Texans vs Seahawks is a TRUE TEST, Are the Texans a playoff team?!

Texans vs Seahawks is a TRUE TEST, Are the Texans a playoff team?!

It’s a Believe in Texans podcast. I’m here with Cecil Schwarz, former Houston Texan. I’m Seth Fay, former Houston Texans, sponsored by FanDuel. FanDuel season has the Texans as three and a half point underdogs in this game as we speak. Maybe that’ll change sometime over the next few days. But, uh, I’m I’m excited about this game really. And and we talked about this on Monday a little bit, but it just it feels like such a true test for what this offense is and then where this team is like having dropped three games to three quality opponents, beat up on a couple of inferior opponents. Where do the Texans actually fit in the hierarchy of the league right now? No, I’m with you on that. And I think bye-weeks are always used to like re-evaluate yourself, reevaluate where you are offensively, defensively, special teams. So, I’m curious to see, okay, do they come out and change anything on the offensive side? Did they come out and change anything or add a personnel switch um to either side of the ball? I’m really interested to see, okay, the first three games, like you mentioned, were really tough opponents. All were one-sore games. How do you handle another tough opponent? Yeah. What would be the different outlook as far as how you approach the game or the play calling on either side? Um, would you be more aggressive here? And there I’m just curious to see how it goes because you’re right, you played three really quality opponents and it was a one point or not one point but one score game in each and every one. Uh, it could have went either way. So, um, now would be a great test to see if if they are like you mentioned top 10, top 12, whatever in the NFL. Yeah. And I when I went back and I watched the Seattle versus Jacksonville game, it was uh it was interesting cuz for one, I kept having like PTSD from some moments in the Jaguars game where the Texans played because they just just played in uh in Jacksonville there. But, uh, the the other part of it was, okay, I’m watching Trevor Lawrence versus the Seahawks defense, and there’s opportunities because the Seahawks defense was all banged up, but the defense the Seahawks defense, and we talked about this on Monday, but they do a really good job of a couple things. They win the physical matchups with the Seahawks defensive line. So, they just they beat up on the Jaguars offensive line, but two is that they disguise really well. They do all the sim blitzes at the line of scrimmage, but they disguise their coverages real well. So Trevor Lawrence was getting pressured, but it wasn’t like it was a lot of really fast pressure. It was as he’s trying to figure out, wait a second, they show they showed zone, but now they’re they jumped to man. Lawrence would just kind of get stuck on his initial read and and not find the open guys elsewhere because Seattle, they’re they’re banged up in the secondary. They’ve got guys that were in man coverage. There’s going to be opportunities there, but he just didn’t he didn’t get to it quickly enough. So, I feel like just in in really seeing where CJ is where it looks like he’s been crisper with his reads these last couple weeks, if this if this really ends up being the test of, oh, okay, compared to Trevor Lawrence at least, boy, CJ’s getting there a lot faster. He’s got a better feel for this offense. Yeah, I think that’s the last part is what what gets me the better feel for the offense because in every offense, especi especially this type of offense, we talked about it beforehand, there’s always answers in the play call. There’s always answers to what they could possibly do. So, we see him make adjustments at the line of scrimmage, maybe throwing a couple hots, maybe make the slide protection here or there, we can say, okay, hey, he’s getting he’s getting comfortable. He’s starting to feel his way through the offense and getting some confidence there. um if we see some of the same struggles, I might I might be a tad bit worried like he’s not he’s just not there yet. There’s one of the things that that Demo had brought up when he was on the coach’s show with Mark Vandermir and John Harris was I think CJ getting comfortable with well he was talking about the offense, but I think he was talking mostly about CJ getting comfortable with the guys who aren’t Nico Collins or the guys that he’s not familiar with. And I was wondering about that from your perspective when a quarterback is in a new offense and you’ve got rookie wide receivers out there or even Christian Kirk who’s new to the system like is that like is from a receivers standpoint like like what’s when do you feel that trust start to click? Is it just from does it start in practice from just being in the right spot all the time or just like the the quarterback understanding that you’re seeing the game the same way? It starts in practice but honestly the real confidence comes from game reps. Like it’s hard to build confidence and trust guys that aren’t playing in the game. So if you aren’t playing in a game and you get an opportunity to have a rep with the quarterback and he and you’re in the right spot at the right time, he delivers it. Boom. He trusts you. All right, cool. He comes come at you again. Boom. Or or a situation where it’s a one-on-one coverage and he’s giving you a shot and you come down with it. Boom. Like that’s how you build the confidence of it. So for me, my question to Demo would be, well, I need to see more from Jaden Higgins. Yeah. I need him to get more reps, right? I need I need No to get more reps. I need Christian Kirk who’s who plays a lot. And I think you seen the ascending Christian Kirk the last week he played with I think four catches, 64 yards. Um the more they play with him in real time, the more he’ll get familiar with him. So you can practice all you want, but it’s about the game reps and actually building that confidence and hey, can you beat a guy in the game? Can I trust you in a game when the bullets are live? You know, the other thing that the Seahawks did really well versus the Jaguars when we talk about the offensive line and the challenge they have was they they you know, the Seahawks barely blitz at all, but they show all these sim blitzes and the protection the Jaguars had the protections pretty well handled and it’s easier when you’re not getting blitzed, right? Because like you’re still going to match up guys one-on-one. But a lot of the a lot of the overload fronts they use where you got three defensive linemen on one side and one on the other, they they do a good job of kind of using those to gunk up the middle and then create these one-on-one matchups with the Jaguars left tackle Walker Little had a really tough game and yeah, like the left guard had a really tough game. So you look at the Texans and that it goes right back to that same thing. Okay, we’ve seen Arante Ursery and Juice Scrugs do some good things and make some improvement. the right side of the offensive line. They’ve been those guys have been solid, but it’s really from the center to the left guard to the left tackle. That’s what I’m I’m really curious to see. And I I’ll be genuinely over the moon if the Texans offensive line performs well versus this defensive front because they’ve got it looks like that it looks like the Seahawks have four defensive tackles out there at times. Like they’re just they’re really physical. They’re big, strong guys that uh aren’t necessarily like super fast Josh Hines Allen type guys off the edge. They just they just kind of beat guys up physically and they might not win fast but they can press the pocket. Um and those like those are the two hot points for the Texans right now is hey how’s the passing offensive offense look CJ with all those receivers and then the offensive line specifically and and then we’re also starting to come up on the trade deadline. So we’ll see based on this game. I don’t want to talk too much about trades, but the the Interior offensive line trade market, there’s some guys out there. I’m going to wait and see until after this game, like how Juice Scrugs holds up and and and just I I don’t know. I’m just I’m I’m kind of tippytoing into this game and then I’m going to be cocky as hell afterwards if they win. I’ll be like, “Oh, yeah. I knew it all along. Yeah, they’re going to take care of these guys. I I wasn’t sweating it one bit.” I wasn’t expecting the Seahawks to be what? They’re five and one right now. Yeah. I wasn’t expecting that again the season. Like I thought Sam Darnold coming like new situation for him. You know, he had a good what couple years and where was he at? Minnesota. Was that correct? Yeah, Minnesota last year. Yeah. Um and then I’m like I don’t know if the switch up. I mean the OC of Minnesota knew what he was doing. Is he gonna be He’s playing well. Like they’re Seahawks four and two. Sorry, I forgot. Four and two. Sorry. Four and two. I I didn’t expect that. I thought they were going to struggle. Well, this is okay. This is the thing about the Seahawks because again they’ve got that banged up secondary and and that’s why it’s such a great test again is that the the um the Bucks the week before had put up like 38 points on that defense and that you could cite all those injuries in the secondary and that’s really where it comes down to it is if the offensive line can hold up and I think the way Demo phrased it was if you can get past that front there’s some opportunities down there and like they’ve given up some points and they’ve got some concerns. Demarcus Lawrence being back for the Jaguars game was a big difference too like especially in setting the edge versus the run. Um but I think in terms of Sam Darnold, okay, the the crazy thing Cecil, he’s leading the league in yards per attempt. I think he’s at nine and a half yards per attempt. Oh wow. But he’s also got the lowest turnover worthy uh throw percentage. So like he’s really he’s taking care of the ball and a lot of it this is there’s so much that people in Houston are familiar with when you talk about the Seahawks defense or offense because it’s it’s Clint Kubak as the offensive coordinator son of Gary Kubak. They run the play action really effectively. Here’s uh here’s Demo on them establishing their play action game. They’re good at the play action pass game because you know Kubak’s done a good job wherever he’s been as a play caller. He’s done a really good job of establishing the outside zone scheme, right? And with the outside zone scheme comes the keepers off of the outside zone action. So, he’s done a really good job of marrying both run game and passing game, meaning they both look very similar. So, the the play action pass game works because of the offensive line and how they come off the football, right? How they make the run look exactly like the pass. It puts the second level defenders in a bind where are you stepping up to defend the run or are you can you key it and diagnose it quick enough to understand that it’s pass and now I need to drop in coverage. Yeah. And so I don’t know why I put that little slide transition in there. That bad job editing by me. Um the look it’s it’s everything that we talk about when Aaron Foster and Matt Shaw and Andre Johnson and all those guys were here. Yes. All of that. Set up the outside zone. uh establish, you know, get guys to bite and get those clean looks downfield. And I think Darnold’s done a really good job of understanding when it’s working and when I can take my shots downfield to Jackson, Smith, and Jigba. I was curious what it’s like uh as a receiver because I’ve heard defensive backs talk about it a lot about just playing against that scheme when all of a sudden you’re just flying up trying to stop the run and your guy runs past you and you realize, oh, ah, it’s a pass. Like, is that what’s that like? Like can you do you feel that moment like when all of it like you know it’s play action and you can just tell that they bit on it hard? It’s a great feeling. I’m not going to lie to you. Yeah. Depending where you are in the field like say if you’re a slot receiver and you know the play action is happening your way and that safety bites down and you come right behind as soon as he bites like oh I got him. We take off. It’s coming. It’s coming and throw it. Throw it. Throw it. Yeah. It’s a fun feeling because you know it’s working and it’s it’s setting them up. But that also puts them on puts them on skates now because they’re like, “Okay, I can’t bike. I got burnt now. I got to stay back and make sure.” Opens up the running game. So, it just works hand in hand. That that’s that outside zone, but play action in general, it just really works well when you do it right. Yeah, they’re um and they’re doing, you know, what it’s frustrating for fans a lot of times when you commit to the run even though you’re not necessarily running the ball all that well. And that’s where the Seahawks are right now. They’re committed to it. They’re going to keep running. And I wouldn’t if I were a Seahawks fan, I wouldn’t be too upset about it because the offense is playing really well. But I think the one thing the one area it shows up is that they can’t necessarily close out those close games as easily. Even the Jaguars game, they just they can’t run the ball when they need to run the ball. So, it’s awesome for setting up the play action and everything, but man, when you’ve got a when you’ve got a seven-point lead and you just want to really put your foot on the throat, they’re not they’re not quite there yet. So that’s, you know, the Texans run defense is it’s it’s better than I think people feel like it is sometimes. My only concern is that a lot of times they’re doing it. They’re setting they’re they’re loading the box to stop the run. And that is one thing Kenneth Walker has been he’s faced the fourth most loaded boxes in the league. And so that’s that’s what teams are doing against them. And like obviously it’s setting up some shots downfield for him. Well, I think too like if I look at the Seahawks on paper, you got Zack Sharpet and Kenneth Walker and then look at their receivers, I’ll be more intimidated by their running backs, right? Especially coming into the year, but we didn’t know what JSN would be able to do um with the older Cooper Cup and some younger guys they drafted. So, it makes sense that they’re going against a lot of loaded boxes because I want to stop that run and make Sam and JSN and somebody else try to beat us. But, they’re doing a good job converting and and making plays, proving he’s that guy. Yeah. now some it’s like I I think this is the kind of thing where as a sometimes sometimes you’re sitting in game plan meetings and you’re hearing what the coaches are selling and you’re kind of like I don’t know about this like where you’re getting to the point where all right man Jackson Smith and Jigma is making a lot of dudes look really stupid out there like uh I wouldn’t mind maybe bleeding a little bit versus the run so I don’t have to which brings us to Derek Stingley because you got a guy like Jackson Smith and Jig who’s leading the league in receiving He’s had this oblique injury and you know the last couple games he didn’t travel. I don’t know if they thought he should have or needed to versus maybe Z Flowers or something. Um and it’s not like those g that game was ever close defensively. I I wonder if if Derek Stingley, like if you were a defensive coordinator, would you just say, “All right, Dererick Stingley’s on Jackson Smith and Jigba,” or are you going to mix and match a little bit more? I would do one of two things. I would because uh Jackson, if I’m not mistaken, earlier in the week, you told me he’s primarily outside now. Yeah. Difference from last year. So, I would either have Derek just follow him the whole game and take him out. Or I would have uh just the corner stay on that or have the second corner, which is Kamari, follow him around and have the safety kind of linger and pay attention over top. So, you’re kind of like doubling him, per se. And then I got my best corner on whoever their second best receiver is, right? So that’s kind of kind of the Bill Bich type of idea. Yeah. You’re not. Yeah. It’s like, okay, we’re gonna take our best guy and just let him do what he does and then we can take our our second best guy and just give him a little extra help and do that. I guess the one dynamic that um that that I think you’re going to like watching this game is that you Cooper Cup is there and Cooper Cup isn’t putting up spectacular numbers or anything, but then all of a sudden, and this is I think this is the way it happened in the Jacksonville game. All of a sudden there he in the second half, oh, he slept on Cooper Cup. There he goes, you know, and he’s doing all the little stuff right and all the veteran stuff in the slot, but you’ve got to still be worried about Cooper Cup’s, you know, I don’t know what his high water mark is or anything anymore, but like he’s just that that constant threat. The other guy that people have a lot of questions about just because I get probably two questions a week on Christian Harris. Uh this is Demo on Christian Harris last week. get get yourself ready to absorb this update. For our inactives, it’ll be different guys are inactive every week as you guys see. You know, it’s just kind of flow for how that week is going and what we see is best for us to win the game that particular week. So, it’ll be it’ll change every given week. So, nothing against Christian. Yeah. So, he was asked specifically about Christian Harris being inactive in the Ravens game. And that was the answer he gave. Basically gave a blanket statement. He’s played he’s only played about 30 to 40 snaps on defense this year. And his name came up this week because people floated him as a potential uh somebody that the 49ers might want to trade for. He’s just I I went back and I watched all of his plays this morning. He’s just he’s physically not the same guy he used to be. Whatever whatever his calf injury was. Yeah. He’s just uh you know because he barely practiced during training camp and then when he’s been out there it’s it’s really clear when he’s standing next to Aziz Alshshire or Henry Toato in the game you can see that those guys they just move better than him and it used to be the opposite. It used to be Christian Harris was the most exciting athlete out of those guys and you know especially compared to Toatoa and there’s just he’s just a different guy now. So it’s the that’s that’s unfortunate. Yeah, right. Yeah. Was out for I mean weeks on weeks on I mean it was months. It was it was training the first day of training camp uh last year in 2024. We were out there the first day of training camp and it was probably about like a half hour into practice. Everybody kind of just started asking like, “So, where’s uh anybody notice Christian Harris?” Because you know that first day of camp there’s like there’s there’s 80 guys out there and you don’t know who any of them are or anything and you’re just sorting through and like nobody could put eyes on Christian Harris and he ended up he tried to practice a little bit during camp. Didn’t end up playing for a long time. came in like twothirds of the way through the season and played a couple of games, but then they they pulled back a lot again and then he was wasn’t doing OTAAS, wasn’t doing much of training camp this year in 20125. They they worked him in towards the end of camp and I just I it’s one of these mystery injuries. It’s kind of like with Joe, it’s a a lesser version of Joe Mixon right now because we don’t even know where Joe Mixon is. But I don’t with Christian Harris, I just I don’t look at him right now as a guy that I’m expecting to see at full force anytime this season because I just don’t I don’t know what’s going on with his calf and how it’s affecting him. That’s just sad. I’ll never forget the playoff game versus Cleveland. That season was just amazing for him. All in the word. I’m like, he’s about to be a superstar. Like this kid is is something else. And then the calf game and it’s I’m interested because I’m like a calf usually isn’t that bad. takes time but isn’t that bad. He must have really ruptured or really took care of that thing. Maybe even I don’t know Achilles possibly something. It’s just doesn’t doesn’t sit well. I think sometimes there can be like blood flow issues or complic anything in the lower leg. The way I understand it, just from the issues I’ve had and the way it was explained to me is always that everything’s so compressed that everything just gets you you’ve got all these nerves and all these compartments of muscles and everything that just sometimes if there is a lingering issue and I I had it cuz I had an issue with a knee injury, but the my calf was like uh getting bleeding from it and everything. I got compartment syndrome where your calf just swells up and there’s not enough space for the muscle in your calf or all that fluid and it just it shuts everything down and sometimes it can create nervous nerve nerve issues and everything. So, I just I I think it just is probably it’s one of those things where I think we get frustrated because you don’t get clarity on it. And if the medical staff was to open up about it, I there’s I think there’s a good chance it would be it wouldn’t be any less frustrating because sometimes I and I think this is what sometimes people in the media don’t understand. Sometimes the medical staff just flat out doesn’t know. You know, it’s like it’s a medical mystery. We can’t figure this thing out or why it’s not recovering. But, and I have no inside information on it. I just know that it’s it’s taken a lot longer. the uh but yes, you can’t delete the memories of Christian Harris in the playoffs in 2024. Delete me can make it easy, quick, and safe to remove your personal data online. Sorry, I’m I’m taking a bad situation and turning it into profit here. Uh for but it’s look, they can make it safe to remove your personal data online at a time when surveillance and data breaches are common enough to make all of us vulnerable. There’s data brokers out there who profit off your data. Your data is a commodity. Anyone on the web can buy your private details. You don’t want that. It can lead to identity theft, fishing attempts, and harassments. Go to joindeleteme.com, use the offer code pro. So go to joindeme.com/pro. Use the promo code pro at checkout and you’ll get 20% off. So go to joindeme.com/pro. Enter that code pro at checkout. joined me.com/pro, offer code pro. Did you ever have any of those medical mystery injuries? Medical mystery? No. No. You had a very like Yeah. There were no Yeah. You just tore your knee apart completely and there was no mystery about it, right? Yeah. The only thing that was a mystery and I didn’t know at the time was I was like I think two centimeters or three centimeters away from having my leg amputated. That was the only thing that was uh kind of a mystery type thing. Trying to see where my arteries were. Like you mentioned all the Oh yeah. All the guess the arteries and something else they were looking at. Uh, but I had nothing nothing like But like if you’re if you had severed it like in a different way or whatever, like it could have ended up being that bad. It could have been, you know, I walked around with no knee or no leg on my right leg. So, nothing too crazy. How about you? That’s the other uh that’s the other mystery is just figuring out the metric system there. Like, give it to me straight, doc. How many inches is that? I was like, I don’t know what three centimeters is. Um, I had I tore I I I had a torn an ACL, which should have been a simple affair, in September of 2003. Okay. And like, you know, you tear your ACL in October and it’s kind of a blessing in disguise because you’re like, “Oh, I’ll be completely recovered by September.” And we ended up having all kinds of issues with it. I ended up having like four or five procedures afterwards and they couldn’t figure like this is where I I can speak from experience. They couldn’t figure out what was wrong with my knee. And ultimately they went in. I had used a cadaavver tendon for the graft. Cadaavver Achilles tendon for the graft. And they thought, “All right, maybe your body’s having some kind of an immune response to it.” So they plucked it out. But it ended up being like a three or four monthl long ordeal where I was hooked up to antibiotics the whole time. My leg had atrophied down to nothing. And it was I was in that same spot where I was worried that I might I might have to lose my leg. Um I didn’t know if I was ever going to play football again. So that was really I that’s the part where I get and I understand when sometimes the team plays it real close to the vest. It always makes me kind of wonder like all right there might be something really serious going on here because guys don’t want guys don’t want the player to have all their business out there if they don’t want it when they’re also maybe contemplating whether they’re even going to be be able to play football again which uh it’s not a great place to be. Yeah. Taking care of that guy makes sense. Yeah. the uh I don’t know if you’ve seen this Josh Simmons scenario at all and everything that’s going on. This uh offensive tackle, rookie offensive tackle for the Chiefs. This is what happened before the game on Sunday. There’s this report. The first one I saw from it was from James Palmer where basically Josh Simmons wasn’t going to be there, wasn’t going to play that day, and it was a surprise to the actual coaches on the team. Like everybody on game day was looking around saying like, “Wait, wait a second. Where’s Josh Simmons? What the hell’s going on here?” So, this is uh from from Bobby Barack Brick, I think, from Outkick. These are what we know about it. The Chiefs listed him as questionable hours before the game two weeks ago with illness. He ended up playing this past weekend. Mahomes showed up for the game and noticed his left tackle wasn’t there. A report came out that some coaches didn’t know where he was. Earlier that day, Simmons had deleted his Instagram. The Chiefs announced that Simmons would miss the game for personal reasons. Uh, SiriusXM initially said family reasons, but some reporters have since indicated that might not be the case. Andy Reid has said multiple times he won’t comment and doesn’t know when Simmons will return. And uh, Reed said the GM is now handling the matter, indicating the team is considering some kind of roster move. So, the guy’s just MIA. And now the latest report too was that he’s in California and he left at a time on Sunday that is extremely unusual. Uh like that’s that’s uh per per some of the reports out of here. So the guy the the kid just went missing and nobody knows where he is or didn’t know where he was. And I just I can’t I don’t know if I’ve ever seen a scenario quite like that. That’s crazy. Like he just disappeared. Just didn’t show up. Say I’m going to go. He didn’t say anything I guess. No this is Okay. So now this is where the Texans relevance is to it. When the Texans traded out of the first round, obviously needing an offensive tackle and people wondering if they’re going to draft an offensive tackle, there were two offensive tackles there. Josh Simmons was one of them. Um Josh Connorly was the other one. He ended up getting drafted by the Commanders. So, the Texans reportedly were trying to trade back up into the first round to take one of those two guys. I’m guessing that it was for Connorly because there were reports before the draft that some teams had just taken Josh Simmons completely off his board for character reasons or maturity concerns. And that’s where like cuz you’ve se seen this, you’ve been here. I don’t know what the potential family issue was or whatever with Josh Simmons, but there’s a way to handle those situations, you know, like like if you if you had a if you had somebody really close to you have some kind of a tragedy when you’re a player and it happens say the night before a game or the morning of a game, like there’s a way you handle that. Like if for one you tell the team and like and yeah and the other part of it is like man the guys who have the character concerns there sure do seem to be a lot of scenarios around them that aren’t technically their fault but it does seem to like there’s there there’s always something and I I just feel like regardless without being insensitive to Josh Simmons and what his personal issue might be right now like I I feel like all right sometimes you get agitated if the Texans are a little too careful with the character concerns or thing. This might be the classic scenario where you don’t burn a first round pick on a guy that’s got issues like that. No, they probably had some insight with uh CJ probably not too far removed from him and everything else. Yeah, that’s a tough one for CJ. That’s a uh that’s where sometimes sometimes you’re careful to ask guys about guys they played with because you’re like, I don’t want to put CJ in a situation where he has to I’ll give CJ a chance to stand up on a table for him. you know, I like you don’t ask specifically about him, but you might say like, “So, who are the guys you really like from this class and uh we’ll we’ll see biomission perhaps what he might think about it.” So, uh the the Texans the overunder again on this game is again a low one at FanDuel. It’s at 40 and a half. I I prefer to think that that’s a a mark of respect for the Texans defense more so than questions about their offense. But again, great way of looking at it. Yeah, that’s a great positive optimistic way of looking at it. instead, hey, nobody’s going to score with Texans not going to score, but they are going to slow some guys down. Yeah, if it works out well for the Texans again after the game, I will say I knew it all along. I just the disrespect they showed our offense unconscionable. We’ll we’ll uh we’ll get that version of me or the absolute opposite version me of me on Monday. Thanks to FanDuel for sponsoring. If you’re listening on Apple, please leave a fivestar review and some kind comments. If you’re on YouTube, like, subscribe, and Cecil and I will catch up with you next week.

The Houston Texans face a Seahawks team that might provide the perfect opportunity to figure out if these improvements in the Texans offense are for real. Former Houston Texans players Cecil Shorts and Seth Payne discuss how Houston’s offensive line will be tested by a physical Seahawks defensive line and C.J. Stroud will be challenged by a secondary that is very good at disguising their coverages.

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