LAS VEGAS — New Colorado Rockies president of baseball operation Paul DePodesta left the NFL’s Cleveland Browns after nine-plus years to take his new position in Denver.

While there may be some similarities between working in the front office in the National Football League and Major League Baseball, there is one brutal reality DePodesta is leaving behind with the Browns — and one he is inheriting with the Rockies.

While in Cleveland, DePodesta, working as the Browns’ chief strategy officer, was part of the group that traded for and signed quarterback Deshaun Watson to a $230 million guaranteed contract March 20, 2022. Since that time, Watson has started 19 games for the Browns due to various injuries and an 11-game suspension for violating the NFL’s personal conduct policy.

In those 19 games, Cleveland went 9-10 while Watson posted a quarterback rating of 80.7, much lower than the 104.5 he posted in 53 starts across four seasons with the Houston Texans.

The Watson trade altered the trajectory of the Browns and has left the franchise with burning questions about its reasoning for the deal and what comes next.

Injured Cleveland Browns quarterback Deshaun Watson is pictured on the sidelines during an NFL game against the Green Bay Packers in Cleveland, Sept. 21. (The Associated Press)

In Denver, the same can be said for the Kris Bryant contract, a seven-year, $182 million deal handed out March 18, 2022. Since that time, due to various injuries, Bryant has played in just 170 games and posted an OPS+ of 84, far below the 133 he posted in seven seasons with the Chicago Cubs.

Signed two days apart, the Bryant and Watson contracts are deals that have hamstrung their respective franchises.

The common link is DePodesta, who is leaving one behind and inheriting another.

On Monday in Las Vegas, DePodesta openly discussed the Watson contract and his time in Cleveland, knowing that is on his resume as much as the 20 years he spent in MLB front offices with five organizations.

“Here’s what I would say, and I truly believe this. I believe that most of the decisions, especially the big ones like that, are organizational decisions, right? I’m not a believer in the ‘King Scout’ situation where there is one guy who makes every call,” DePodesta said. “The jobs are too complex. The decisions are too hard. They impact too many different things.

“I always think these sorts of collective decisions, it can be hard to get unanimous (opinions) on those types of things. Everyone who was a part of that? We all own that. We just do. That’s part of the deal.”

DePodesta readily admits there are lessons to be learned from the Watson contract and its impact as well.

“You can always look back at and say, ‘OK, what would I do? What have I done? What would I have done differently? Or what did we learn?’ And we try to do that every time, even the decisions that work out extremely well,” DePodesta said. “It’s like, ‘Hey, what did we learn from this?’ I’m just a big believer that, hey, we’re all in this together. We all own this. Once we do it, then it’s incumbent upon all of us to try to make it the right decision.”

So are there similarities between the Bryant and Watson deals in DePodesta’s eyes?

“The two sports are very different, even in terms of their framework and how they compensate players and what those structures usually look like,” DePodesta said. “Quarterback is such a unique spot in sports, so I hesitate to liken anything to quarterback.

“Someone asked me the other day, ‘What are you going to do to fix the Rockies?’ I said, ‘Hey man, it all starts with quarterback.’”

Injured Colorado Rockies’ Kris Bryant looks on from the dugout in the second inning of a baseball game against the Arizona Diamondbacks, June 22 in Denver. (AP Photo/David Zalubowski)

The response was a joke, of course, but DePodesta knows the Rockies still must find their quarterback. That’s what Bryant was supposed to be when he was signed before the 2022 season, but his impact has been anything but positive.

So what will DePodesta do regarding Bryant? Will he be part of the team in 2026, or will the Rockies decide to cut their losses with Bryant, who turns 34 in January? It’s too early to answer those questions, but DePodesta knows the Bryant contract will be one of the biggest personnel questions he answers this offseason.

“There are long-term contracts that don’t work out,” DePodesta said. “That doesn’t mean there’s not still a chance, but they didn’t work out as well as anyone anticipated or the way anyone wanted it to work out on all sides.

“There are a bunch of examples of that in sports. I think it’s just part of the uncertainty we deal with in these roles.”