The National Football League might actually be showing signs of positive change after years of shoulder-shrugging and looking the other way when players are caught engaging in lewd or abusive actions, drunken driving or other outrages. Until last week, when it came to holding the line for moral virtue against the NFL’s pursuit of money, morality got sacked every time.
The turning point may have come in the case of Deshaun Watson, the star quarterback of the Cleveland Browns and beneficiary of a guaranteed, $230 million, five-year contract. With that much star power and that much money riding on Watson’s every appearance, the sports-consuming public might well have assumed the guy could shoot someone on Fifth Avenue in Manhattan and get away with it in the NFL’s eyes. At least, that’s the way it worked in the past.
More than 50 women — massage therapists with serious careers — were allegedly harassed or abused by Watson while he was quarterback of the Houston Texans. He could have used a therapist employed by the Texans but chose not to. Lawsuits alleging sexual misconduct resulted in 25 of those cases, with all but one now having been settled out of court. The Houston Texans reached settlements with 30 women.
