How one Browns rookie made a mark during the offseason program

June 19, 2024 Sportextra NFL, Sports 0

Ask any of the Browns position coaches, and they will be adamant about the fact that in the spring, there’s no depth charts.

And even though it was a point that linebackers coach Jason Tarver made once again last week, still, it was interesting to see throughout the offseason program just how much mixing up their position group did during drills, meaning that the spots next to Jeremiah Owusu-Koramoah seem to be up for grabs.

And some of that mixing and matching included rookie Nathaniel Watson getting first-team reps and making plays.

The Browns drafted Watson in the sixth round. He was the 2023 AP SEC Defensive Player of the Year winner and All-SEC first-team selection as well as a finalist for The Butkus Award, given to college football’s best linebacker. He led the SEC with 137 tackles and 10 sacks.

At 6-foot-2, 233 pounds, he played six total seasons at Mississippi State and turns 24 on Sept. 1.

“He’s played a lot of football,” Tarver said last week. “He’s experienced, so he sees things pretty well for a rookie, but like you said, a slightly older rookie in the NFL. So, we like where he’s going. I’m excited to see him in pads. Yeah, I want to see him in pads. ”

That’s a high compliment for any rookie to get this early in their first year.

But you definitely saw Watson’s football acumen throughout the spring. He certainly passed the eyeball test, and never looked lost or out of place throughout OTAs or minicamp when the veterans arrived.

He also made plays.

During the first week of OTAs, Watson ended the second day of practice when he picked off a Tyler Huntley pass intended for running back Jerome Ford, and ran it back the length of the field. He was mobbed by his teammates after the play, and they posed for a photo.

Not only did Watson obviously benefit from having played a lot of college football, he’s proven to be extremely coachable for one reason in particular.

“He’s very experienced, and what Nathaniel does a really good job of is not making the same mistake,” Tarver said. “And if you’re a rookie and you can learn from your mistakes and not make the same mistake twice, he got better and better and better. Like, he had a play today that was the same as one yesterday, and he corrected it.

“So, if he keeps going on that’s what rookies need to do is don’t be the guy that’s making mistakes over and over, be the guy that’s fixing things.”

After spring Watson seems to be thoroughly in the mix in a linebacker room that also include Jeremiah Owusu-Koramoah, who’s coming off his best year yet, Jordan Hicks, Devin Bush, Tony Fields II and Mohamoud Diabate.

No matter how the linebacker depth chart turns out in the fall, though, Watson seems in perfect position to make an impact with the NFL’s new kickoff rules, even though he didn’t have a ton of special teams experience in college.

The new rules will have 10 members of the kicking team lining up on the receiving team’s 40-yard line and a minimum of nine members of the receiving team lining up between the 30 and 35-yard line. The play doesn’t begin until the ball is either caught or hits the ground in the landing zone between the 20 and the goal line — and any ball that lands in the landing zone has to be returned.

While the Browns have been working and drilling the new rules in the spring, the fact remains that no one really knows just what the new kickoff will look like yet — not until we at least get some preseason games in the books.

“I don’t know how it works either, but I know we’re close together so that means it’s just a better impact,” Watson said during rookie minicamp in May. “Like I said, I’m a physical person, I just love hitting somebody, so I mean I just can’t wait to get out there on special teams.”

Based on his performance in the spring, he seems poised to show off that physicality wherever the Browns need him.

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