had promised Watson that he'd be apart of the Texans search for GM and HC. Not long after that, the rumors turned to Watson wanting out. That rumor became real in late January 2021, when it was announced that Watson was requesting a trade.
The Texans had hired a search firm, Korn Ferry, to help them find the best candidates for their open GM and HC jobs. They also put together a panel of former players and executives, including executives from other sports, and also included input from Watson. This was all happening before the first lawsuit against Watson was made public. In fact, just 4 days after the end of the 2020 regular season, the Texans did not take Korn Ferry's recommendation and instead went out on their own and hired Nick Caserio almost out of the blue. This is when the rumblings from the Watson camp began. On January 27, 2021, the Texans hired David Culley as their HC, and the very next day, the Watson camp officially announced they were requesting a trade.
At the time it was thought that Watson was not pleased that he was left out of the process, that his input was never even asked for. This seemed like a pretty silly reason to me because what company has their employees involved with upper management hires? Sure, Watson was an important part of the organization, but for him to want to be traded less than 6 months after signing a mega money contract because he didn't have a say in the GM or HC hirings? Wasn't buying that at all. It was also assumed that the Watson camp was not happy about the competence of the Texans organization, but if this were true, the Watson camp would have realized this long before. The Texans traded away Watson's best receiver, DeAndre Hopkins after the 2019 season, 6-7 months before Watson signed his mega extension. So not really buying that either.
By the middle of March 2021, the sexual misconduct lawsuits started rolling in. It was then assumed that this may have had something to do with Watson wanting out. Whatever the case, none of those reasons really made a whole lot of sense as to why he would sign a multi-million dollar contract, including $27,000,000 up front just to put his name on it, then 5 months later, never wanting to play another down for the Texans, until this claim by a member of a Texans fan site message board came to be.
Again, take this for what it's worth.
This poster, someone highly valued by the community there, claims to have sources inside the Texans organization. This source, or sources, have revealed to him that shortly after Watson signed his contract, Watson's agent, David Mulugheta, made some demands of the Texans. Mulugheta, a black man, steps in and demands that the Texans hire a black HC, and that they hire a black GM, along with an all black executive staff. Mulugheta also wanted a black OC and DC, AND if the Texans released any staff members, coaching or executive, that they be replaced by black hires. Wait, there's more. Mulugheta also wanted an all black QB room for the Texans, meaning Davis Mills, white guy, wouldn't have even been drafted had this played out.
This, of course, did not sit well with Cal, and this is reported to be the reason the Texans ignored Korn Ferry's recommendations and went on their own and hired Caserio, a white guy, to be the GM. This apparently made the Mulugheta/Watson team furious, and Mulugheta let the Texans know that Watson was done playing for them, unless they met one last demand, and that was for the McNair family to sell the Texans to a black owner. Apparently Mulugheta had already put together a group to buy the Texans, fronted by Houston born singer Beyonce. The McNair's of course, were not interested in selling, so it was then made known that Watson was demanding a trade.
Now again, this is all coming from a guy on a fan site message board, so again, take it for what it's worth. There are no other reports out there known to be making these claims. However, if legit reporters do know of this, I can certainly understand sitting on this racial nuclear bomb, without more solid evidence. Of course, if it were a white guy making all white demands, the whole world would not only know by now, but they'd be ready to torch whoever was making those kind of demands, evidence or not. But that's just the double standard world we live in.
Personally, I don't know if any of it is true or not. That said, of all the things given as reasons as to why Watson turned on the Texans so quickly after signing his big contract with them, this makes more sense than any of those. And for what it's worth, when Watson was traded to Cleveland, 3 days later the Browns traded their backup QB Case Keenum, white guy, to Buffalo, and shortly after that signed free agent QB Jacoby Brissett, black guy, to backup Watson. And this wasn't a move to save cap space as Keenum's cap hit was expected to be $3.5M. Brissett's cap hit will be $4.6M. It should also be noted that Mulugheta's clientele consists of only black payers.
So again, this story is from a fan site message board where the "reporter" is not credited with any newspaper or any other accredited media outlet. This is just somebody who can make up an anonymous name and say whatever. However, this message board poster is one who has built up a good reputation over the years he's been there. He doesn't come off as some troll throwing things against the wall to see what sticks.
So again, take it for what's it's worth.
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