- 1 week ago
ITL discusses the one concept they believe could take the Texans to another level and asks how much better Houston can be if it becomes a consistent part of their identity.
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00:00What we do want is the Texans to be genuine Super Bowl contenders.
00:04And I think most everybody believes that under the sound of my voice, right?
00:07That'd probably be fair to say.
00:08Yes.
00:08Let me know if you view differently and I'll adjust my discussion points.
00:13But Ted Wynn of The Athletic does a good job of covering the NFL in general.
00:18I think he has a little bit more of a focus on the Raiders and on just kind of the
00:22Bay Area in general.
00:23I think that's where he's located out there.
00:25But he does a good job covering the entirety of the league.
00:26And he did an analysis piece on why the Houston Texans have a strong case to be Super Bowl contenders.
00:31And there was one piece in particular that it felt like I was holding on to.
00:35Because he started with the defense, obviously.
00:37That is the forward-facing portion of their contendership claim.
00:42And he was talking about the big thing that they are looking to get better at,
00:46that Matt Burke has talked about,
00:48and the big thing that it feels like they would need to get better at is explosive plays.
00:52And then I also thought about, well, in the offense, explosive plays would also be a large portion
00:58of making them significantly better to the point of being a Super Bowl contender.
01:02So how much further do you think, how much better do you believe this Texans team is year over year
01:08at explosives?
01:09This one concept, both on defense and on offense, that would make them champion-type contenders.
01:15I think in a weird way, I think it would be more impactful if they limit explosive plays defensively
01:22than get them offensively.
01:24Simply because it's going to be so difficult to gain an inch, one inch, on this defense.
01:31Just because they're so good at every level.
01:35So when they are exploited with a defensive play, it becomes magnified that much more.
01:42Whether it's an up-the-middle thing, or just a run, a breakdown, missed tackle, whatever it may be.
01:49I think it hurts your defense a lot more than it helps your offense.
01:53And the reason is, this offense is not going to be, it's going to be a run-the-ball,
01:57and explosive play will help.
01:58Obviously, don't get me wrong.
02:00But with this offense, they like field goals.
02:04We've established that.
02:05They like running and gaining, excuse me, running the clock, time of possession, all those things.
02:11I think they're good with, hey, we get one explosive play, that's 20 yards.
02:15It gets us closer to the red zone.
02:17Maybe we'll score a touchdown, but we're good if we have to kick a field goal.
02:21Whereas defensively, if you are in these close games, and you give up one big explosive play,
02:27and heaven forbid it's a big touchdown or something, that hurts you a lot.
02:30That hurts you a lot in terms of how the game flows.
02:33That's definitely the value of limiting explosives on defense, finding explosives on offense.
02:38How much better do you actually believe they are at it?
02:40Because one of the things that I immediately did when I saw this, on the defensive side of the ball,
02:44the curiosity I had was, okay, what do those look like?
02:47And it's not the fullness of explosive plays, but I looked at deep passing.
02:51And they literally gave up 17 deep passing plays on this defense.
02:55So I went through and I watched most of them, or a good amount of them,
02:59and I tried to kind of break down what's happening there from my vantage point,
03:03obviously not on the inside, without knowing their actual responsibilities,
03:05but from the best that I could suss out, what happened there and what was the reason why
03:09so that you could maybe, if they needed to be adjusted.
03:12And, I mean, as you might imagine, a few of them were early on with C.J. Gardner-Johnson.
03:16At least two of them that I looked at, I don't want to say charted because that sounds self-important.
03:20I don't think that I was actually charting per se.
03:21But C.J. Gardner-Johnson was a couple of them, where he was just, he bails out too far,
03:26he gives too much cushion, his hips are kind of bad, and I wonder if his communication was also bad
03:31because the cornerback below was maybe eyes in the backfield, not necessarily as deep.
03:37Maybe that's the cornerback themselves, but also I imagine that maybe there was the communication.
03:40So there's at least a couple of plays of those 17 where I go,
03:43that was just the C.J. Gardner-Johnson not fitting into what they do and the way that they do
03:49it role.
03:49Well, there was a number of the plays that I saw that were kind of man-type coverage.
03:55One of those being, do you remember versus, was it Tennessee?
03:59No, it wasn't Tennessee, it was Denver, where there was a running back wheel ride out of the backfield
04:03and here's Henry Toto having to cover in man by himself on the perimeter.
04:08I actually do. That was early in the game too, I think.
04:10You know exactly how that one went, right?
04:12It's just, hey, buddy, you're not meant to be in coverage by yourself.
04:16But the safety over top of that, influenced in by a post,
04:19was MJ Stewart.
04:20I wonder, and I go, okay, how much better does that look
04:24with Kalen Bullock and Reed Blankenship?
04:26I don't know whichever one of them would be the far back,
04:29the high back in those two high sets, two high safety sets.
04:33But I don't imagine that they're going to get completely dragged out of this
04:36and, you know, I guess deceived with their eyes
04:38to the point where Henry Toto was there by himself.
04:41But I guess that could happen.
04:42Yeah, yeah.
04:42There's a couple of other instances where one against Stingley
04:48and one against Kamari Lasseter in man, where they just lost.
04:51One of them is like a scissors concept where, you know,
04:54just they get beat by Chip Conquil versus the Tennessee Titans.
04:57Another one is Baltimore where Zay Jones, not Zay Jones, Zay Flowers, thank you,
05:02just gets Derek Stingley on a double move when there's eight or nine in the box.
05:10So he's out there by himself and you trust him to be out there by himself.
05:14He just got got.
05:14So there's a few of these that I go, some of these explosives are going to happen
05:18just because someone will win.
05:21But there are actually probably a good at least a quarter of these explosive deep passes
05:26and maybe a little bit more to a third and maybe more of where it's like,
05:29hey, the communication that they have, the changes that they've already made
05:33in some of their personnel will probably limit some of these explosives
05:36on top of them having another year in this defense
05:39and being more attuned to what they're doing.
05:42So I actually do believe that they are indeed better in a way that,
05:45weirdly enough, you don't see on the field necessarily,
05:48but just ways that I can easily see year over year that that's not going to happen.
05:53Yeah, it's just not obvious.
05:54It doesn't sort of jump off the page or jump off the tape at you
05:59because they are doing their job, because there isn't that breakdown,
06:02because you don't see the communication fall.
06:04So would you agree then?
06:05Like limiting the defensive chunk plays, so to speak, big plays,
06:10is where this team is going to benefit more so than even getting them on offense?
06:14I don't.
06:15I think getting them on offense is going to be a huge, huge important leap for them
06:19because I think the defense is already, as we know, by points allowed was second,
06:25but I think we all understand what happened in the end.
06:27It was one of the best, easily said.
06:29But I think that they can tighten up a little bit more,
06:31but I also wonder how much more impact is that
06:34versus the already great impact that this defense has,
06:38retaining, I think, a majority of their,
06:40retaining basically all their core and adding on to that.
06:42I think offensively is where it gets interesting.
06:44If we do believe that they've taken a step forward in Explosive
06:48because what have we talked about, right?
06:50Their ability to run the football, you're hoping that that's better.
06:52But even then, I don't know that it's going to be so much better
06:55where they're just mauling all these teams running the football
06:58to where this is enough offensively.
07:01I think the pass game, it does seem like there's more command from C.J. Stroud,
07:05and it does feel like Nick Caley is taking a step forward
07:07in actually the schematics of what's happening.
07:10But again, I keep asking myself how much more have they progressed
07:13to where they can continue to win and matriculate up the field.
07:16That's the tough thing about doing that type of four yards in a cloud of dust
07:20type running game or matriculating up the field offense
07:22is that you can't afford to mess up.
07:24I think that the more and more Explosives that you add
07:27that mitigates some of the margins of error,
07:30gives you more margins of error for maybe you have a bad run where
07:36I hate to pick on Ed Ingram, but maybe Ed Ingram overruns a block
07:39and now this run takes us off schedule.
07:41If you can get Explosives and if you can get Chunks,
07:43we can get that all back.
07:44We're not off the sticks and then the whole drive is knocked off course,
07:49which we saw way too many times happen last year
07:52where first down they didn't get the yards that they needed
07:54or second down they had a negative play
07:56and boom, the whole drive is over and we're punting
07:58and now the defense is back on the field.
08:00The ability to get those chunk plays makes it so that
08:03it does not have to be as perfect as we are imagining it.
08:07Plus, now that's even more pressure that the defense can inflict.
08:10If, hey, we just got off the field here quickly,
08:12the defense is back out here, the offense has not had opportunity
08:15to continue to get themselves, you know, self-scout or whatever,
08:19get themselves back in line and now they have to go up against
08:22Daniil Hunter and Will Anderson.
08:23Look, I agree with all that and, you know, the question becomes,
08:28you know, how aggressive to make those plays is really what it comes down to.
08:32You know, we've talked about it multiple times.
08:34What is this offense going to be?
08:35You know, run the ball conservative, but they have made some bigger plays
08:39specifically yesterday in the joint practice, you know,
08:41a 25-yard touchdown.
08:43I don't remember how big the other one was.
08:46That one was Lewis Bond.
08:47No, I'm saying that there was another one too,
08:49but I don't know how far they are.
08:51Like, I don't know if they're, like, everybody takes the big plays,
08:55but I don't know if their system is going to be, like,
08:57that aggressive to do it.
08:59So that's why I'm like, all right, so if they just kind of go down the field,
09:02control the ball and the clock, make it the occasional big play
09:05because it's there, you know, is that more important
09:08than preventing them on the defensive side?
09:10I mean, it's a balance, but I think, ultimately,
09:14if the defense can just shut them down, they're going to win a lot of games.
09:17Agreed.
09:17Yeah.
09:18But, again, what you're asking is perfection of your defense,
09:20and you're like, eh, the offense.
09:22Limit the number.
09:23Reduce them.
09:24Yeah, and in a way, you are also kind of asking for perfection on offense,
09:27and which of these units do you believe more is going to give you that perfection?
09:31That would be the defense.
09:31Clearly the defense.
09:32So I think that being able to pick up those chunk plays
09:34and those explosives is going to matter a great deal.
09:36But I bring you back to the original question.
09:38How much better do you believe the Texans,
09:40specifically their offense is, at being able to get those explosives?
09:43Do you believe in that?
09:44I think if Jaden Higgins was still here, I'd have a little bit more belief,
09:48and I know that Keyshawn Booty is here, and he is a big play receiver.
09:51He's also a contact, like, catch-and-traffic type receiver.
09:56And I think that contested catch receiver is what I wanted to point to.
09:59And I think that's going to be very impactful because I'm not certain
10:03that Nick Haley is going to have a system that inherently creates separation
10:07for all these guys.
10:08So being able to catch contested catches matters.
10:11I'm still curious.
10:12I'm with you.
10:12And that is the nice way to say it.
10:14I'm with you.
10:14On how much better this team is going to be at creating explosives.
10:17I'm totally with you.
10:18You know, the run game, you know, David Montgomery has proved it.
10:23And I think he's proved it out of the backfield as a receiver,
10:27which I think we can expect to see more.
10:28Woody Marks can do that.
10:30I almost have more confidence in terms of what we've seen already
10:33with the big plays coming out of the backfield,
10:36and maybe even the tight end room more so than the receiving room.
10:39But first of all, as I mentioned earlier,
10:41I don't think this offense is such like, hey, let's sling it.
10:43But if we can get a big play this way with, you know,
10:47David Montgomery down the sideline for 80 yards,
10:48which we saw in their inter-squad practice,
10:50with Woody Marks, you know, busting a big play on a reception or a run,
10:55with, hell, Dalton Schultz, you know, or Marlon Klein,
11:00which we've seen Marlon Klein in the Chargers game.
11:03Wasn't that like an 18- or 20-yard reception down the middle?
11:07It was like 30-something yards.
11:09Yeah, it might have been more than that.
11:10With that seam route.
11:11I have more confidence that they can do it with places other than the receiving room,
11:15to be honest, outside of Nico, of course.
11:16And I guess if you are bringing it back to the receiving room,
11:18the thing that we have to bring up is Jalen Knoll being a factor consistently
11:22as opposed to having Christian Kirk that did not feel like he gave you the opportunity
11:25to have explosives.
11:26Jalen Knoll, with another year and hopefully with a better grasp of what you're doing
11:30on the field, to be able to be on the field,
11:32that speed that he brings is clearly something that you would hope would give you
11:35the opportunity to have explosives.
11:37And maybe it's just if the offensive line can block better and give CJ Stroud enough time
11:41to see some of these routes get downfield, that gives you the opportunity to have some
11:45more explosives as well.
11:47I definitely believe and buy in on the idea that the limitation of explosives on the defense
11:51is going to happen.
11:52I'm still a little hesitant on exactly how much we're going to get from the offense.
11:56But I guess the possibility means something when the offense was so limited in explosiveness
12:02last year.
12:03But if they can do that, I think that this is the thing that very much puts them in the
12:06place where you go, oh, they could be world beaters this year in this upcoming season.
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