Myles Garrett Named Browns Walter Payton Man of the Year
The Cleveland Browns have announced defensive end Myles Garrett as the team's Walter Payton Man of the Year, awarded to players for their performance on the field as well as in the community.
Garrett has a strong case for the defensive player of the year, having recorded 10.5 sacks and four forced fumbles in ten gams so far this season on the field. Off the field, Garrett has been spoken out against police brutality and reached out to families that have been impacted as well as a retired officer who was murdered in a robbery.
He's also part of Waterboys, an organization dedicated to helping to provide clean drinking water in communities in East Africa.
That's all on top of random acts of kindness to individuals and families that have had a difficult time, ranging from someone short on money having a rough day to a family that lost their home in a fire.
Garrett more than deserves the recognition for what he has done for the Browns as well as what he's done for communities in need, but it's difficult to ignore the fact that he is winning this award the year after being suspended six games for hitting Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback Mason Rudolph.
There will undoubtedly be people who don't like Garrett that will think he doesn't deserve this award and will never look past what happened with Rudolph, which only illustrates the difference between how Garrett is viewed by Browns fans and those he has helped and those who see him only as the player who lost control on the field.
That may ultimately be held against him when it comes to the player who is named the NFL's Walter Payton Man of the Year Award, but for the Browns and their fans, it's about the person and player they have seen consistently since he was the first overall pick in the 2017 NFL Draft. For Garrett, it's not letting one moment define him or keep him prisoner.
Even after Garrett was suspended, he fulfilled his commitment to help provide food to the hungry, answering questions from the media when he could've hid from the world. Everyone would have understood why he wouldn't want to be in that situation, but he not only made a commitment that was important to him, he saw his own plight as small compared to the challenges the people he was helping were facing.
