- 6 months ago
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00:00So the Texans offseason. I think they've had a good offseason so far. Seth Walder of ESPN.com
00:06put together his NFL offseason grades. I'd love to know what Nick Casario thinks of these. He's
00:11such a big advocate of report cards before any of the players involved have done a single thing
00:15for the team. It's funny. One of my, I don't, yeah, I'm not on TikTok very much, but I have
00:20one little cut up of Nick Casario from two years ago talking about how stupid draft grades are.
00:26And it continually just, I get notifications that there's comments on it and everything.
00:32So now people see it and they still think that it's like, they think it's from this year's
00:36draft. And it's, yeah, he's not, that's how angry, that's how indignant he is in this clip
00:44about how much, how stupid draft grades are. This article probably triggered that video back
00:50to the surface again, I would imagine on TikTok. Because it's, it's a, it's a, you know, one
00:55of the leads on ESPN. It's one of their most trafficked articles of the last 24 hours.
00:59What would you give before we get to the Texans grade, Seth from Seth Walder, what would you
01:03give the Texans if you were a professor giving out a report, giving out report cards to all
01:07the kids in class here? I would, I would write a preface to this article saying, look, I agree
01:12with Casario. The problem with any kind of offseason grades or draft grades or whatever immediately
01:17afterwards is you just flat out don't know. Yeah. So many moves that look stupid end up being
01:22brilliant and vice versa. But I, I would have preferred that they were more aggressive in
01:27addressing the offensive, keeping the B region for me. Yeah. Saying I might, obviously we could
01:33be four weeks into the season and it'll look like they got, they should have gotten an A for that
01:37because the O-line is playing well or vice versa. But I would, I would probably give them a B plus.
01:41I liked a lot of what they did. I just, my, my personal preference was, I wish they would have
01:46been like the Bears or the Vikings who were really aggressive in getting the higher caliber
01:51for you. That's the last, the last part, the last part is what you touched on there. Cause I think
01:54if you, if you just left it, I would hope they were aggressive on the offensive line and addressing
01:58it. My response, if I were Casario beat, we were pretty aggressive in addressing it. We got rid of
02:03three fifths of our starting offensive line. Right. Right. Yeah. They did. Yeah. They drafted,
02:08they traded up to draft the guy in the second round, but then the free agency signings were a lot
02:12of guys that are like, okay, good, solid NFL player, but I'm not. Yeah. But your definition of
02:16aggressive, I think is what everybody else's is, which is aggressive. And you feel like it's much
02:21improved with the bears are a great example of that. I think you just touched on them. The bears
02:25had just as bad an offensive line last year as the Texans did. Nobody got the only person that got hit
02:30more than CJ Stroud, a quarterback was Caleb Williams. Now, some of that is on Caleb Williams for
02:36extending plays and so forth, but they went out and got Joe Tooney. They went out and signed Dolman from
02:41Atlanta, the center. Who's like a top five PFF guy. Um, they signed, they traded for Jonah Jackson,
02:46who's kind of a distressed asset, uh, with the Rams. So they, they, they were aggressive in not only
02:51tearing it down, but building it up with what feels like much higher level talent.
02:55They were, you know what they did? It's kind of like what I did with my mustache.
03:00I, I, they were kind of disgusted with themselves. So he said, let's screw it. I'm going to,
03:04I'm going to shave it off. Yeah. I'm going to shave off the mustache.
03:07That's what they did. Trade away, uh, trade away, uh, two guards and, or in, well, trade away one
03:14guard, cut another guard and we're going to, we're going to grow a new mustache. They just, uh,
03:19they're, they're kind of slow to grow facial hair right now. They're kind of like the 15 year old
03:24kid standing outside the convenience store asking, asking bums to buy him beer. You know, like it's
03:30just, they're in that moment of the rebuild. That's right. That's right. Um, Walder gives them
03:35a B plus. So you, and I'm, and that's, that's, that's about where I would put it. And I, and
03:40when I was looking at this article yesterday, I said, it feels about right. You know, that
03:42feels, that feels about right. He has biggest move, move. I liked move. I disliked biggest
03:49move trading away, Laramie Tunsil. And I think that's undeniable. That was the biggest move
03:53that they made this off season says offensive line play sunk the Texans offense last season.
04:00I agree with that as well. So naturally, so naturally they dealt their best offensive lineman
04:04away sarcastically. He says it's a move. I struggled to assess at the time and still
04:09do given its unorthodox nature as wild as it seems. I didn't hate it because the return
04:15was strong, a third round pick, a seventh, a future second, and they swapped fourths.
04:20Houston must've believed the hall was worth more than Tunsil. Perhaps they were worried
04:24he'd want a new contract soon. I think that's probably a concern as well. Who's still a great
04:28pass blocker, but isn't on the same level in the run game. What a Seth, what would we be
04:33saying if Bill O'Brien was the one who made the Laramie Tunsil trade?
04:37Uh, that, okay. That's a, that's a great question because we got to be honest with
04:41ourselves. Yeah. All right. The difference between the Laramie Tunsil trade and
04:47the between Laramie Tunsil trade and DeAndre Hopkins trade. One is that people very much
04:54approved of DeAndre Hopkins. Texans fans very much liked DeAndre Hopkins and was looked at him
04:59as one of the strengths on a team. Um, two was the return that they got for DeAndre Hopkins,
05:06which was universally panned as a ridiculously bad deal. So with Laramie Tunsil, the feeling is
05:14different. If Bill O'Brien had done it, I think people still, people would have been questioning it,
05:19but I think in a lot of ways, that's like, be honest with yourself too, about how you might've
05:23felt about Bill O'Brien at the time. It wasn't necessarily the same level of vitriol as when
05:27everything fell apart. Um, that Laramie Tunsil wasn't as popular as DeAndre Hopkins, not as
05:34good a player at the time. Very, very good player. Don't get me wrong. Uh, but then also Laramie Tunsil
05:39got what all the capologists and everything say is a good return in trade. So it was a, it was a fair
05:46and balanced trade. The value the Texans got back was about what most of the cap people I saw said,
05:52yeah, that makes sense. They didn't say that the commanders worked one over on the Texans or that
05:56the Texans screwed the commanders. They're like, ah, that seems like adequate compensation.
05:59Yeah. And I guess I'm in, and, and I'm thinking too, it's, it's a, it's a complex question because
06:04I, this trade, I don't know if I've ever seen a trade that was made that was so like, you look at it,
06:12it is a bit of a side-eye trade team that has the worst offensive line in football trades their
06:17best offensive lineman team that has the hardest time protecting its quarterback trades away a
06:22premier pass protector. And yet the approval rates, unlike the Hopkins trade, this trade within Houston
06:30were through the Texan fans, 80 to 90% when we polled them on Twitter said, we like this trade of
06:38getting rid of Tunsil because they, like you and I and everybody else here, they watched snap to snap
06:42and they followed the team all week long and they know he never practiced and they know that he
06:46probably shouldn't have been a captain and all those things. Well, no, and then he led the league in
06:49penalties. And that too, yes. And a lot of those penalties come at inopportune times or took you out of
06:53scoring position and all those things. No doubt, no doubt, no doubt. And yet, yet I think there was an element
06:58outside of Houston that looked at this trade a little Hopkins-ish, you know, like Walder touches on it
07:05there. Offensive line play sunk the Texans last season. So naturally they dealt their best lineman
07:10away. I think outside of Houston, if it was O'Brien making the deal, they would have been like,
07:14Oh my God. I think, I think Casario has enough goodwill banked obviously here in Houston and
07:19outside of Houston where people, certainly people in Houston are willing to see how this looks.
07:24They approved of the trade, but I think even people outside of Houston, like Walder says,
07:28I struggled to assess it at the time and still do as wild as it seems though. I didn't hate it.
07:32The return was strong, you know? Yeah. And this is where, if you find yourself, because there's
07:36still these, there's still these people that, that including in the media, that feel like they need
07:41to stick up for Laramie Tunsil or something. And this is, if you find yourself in a conversation with
07:46somebody who says, yep, he's the best, he's one of the best pass protectors in the league. This is
07:50what you need to tell those people because, because you know what I'll always say is all those
07:54people love to point out his pro football focus, uh, pass protection grade. Yeah. And look at it.
08:00It's one of the top four. And I always say, well, why don't you show his other pro football focus
08:04grades? Yes. Cause pro football focus has him as the 21st or 22nd Bethel in football last year,
08:10not a top five. Right. And they'll say, well, pro football focus in their grading factors in
08:17penalties way too much. All right. Okay. If that's how you feel, if you think that's overly weighted,
08:22here's the problem with that. Hey, Laramie Tunsil is an incredible pass protector. Don't you know?
08:27Okay. Well, those guys like, like Trent Williams typically have fewer than five, uh, false starts
08:36in a year or pre-stop penalties in a year. Often a lot of times zero, one or two, all those guys. Yeah.
08:43So what you have to realize is Laramie Tunsil gets these, gets these great pass protection grades
08:48because he's kind of cheating partly. Yes, he is real. I love watching him. He's a, he's an artist,
08:54but he's also by damaging the team in these consistent pre-snap penalties. He's, he's cheating
09:01the grade system a little bit. It's almost like if you're like, wow, that guy's a straight A
09:06student. You're like, well, yeah, but he was also, you know, he was also copying off the guy next to
09:11him, but yeah, but he's a great, a straight A student. Like, no, he's getting a jump on the snap
09:16count and he doesn't give a single damn if it hurts the team or, and this is most critically,
09:22all right, it's third and four. Laramie has a false start. Really no big deal for Laramie because
09:28he's going to, he's going to be good in pass protection on the next down no matter what.
09:31Yeah.
09:32It really, really, really screws your struggling guard, your struggling center,
09:37your struggling right guard. When all of a sudden you take a third and four, which is a,
09:42it could be either or could be run, could be pass quarterback. Wouldn't have to, you can,
09:46you can hit something quick and get the first sudden a third nine. And there's that much more
09:52pressure on the interior offensive lineman to pass protect longer, to have defensive lineman
09:58that are in pass rush mode, all that stuff. So it's a double whammy on the rest of the team.
10:04And that's the kind of culture that you just can't have on a struggling offensive line. It was just,
10:09and it was infuriating to me to watch because it's just so selfish. It's so incredibly selfish.
10:15And if you bring up the pro football focus pass protection grades and don't bring up any of the
10:20other pro football focus grades, you're being a little bit fraudulent. I'm sorry, but you are
10:24more than a little bit fraudulent. More than a little bit. Um, that's a great breakdown. Um,
10:29move. I liked move. I disliked. We'll hit these quickly. This is Seth Walder's report card gave
10:33the Texans a B plus for their off season move. I liked trading down from 25 to 34 in the draft.
10:40So that's, that's, that's the move. He likes to just to contextualize it a little bit. That was
10:44when they, when the giants traded up to get Jackson dart and the Texans moved back to 34,
10:49picked up a couple of third round picks in the process and drafted Jaden Higgins,
10:54who they may or may not have had as the top guy, one of the top guys on their board at 25,
10:59they were still able to get him at 34. The thing I liked most about that was,
11:03and I think this entire draft was like that, the, that, that Casario has very much of a kind of a
11:12gangsta. We don't love them hoes type of attitude about draft prospects, you know, like, Hey,
11:18love them, leave them, you know, whatever. And, and just, uh, you don't, you don't fall in love with
11:25prospects to the point where you're like, Oh, Oh, God. Oh, it's a sweet spot. You kind of try to
11:32stay detached emotionally as much as possible and, and match up with, okay, are we picking at a spot
11:39where it makes sense that we're drafting this guy? Cause you know that by and large, if you let your
11:43heart rule things too much as a GM, you're going to get destroyed in the longterm. So Bill O'Brien.
11:49Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You just can't be impetuous. Now it's not to say you can never fall in love,
11:55right? They were clearly in love with Will Anderson. Yes, but it's, you gotta be selective.
11:59You can't go out asking every girl you meet to marry you. You know, you're going to get screwed,
12:04buddy. Yep. Yep. Absolutely. Absolutely. A movie dislike. We'll hit this real quick.
12:11This, and this may be, this may be the, the indication that the Texans had a really good
12:16off season is that the movie dislike Seth Walder is trading for Ed Ingram. He traded a future sixth
12:23for a backup guard. And that's the movie disliked. Right. Yeah. And didn't he say something
12:28weird is going on with the ESPN on my computer? Didn't he say something like, Oh, maybe they just
12:32look at him as a guy that's going to be a backup or something like, yeah, they're probably, and they
12:37think with potential upside. And, but the, as of right now, the most likely scenario is that Titus
12:43Howard is going to play right guard. And I think a lot of people writing these articles and they're
12:46look, they're doing it for 32 teams. I don't expect them to know this. I think a lot of people
12:50writing these articles just don't realize that Titus Howard is probably going to be a guard this year.
12:54You may be right about that. Yeah. You may be right. Yeah. Real quick. He says this. I did
12:58not like the Ingram trade. The Texans surrendered a future six round pick for the former Viking
13:02who was benched last season. If Ingram ends up being only a depth player, giving up a six
13:07round pick and paying him and he's this year will be a steep price. Okay. I mean, this isn't
13:14a team that's dealing with the salaries. Right. Right. And it's not like the Texans and it's not
13:19like the Texans right now, Seth are a team that's having to cut guys to make cap, you
13:24know, like it's, I mean, they're up against it a little bit, but this, yeah, I, I, you
13:28had to kind of, I look at is he had to kind of dig to find something here that they did
13:32where you're like, no, that's a really bad move that they made. Right. Yeah. That's a
13:35good point. And he's not crushing them for it. He's just giving them a, he had, if he had
13:38to, he had to pick a worse move and that's the move that he had to pick then. Yeah.
13:43Good off season. That's pretty good. Yeah. That's good.
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