Cleveland Browns, he’s your drawback now.

You courted Deshaun Watson, took him in and handed him the fattest assured contract in N.F.L. historical past, regardless of his tarnished repute and the numerous girls who’ve accused him of sexual misconduct throughout therapeutic massage periods.

Now, for all of his chic abilities at quarterback, you need to additionally cope with the storm cloud he creates.

It can preserve looming, foreboding and unavoidable, regardless of a grand jury choice on March 11 to forgo bringing prison prices in opposition to him.

Watson’s authorized battles proceed. Twenty-two civil fits alleging abuse stay.

Even when Watson, 26, avoids a civil trial and settles these circumstances by paying his accusers, slicing a deal so that they’ll preserve quiet — frequent apply when rich, highly effective males face a cavalcade of horrible accusations — few will overlook.

It is a advanced state of affairs, crammed with questions that we’ve grown all too accustomed to in sports activities. And like so many issues in fashionable life, it’ll divide.

Many followers will stick firmly behind Watson. They are going to level to the grand jury choice and say the quarterback was wronged by his accusers. They are going to wholeheartedly imagine Watson’s claims of innocence, simply as they imagine the reason of his lawyer, who has acknowledged that, sure, there have been consensual encounters between Watson and a number of the 22 girls who filed fits in opposition to him, however no matter occurred was “mutually desired.”

These followers, trapped, maybe, by the attract of stardom in a world the place athletic icons are too usually considered as almost infallible gods, will say it’s time to transfer on.

However loads extra will bear in mind and are possible by no means to forgive. As an alternative, they are going to take a look at the entire image: the cascade of claims from accusers who got here ahead with tales of Watson exposing himself, or touching the ladies along with his genitals, or ejaculating on them. Three of the prison complaints alleged both sexual assault or tried sexual assault.

That’s a sample. It’s disturbing, to say the least.

Contempt will understandably keep on with the Cleveland Browns for good, irrespective of how “humble, sincere and candid” the crew homeowners discovered him in interviews, and irrespective of how effectively the crew performs on the sphere.

And the N.F.L., which as soon as once more has proven that it is able to put revenue and successful above all else, will face yet one more reckoning.

It’s well-known that claims of sexual abuse are troublesome to show within the prison courts, notably when there’s little to no bodily proof and the alleged acts passed off in non-public. However as soon as Watson’s prison case ended, loads of N.F.L. groups had been prepared to maneuver on as if his accusers hadn’t spoken with troubling consistency about what occurred to them.

With Watson’s longtime crew, the Houston Texans, seeking to commerce away its star quarterback the second the prison case concluded, the Atlanta Falcons, Carolina Panthers and New Orleans Saints all jumped into the recruiting combine with Cleveland.

These groups had been keen to debate buying and selling their integrity for an opportunity to construct a winner with Watson. They couldn’t assist themselves, couldn’t wait to see what would turn into of the civil circumstances. They disregarded victims and their accounts.

Sure, Cleveland received him. However if you’re a fan, an worker or an proprietor of a crew that went after Watson, effectively, bear in mind the previous saying: Typically the very best prayers are those who go unanswered. That now applies to you.

In Cleveland, it will likely be a unique story. Watson initially spurned the Browns, however the crew beckoned with a deal so lavish it appeared meant to coat him in a patina of respectability: 5 years, $230 million, each greenback assured.

Roger Goodell, the league commissioner, may have checked out the entire publicly recognized allegations and determined sufficient was sufficient. He may have despatched a robust message by placing Watson on depart for violating the N.F.L.’s conduct coverage — it doesn’t matter what occurs within the authorized combat.

Goodell hasn’t performed that.

As an alternative, from N.F.L. headquarters, we hear that the league continues to be conducting its personal investigation — molasses sluggish when the sign despatched by decisive motion is warranted.

How can we be stunned by something from a league that hardly covers itself in glory relating to standing up for the rights of ladies?

The N.F.L. allowed Antonio Brown to play for Tampa Bay at the same time as he confronted accusations of sexual harassment and a lawsuit accusing him of rape. The N.F.L. stands idle at the same time as one among its foundational groups, the Washington Commanders, is saddled with accounts of harassment from over a dozen girls that even contain the crew proprietor Daniel Snyder. There are many comparable tales. By now they’re a part of the N.F.L. material.

As I mirrored upon the Watson story over the previous couple of days, I couldn’t assist however consider one other aspect. What about girls who’re merely attempting to outlive harassment and abuse? How did information of Watson’s signing have an effect on girls at a spot just like the Cleveland Rape Disaster Heart?

“There was outrage, confusion, ache and ladies right here wanting to grasp how on the planet this might even occur,” stated Donisha Greene, the clinic’s director of neighborhood engagement, who spoke to me on a video name.

“It positively triggered loads of terrible feelings,” she stated. I may hear the weariness in her voice. “Quite a bit.”

Greene pointed me to startling statistics displaying the amount of sexual assault in America and the way onerous it’s for ladies to obtain justice within the court docket system. Of each 1,000 circumstances of sexual assault, the overwhelming majority will go unreported. Of the 50 that result in arrest, solely 25 perpetrators will probably be incarcerated.

In relation to sexual abuse, we reside in a world the place males usually get second probabilities and ladies are left with unfathomable ache that society fails to acknowledge or see.

“Sadly,” Greene stated, “tales like this are usually not stunning to us.”