- 1 week ago
Seth Payne and Sean Pendergast react to the Texans' initial 53-man roster.
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00:00I wish I could say the news gets easier the years I've been a head coach, but it's never easy.
00:06Every time we have to sit there and talk to a guy and give him the devastating news to him
00:12that he's not making a team,
00:13it's hard to give that news, and I know it's hard to receive that news as well.
00:17So there is no pretty way of doing it for us and how Nick and myself has handled it.
00:22We're always honest, truthful, up front with those guys and give them the reasons behind why
00:28and things that they can improve upon to help them truly be a better player
00:32so the next time around they can make it.
00:34All right, there you go.
00:35That was D'Amico Ryan's Texans head coach last week following the Texans' final preseason game on Friday night,
00:42and yesterday was that day.
00:44Saturday and Sunday they were delivering that news to a bunch of guys,
00:47and we've got a 53-man roster now that will almost undoubtedly change over the next couple of weeks.
00:54There's going to be so much tumult over the last, I would say, in the next 72 hours even.
00:58Who knows?
00:59Yep, yep, yep, yep.
01:00As we welcome you in here on a Monday, that's Seth Payne, of course.
01:04I'm Sean Pendergast, and we should mention here that Nick Casario is meeting with the media tomorrow at 9 a
01:12.m.
01:12We're going to carry that press conference live,
01:14and then he's going to join us at 7.30 on Wednesday live on Payne and Pendergast.
01:19So for all the talking that's going to go on about the Texans and the roster, specifically today,
01:24you know, they just did the cut down yesterday.
01:27We're going to talk about it here in a second.
01:29Plenty of access to the GM of the team here between the press conference and our show over the next
01:3548 hours or so.
01:36So good to be with you.
01:37I hope you had a great weekend.
01:38We're off and running on a Monday, and we've got the Astros taking two out of three from both New
01:43York teams last week.
01:44We'll get to that here in the 6 o'clock hour as well.
01:47How are you doing this morning, my friend?
01:48Good, and Byron can cure that echo that we're having an issue with again.
01:55People on the YouTube are getting tormented by the echo.
01:58Yeah, yeah, yeah.
01:59I'm doing good.
02:00I apologize for everybody in the YouTube chat who might be hearing the echo right now.
02:05He got it.
02:06Byron gave me the thumbs up.
02:07Okay, got it, got it, got it.
02:08So this is, boy, it's weird.
02:11And I think that was the first word that you used, your first text to me after the initial roster
02:16was actually put up on the website.
02:18I was stuck.
02:19I was tracking.
02:20I've got a doc where I was crossing people out, highlighting them in red.
02:24That's smart.
02:24And I was stuck at, like, 56 for a while as we waited for a few things, like, guys like
02:29Bryce Hall and everything to get official.
02:31But you're sitting there, and I was sitting at 57 players on the roster.
02:37They had to get down to 53.
02:38I'm looking at the offensive line room, and I'm trying to figure out, all right, I knew they had traded
02:43for somebody.
02:43And I knew that they had, like, there had been some guys confirmed to be on the roster where it
02:50didn't make any sense that you had 12 offensive linemen.
02:53So I thought that I was going to find some blockbuster.
02:55No, lo and behold, they have a bloated room full of bloated human beings in the offensive line right now
03:01with 12 players.
03:03And I think that that's probably going to change sometime in the next couple of weeks.
03:07Meanwhile, the wide receivers, where we'd been bending over backwards trying to figure out how they were going to cut
03:13the wide receiver room down to six.
03:16Nope, there's five.
03:19Five wide receivers.
03:20They sailed right past six and went to five.
03:23Let's see if we can get to four.
03:25No problem getting to five, yeah.
03:28I'm with you.
03:29My gut reaction to this roster is, is it possible for an initial 53-man roster?
03:35We need to make that very clear.
03:37This is the initial 53-man roster.
03:40I don't think I've ever seen a Texans' initial 53-man roster where I feel more strongly that there's going
03:45to be more moves coming than this one.
03:47For the exact thing you just said, Seth, there's no chance.
03:50There's no chance that they go into week one of the NFL season with 12 offensive linemen on the roster.
03:55And for those who don't follow rosters all that close, nine or ten is the number that teams go with
04:0199% of the time.
04:03Nine or ten.
04:03Man, there's no way they go into week one with three running backs and one of them being British Brooks,
04:09who's not even really a real tailback.
04:12Like, he's a hybrid fullback special teams guy.
04:15So, yeah, that was the other thing.
04:17Like, is it going to be Noah Whittington or Juar Jordan?
04:19How about neither?
04:21Neither.
04:21How about neither of them?
04:22I think, in some ways, I think that what the Texans did is they looked at a lot of the
04:27guys that they're going to cut.
04:28And they have a boatload of guys they cut yesterday who are worthy of being on an NFL 53-man
04:34roster.
04:35I think that they just figure enough of them are going to make it through waivers and end up on
04:40the practice squad that they feel comfortable with the depth that running.
04:44You know, either Juar Jordan or Noah Whittington, maybe both, end up making it to the practice squad.
04:49And Nick always looks at it as it's not just the 53-man roster.
04:54It's the 53-man roster plus the practice squad because it's so easy to pull guys up these days compared
04:59to in the past.
04:59Yeah, this is what I think is going on.
05:01Again, my gut reaction just overall was, is it possible that this 53-man roster, the initial 53, is both
05:08the best and the weirdest initial 53-man roster that I've seen with the Texans?
05:14Just because of how the position groups are stacked quantity-wise.
05:18And the biggest thing, for those of you who are diehards and who watch the entire third preseason game, probably
05:26one of the biggest surprises on the roster is in that offensive line room, which is Sam Hagan is on
05:31the active roster.
05:32And Sam Hagan got destroyed a few times in the game on Friday night.
05:36But my thoughts on Sam Hagan are that from the very first time I saw him in a padded practice
05:43playing tackle against some of the starters and some of the second stringers, I honestly, I thought he had some
05:51really impressive reps.
05:52He's also had a bunch of reps where he looks a lot like an undrafted rookie free agent from South
05:57Dakota State.
05:57And I think that they just like the upside of him and think that, all right, a 6'6", 320
06:04-pound guy like this, who went to a smaller school, that a lot of teams out there are thinking, okay,
06:10this guy's got upside and he's going to be very raw and maybe a little bit further behind the curve
06:16than some SEC offensive tackle, that they didn't think he'd make it through waivers.
06:20Yep, that's got to be it.
06:21So this is what I think about the 12 offensive linemen.
06:24And we'll go through the biggest surprises here in just a second.
06:28If I had to guess, Seth, I think that they're probably down the road on some trade talks for a
06:35couple of these guys.
06:36They already traded Jared Patterson yesterday.
06:38So they traded Jared Patterson to San Francisco.
06:41These are all going to be guys that get traded for late-round picks, but a late-round pick is
06:45a late-round pick.
06:45We know Nick likes to use those to maneuver around in the draft and identify guys and go get guys
06:51that he really likes or at least get into a range of guys that he likes.
06:54If I had to guess, I'd be stunned if there's not a trade of at least one, maybe two of
06:58these offensive linemen.
06:59I could see them talking to teams about one of their, you know, the ninth or tenth offensive linemen and
07:06a team, a trade partner going, hey, look, we like this guy.
07:10We got this trade queued up with you.
07:12We want to wait and see what's out there on the waiver wire first.
07:14We'd rather go get a guy for free and not have to give you a draft pick.
07:17So if there's a guy we like out there that got cut by somebody, we're going to go pick him
07:21up.
07:21But, you know, let's talk Monday afternoon after we see who all makes it through waivers.
07:27So if I had to guess, purely a guess, I would guess that there's going to be at least one
07:32trade maybe later on today, if not multiple trades.
07:36Twelve is just, you're overloaded there.
07:38They're not going into week one with twelve.
07:39So that was the biggest quantity surprise to me.
07:43Jake Andrews making the team also was a little bit of a surprise to me.
07:48And that might have been the most polarizing retention that they had, even more so than Sam Hagan, I think,
07:54is that at least people haven't seen Sam Hagan perform poorly in a regular season game,
07:58where they've seen Jake Andrews perform poorly in regular season games.
08:02And I think a lot of people thought, all right, well, Jarrett Patterson, he feels more versatile.
08:07You can use him at center or guard where Jake Andrews doesn't have that.
08:11I think that there's still a very good chance that maybe they're waiting to see if they can trade him.
08:16And the first offer they got, they might have been planning on trading both Jake Andrews and Jarrett Patterson.
08:21And the first offer they got was on Jarrett Patterson.
08:23So, because I think right now the genuine backup center is probably Keelan Rutledge.
08:29I agree.
08:30That if they had to replace Evan Brown, they would move Keelan Rutledge down to center and put Wyatt Teller
08:35at guard.
08:36Three undrafted free agents.
08:38If you had told me last week that three undrafted free agents would make the team
08:43and that none of them would be Noah Whittington, I would have said, you're crazy.
08:47Like, I would have bet a lot of money if you told me blind three undrafted free agents make the
08:51team.
08:52Bet whatever dollar amount you want that Noah Whittington is one of them.
08:55I would have said, yeah.
08:56Like, he's flashed in camp.
08:58He's been competitive.
08:59It's a position where I think the competition at the back end of that room is conducive to an undrafted
09:06guy making it.
09:06He didn't make it.
09:08But Colin Wright did.
09:10The cornerback out of Manville.
09:12Then Stanford made it, despite not practicing for the better part of the last three weeks.
09:17He's been injured the last couple weeks.
09:18Yeah, yeah.
09:19He made it.
09:20You mentioned Sam Hagen making it.
09:21A little bit of a surprise.
09:22And then Harsh, the defensive end that really flashed big in the third preseason game.
09:31He was a monster in that game.
09:33Number 74.
09:33And I've been increasingly impressed by him throughout camp.
09:37The thing was that there was such a numbers crunch at defensive end.
09:41And then all of a sudden, in the last nine days or so, it's a Civil War battlefield of maimed
09:47defensive ends.
09:48You know, Ali Gay, Solomon Bird, Dylan Horton, all sustained injuries.
09:54And Dominic Robinson had been injured, not Paxton, so there's more of a chance for Sebastian Harsh to do some
09:58good things.
09:58Clowney, too.
09:59I mean, Clowney also.
10:00Yeah, Clowney's injured.
10:01He was in no danger of not making the team.
10:03As far as actual roster decisions, those three guys, Horton, Bird, and Gay, they're all of a sudden just out
10:08of the mix completely with bad injuries.
10:10So, and credit to him, Sebastian Harsh, he played his butt off and he made the squad.
10:16Made the team, man.
10:16If you don't think guys can make it in preseason week three, they can.
10:21TJ Yates is proud today.
10:23NC State.
10:24There you go.
10:25Oh, yeah.
10:25No, he went to North Carolina.
10:28He did?
10:28Yes.
10:29Yes.
10:30I've got to change the whole way I operate my life.
10:33Yeah, yeah, yeah.
10:33No, he's a Tar Heel.
10:34He's a Tar Heel, TJ Yates.
10:36He's probably still.
10:37He's a notable Texan who went to NC State.
10:39I'll let you look that one up.
10:41Go on.
10:41Keep moving on.
10:42Yeah, I'll keep going.
10:43Five wide receivers, as you mentioned, make the team.
10:46I think, yeah, most of us were going, like, who makes it?
10:49Who's the sixth one between Lewis Bond, Jared Wayne, and Justin Watson?
10:54It ended up being Jared Wayne, who I'm very happy for.
10:57He had a camp that that guy, if you just watch him play, like, okay, that guy deserves to make
11:04the team.
11:04Like, he had a good camp.
11:05I feel good for him that he's kind of made it past the emotional baggage of what happened with Tank
11:10Dell.
11:11Also, that was kind of a storyline with Jared Wayne.
11:14I'm sure there's tank people out there that are disappointed Jared Wayne made the team.
11:18We do have the audio of Tank Dell, you know, affirming that, hey, man, accidents happen.
11:23There's no hard feelings, all right?
11:25If you don't listen to us, listen to Tank Dell.
11:27Yes.
11:27He's moved on.
11:28Yes.
11:29He never had to move on.
11:30It was never an issue for him.
11:32No.
11:32Aiden Fisher making the team.
11:34That was the one where, you know, the Texans put out, when the Texans notify the media of all these
11:40decisions,
11:41they don't send out the 53-man roster.
11:43They send out the list of everybody who got cut.
11:45Yeah.
11:46And then you're forced, if you want to figure it out, you're forced to kind of reverse engineer things and
11:50go,
11:50okay, well, who's left?
11:51And Aiden Fisher was the one.
11:53I got it down to 50.
11:54I got it to 52, and I'm like, who am I missing here?
11:57Yeah.
11:57And it was Aiden Fisher, and I just didn't think he was going to make the team.
12:01He had a great – he's another guy.
12:03He and Sebastian Harsh might have both made the team in the third preseason game.
12:07And Sebastian – Aiden Fisher had a bunch of tackles in the second preseason game, too.
12:11I think the thing about Aiden Fisher is, if you look at all the linebackers right now,
12:16I mean, none of them were really super impressive.
12:19I thought Aiden Fisher did some good things, but he's also – man, you can see where he lacks the
12:26speed
12:26of guys that might have gotten drafted higher than he did, but he's got good instincts and a good football
12:32IQ.
12:32He was a captain for the national championship team.
12:35Like, he checks off a lot of boxes.
12:37So I think first and foremost, above all else, I think they might trust him as a guy
12:41if you need to go in and stop the run and you have to play three linebackers.
12:45D'Amico might really think that there's an immediate upside there.
12:49So if you need to – if you're worried about the pass, then you just keep – you keep Jalen
12:54Petrie in there.
12:54Yep.
12:55Or you play your five defensive line package.
12:57You know, you don't – you don't – you don't necessarily look at Aiden Fisher right now
13:02like a complete player, but it's D'Amico's baby position.
13:06I mean, and I trust D'Amico when it comes to his ability to evaluate the upside of guys.
13:12You know who's a guy who wasn't quite fast enough to be a legitimate linebacker in the NFL?
13:17Who?
13:17Aziz Alshire is an undrafted rookie free agent.
13:20Yep, yep, yep.
13:20And Aiden Fisher is a seventh-round pick.
13:22I think they like him, and I think there might be more of an immediate need for him situationally
13:27than you might realize.
13:28He's a seventh-round pick, which means he already has a better pedigree than Aziz did
13:31coming in the league.
13:32Aziz is undrafted, yeah.
13:34Yeah, and Jamal Hill gets released, and look, you can see the writing on the wall.
13:38As soon as the Texans drafted two linebackers, this is Jamal Hill's third year.
13:42He's got to really do something and take a step forward, and he just – again, he's in that
13:45group of guys that never really flashed or made you feel good about it.
13:50Yeah, there were definitely a few surprises.
13:52There were a few that were expected, but we're just kind of like – seeing Brevin Jordan
13:57get cut, that just made me feel bad because he's had to come back from multiple knee injuries,
14:03and he had to deal with an injury again in this training camp.
14:05It felt a little bit like euthanasia, you know, of a pet, not a human.
14:10But it was just –
14:12A pet that you really, really like, you know?
14:13Yeah, right.
14:14A pet that's had his fair share of, like, health issues, too, like, you know, like,
14:19it's – oh, man, lucky my three-legged dog had another knee injury, you know, that kind
14:24of thing.
14:25So, yeah, Brevin Jordan getting cut.
14:27Jawar Jordan getting cut was, I think, a surprise to some people.
14:32Solomon Bird – I thought Solomon Bird had made the team.
14:34Well, I think that – I think the surprise there is, at least for me, I'd gotten it down
14:39to Noah Whittington or Jawar Jordan.
14:42I figured, okay, like, Noah Whittington looks more polished than your average rookie.
14:48I think he fits in really well for the types of runs they want to run.
14:51I think he has really good vision.
14:53D'Amico talked about that with Noah Whittington.
14:55You know, pass protection was going to be a work in progress, but whatever.
14:59The fact that neither of those guys made it and that – I think they're hoping – you
15:04know, Jawar Jordan's made it through waivers before to make it to the practice squad.
15:08I think they just figure, all right, one of these guys will still be there.
15:10Yeah, and I think they'll be shopping for running backs out there.
15:13We've already got somebody asking, hey, Damian Pierce got cut.
15:15Do you think he'll be back?
15:16Never say never, I guess, but you and I talked about this before the show.
15:20You just think stylistically not a great fit for Damian Pierce in this system.
15:23Yeah, I think everything that I just said about Noah Whittington is not what Damian Pierce
15:28is.
15:28The vision just isn't there.
15:30Without getting overly technical, this team likes to run a lot of duo, and that's a play
15:35where the running back has to make a read and decide where he's going to go, as opposed
15:40to, here's the hole, hit it.
15:42And it's just Damian does not excel at that type of stuff.
15:44Damian decides as they break the huddle where he's going to go.
15:47Yeah, yeah, yeah.
15:48Whatever it says on the diagram in the iPad, that's where he's going to go.
15:54That's where he's going, yeah.
15:56We're probably burying the lead a little bit here, just going through all the kind of nooks
15:59and crannies of the roster.
16:00We're unthanized the lead?
16:01No, we didn't.
16:03No, it's a lie.
16:05We're resurrecting it right now.
16:06Tank Dell.
16:08Tank Dell is going to, as predicted on Payne and Pendergast and other places, he will start
16:14the season on injured reserve with a designation to return, as will defensive back Jamarcus Ingram,
16:21who is a pretty good special teams guy for them.
16:22So, they're allowed two of those that they didn't have to hold on to the 53-man roster
16:28coming out of yesterday.
16:29So, Tank Dell, to me, to very little surprise.
16:33I had heard other people out there talking about, hey, maybe just put him on IR for another
16:38year and do a Brevin Jordan thing where you give him another year on the back end.
16:41They obviously, unless they're being sentimental, which I don't think they are, they obviously
16:46think that Tank Dell is going to contribute to this, or there's a good chance he's going to
16:50contribute at some point this season.
16:51Because you only get eight of those.
16:53Yeah, and they use those on Jamarcus Ingram.
16:56Well, for the two exemptions they get.
16:59So, Tank Dell and Jamarcus Ingram get the exemptions, so they don't count against the 53-man roster.
17:05Right, right.
17:05Where anybody else that they put on IR with a designation to return moving forward will.
17:10That's where they've got a little bit of leeway here with Tank Dell for a while.
17:14Yep, yep.
17:15So, I'm curious what people think about that.
17:17Look, if you've been out of practice, if you've been out of practice and watched Tank and saw
17:21how little he was doing compared to other active players, and then you were out at practice
17:26and saw that there was no Tank Dell for the last 10 days or whatever it is, then this isn't
17:30a real surprise, I don't think.
17:31I was getting a little nervous when it was coming down to the wire, just in terms of you
17:34and me and having to deal with people saying, I told you so.
17:38It got down to an hour or so before the wire, before we heard news, I think, from Aaron
17:43Wilson that Tank Dell was going to be on IR.
17:45Well, I mean, maybe that's a question for Nick Casario.
17:48Yeah, maybe it was actually.
17:50Were they really struggling with that down the stretch?
17:53I would guess, I would hope that he'd get asked that tomorrow at his press conference,
17:56but if not, we'll ask him on Wednesday when he joins us.
17:59Nick's going to join us at 7.30 on Wednesday, a couple days from now.
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