- 12 minutes ago
Seth assesses Sean's hot takes formulated almost solely based on the Pro Football Focus grades of the Texans' most intriguing players.
Category
🥇
SportsTranscript
00:00I went to the old pro football focus yesterday, Seth, for the Houston Texans, just the final
00:05grades. I'm like, hey, you know what? I like seeing where guys ended up in the rankings
00:09at their position. I know it's not always accurate. It seems to be on the margin sometimes.
00:14You're like the really, really good ones. You watch and you go, oh yeah, that guy played really
00:18good. And the really poor ones, the really poor ones tend to line up. And then there's all this
00:23muck in the middle, like 75% where it's, you can, I can be like, Hey, Woody marks 46 out
00:29of 59 running backs. I don't know. I thought he felt like he played better than that.
00:33Yeah. Yeah. I don't know. It's in any given when you watch Monday or Sunday night football
00:38is the worst. Cause they, cause Chris Collinsworth owns PFF. So they put up all the grades and
00:44it's hilarious because half the time he's gushing about how this guy's one of the best players
00:48in the league. And I'm like, I just saw his PFF company, the company that you own says the guy
00:54is mid he's 86 out of 89 in his position. What is, what is Chris Collinsworth known for on those
01:01broadcasts gushing about Pat Mahomes? Oh yeah. Pat Mahomes 16th ranked quarterback on PFF. That's
01:07what it said as he was gushing. What are you doing, man? This is your own company. This is like
01:13going on as a, as a chairman of a, of an automobile company and gushing about how vehicle is great
01:22or something. It doesn't make any sense. Yep. Um, all right. So I went through the Texans
01:26grades yesterday. There's a lot of interesting ones. I narrowed it down to five that I now
01:31have hot takes on based totally on their PFF scores. The first one, Will Anderson Jr.
01:39is the best defensive player on the planet. Well, that's just data, Sean. It's hard and fast.
01:45It's I can see it right there. There's a number attached to it. Gots to be correct. He is the,
01:50not only first among edge rushers, he has the highest score of any defensive player in football.
01:56Does that match the eye test? I think, uh, I don't know if it matches the eye test a hundred percent.
02:01I would put them in the top five, but it's also when it comes to the grades and everything you,
02:06you, you, like, you have to accept also that he does, he's playing opposite of Daniel Hunter.
02:10So like that helps a lot. And it's, I, I feel the dirty saying this because I know people are
02:16going to hear it the wrong way or something. It doesn't take anything away from how good he is.
02:20It's just also, that's also a great situation to be in. He's in the perfect situation right now.
02:25Um, at the time, you know, sometime in the future when he doesn't have a Daniel Hunter because
02:29Daniel Hunter retires, what you hope is that that's when, I mean, the most famous example of this
02:35is when Bryce pop one defensive player of the year as he's playing opposite of Bruce Smith.
02:40Yeah. So Bruce Smith was still way better than Bryce pop was, but Bryce pop wasn't getting all
02:46the double teams and everything. Got all the sacks. Bryce pop ended up getting 17 sacks or something
02:50in a 16 game season. So I could totally see that scenario sometime in the future where Will Anderson
02:57is the best edge on the team, but there's some guy, some gets a player of the year because,
03:03because Will is so good. Yeah. Yeah. Bryce pop. I'm looking it up right now. He was a teammate
03:07of yours in Jacksonville for a couple of years. Yeah. 17 and a half sacks in 1995.
03:12My favorite, my favorite story about Bryce pop is just kind of a, an illustration of how sometimes
03:18front offices don't operate as, as scientifically as you would like. They signed Bryce pop towards
03:25the end of his career to a nice contract and Bryce pop kids was, he's mostly the, you know,
03:30classic. They call him a linebacker, but he's just an edge rusher. Yeah. And I remember
03:34in the first mini camp, uh, he came back to the huddle and he said, he said, I don't know
03:39if, I hope they don't expect me to cover tight ends and I'm looking around. I'm like, I based
03:47on the last play call, I think they do. I feel like there might be an issue here. This period
03:58alone, they've asked you to cover a tight end three times. What the hell's going on?
04:02That's hilarious. Oh my God. All right. Hot take. He didn't win any defensive players. He did not. I'm
04:09looking at his numbers. The numbers went down in Jacksonville. Uh, hot take number two, according
04:14to PFF scores. CJ Stroud is barely a starting quarterback in the NFL. Yeah. He is 31st out
04:23of 38 qualifying quarterbacks. CJ's grade is a 65, which is mediocre. Davis mills. Great
04:29is a 64. You want to add any fuel to the should have brought in Davis crowd at halftime on Sunday.
04:36So he's way above Shadur Sanders. Yeah. Yeah. Way above Dylan Gabriel. Bad as he, as he was
04:44these last two games, I don't think he's 31st out of all the quarterbacks in the NFL. I'm going to
04:50look at some of the guys above him on the PFF scores where I could say emphatically, no, he's
04:54better than this guy. Well, like, I think he's better than Aaron Rogers was this year. Yes. I
04:58think he's better than Jackson dart was this year. Wow. Yes. Um, you know what? I'm going to be
05:03honest. I haven't watched enough of the saints and maybe I will in the off season a little bit.
05:07Uh, but I think he's better than Spencer Rattler and Marcus Mariota. So where's Tyler
05:12Shuck on there? Cause he's the one who was winning all those damn games at the end. Tyler
05:15Shuck was 19th. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I don't know. I'd still take CJ Stroud
05:20as my quarterback over Tyler Shuck. Part of it was CJ this year was, and this is what was
05:24so frustrating about the playoffs was CJ's numbers were CJ was doing a good job of understanding
05:33understanding that he has a really good defense on the other side of them and he was being
05:37conservative and they weren't trying to necessarily take the top off the offense. They were doing
05:42everything they could to make the offensive line, frankly, look better than they actually
05:46were getting rid of the ball quickly. Here's all these things that make for a less statistically
05:51dazzling quarterbacking performance. And I gave him a lot of credit for that. Cause I thought
05:55he grow, he grew, he matured, he did a lot of things. And then it just all evaporated in
06:00the playoffs. You had said heading into the playoffs that the version of CJ Stroud this
06:05season, even though it was statistically inferior to his rookie year was better equipped to have
06:10success in the post season than rookie CJ Stroud. A hundred percent. I believe that. Yes. Like
06:14the idiot that I am. I 100% believe that I could have that same take. And, but what I would
06:24have said is barring some weird meltdown by CJ Stroud, which is probably definitely going to
06:32happen. Uh, but barring that CJ is better equipped to handle the playoffs this year than he was in
06:38his rookie year. He's done all of these higher level quarterbacking things at a much better
06:43and he's done it and operated the offense more effectively like a veteran quarterback than he did
06:50his rookie year. I surely won't expect him to melt down, but if it, if he does melt down,
06:55things could go South for the Texans. And they did. And they did. Uh, all right. So, uh, hot takes
07:01based on pro football focus scores, will Anderson jr, the best defensive player in football. He was
07:06number one on PFF. That one's in the neighborhood at least. Oh yeah. A hundred percent. CJ Stroud is
07:10barely a starting quarterback. I think they're in a different zip code on that one. All right. Here's
07:15one for you, Seth. This is a hot one. Blake Fisher may be salvageable. Yeah. He finished 29th out of
07:2489 offensive tackles on pro football focus. This is a hard one because he spent the vast majority
07:29of his time, or at least the majority of games. I don't know how the snap counts laid out, but as
07:33the sixth offensive tackle and, uh, by like just by sheer numbers, you're going to have an easier go
07:39of it when there's six offensive linemen or the six offensive linemen, not the six offensive tackle.
07:44Right. Um, so I do think that he, I think he, he, he showed some growth. I think he's definitely
07:51salvageable. Um, and I think he got better along the way, maybe being able to take advantage of
07:56only having limited reps and what have you. So there's something there. He's a guy that far
08:02out of whack in terms of his technique and everything else last year and it during training camp this
08:08year that I want to give him time for Cole Popovich to take hold that especially for a longer
08:14lankier guy. You really got to be nailed down with your technique. He's not going to be a guy who's
08:18ever going to overpower anybody. So he's got to have his technique nailed. And I think Cole Popovich,
08:24if anybody can get it out of him, it'll be Cole Popovich.
08:27Blake Fisher becomes what they thought he could be as a second round pick a couple of years ago.
08:31That's a huge, that's a big deal. Cause Ariante Aresary is going to be your left tackle.
08:36If Blake Fisher can be your right tackle and you can put Titus Howard at left guard. There's so much.
08:40Yeah. I don't think that's, I'm not willing to go there yet. I think he's salvageable as like,
08:45I, as a viable swing tackle. I said, if yeah, like, like that would be huge. I'm not expecting
08:51it. It would be huge. Like Blake Fisher still hasn't shown to me any actual real man strength
08:55yet. You know, like when I got, when he, when he goes out there and even when he does well,
08:58I feel like he's a college kid just hanging on for dear life. Um, that no, sometimes guys develop
09:05that dad strength as they get to 25, 26 years old, but right now I just haven't seen it yet.
09:10Okay. So that, how hot is that take by me then that he may be salvageable?
09:13Well, maybe salvageable. It depends on, I look at it as salvageable as a viable NFL backup
09:18offensive tackle. Yeah. I think that's, I don't think that's all that hot of a take.
09:21All right. Here, here, here's one. Number four, based on PFF scores,
09:26Kamari Lasseter is actually a better cornerback overall than Derek Stingley jr. Right now.
09:31Uh, Mario is seventh out of 113 cornerbacks. Derek Stingley is 45th out of 113 cornerbacks.
09:41I think that there are different types of cornerbacks and teams are still really loathe
09:46to test and challenge Derek Stingley. Lasseter is fun because teams want to test him. And I don't
09:53think they give him enough credit for his ability to make plays on the ball. Even if he's otherwise
09:58beat, like he's so good at being beat by a half step, but he's got such a good knack for
10:04the timing of when the ball's going to arrive that it ends up being a broken up pass with
10:08regularity. Yeah. I think with Stingley, a couple of things happened this year. I think
10:12his oblique injuries, the really held him back. You know, we saw in the first half of the season,
10:18he just wasn't moving the same way he typically does. And then I think the other thing is that
10:22with PFF, they don't, there's kind of a glitch in, you get a lot of credit for going up and
10:28playing press man and just being like, Oh, yep, that's a hundred percent. Definitely just pure
10:32man coverage and everything. And we can, we can see that we can grade it when you do what the
10:36Texans do, which is you play off a lot and you're matching, you're turning zone into man. It ends up
10:42looking like players, receivers have more separation than they actually do. So I just don't think,
10:48I think the grading system, and I've heard a lot of people that know what they're talking about,
10:51say that the grading system for PFF seems to mesh it match up closest with how coaches look at
10:58things. When you look at the offensive line with defensive backs, it completely is unreliable
11:03because you just, you never know exactly unless you know, the actual game plan, you never know
11:09exactly what coverage and what coverage rules guys are playing by. And it's easy to think that
11:15a guy screwed up even with a learned eye that is that you just flat.
11:21That out don't know. When Robert Sala got to San Francisco and he got to sit down and talk to
11:27Kyle Shanahan about the way the Seahawks had operated defensively, Shanahan had gotten it wrong
11:36completely. Like he just, he didn't know, he really didn't know what coverage the Seahawks were in
11:41in certain scenarios. And like, and so if you're smarter than, if the Uber driver who's grading
11:48for PFF is smarter than Kyle Shanahan, that guy needs a career counselor. It's just, it's really,
11:54really hard to judge defensive back play. So is there any argument that Lasseter is actually
11:58better than Derek Stingley Jr.? No, I don't think you could argue that he's equal to Derek Stingley and
12:06that they're different types of cornerbacks. Um, and that's what's, it's kind of nice because
12:10you can do things with that. So that's a bit of a hot take right there. Uh, last one based on PFF
12:15scores, hot takes on the Texans based on PFF scores. Tommy Togiai is an elite interior defensive
12:22lineman. I, yes, I agree with this one. Ninth out of 120 interior defensive lineman graded on PFF.
12:29And you agree with this. I do when it comes to run defense. Yep. And then also his ability to push
12:34the pocket and stay in pass lanes and everything. I don't think he'll, there's a real good chance.
12:39He's never even makes a pro bowl, uh, because it's all about the pass rush these days and the
12:44defensive tackle, unless you're a nose tackle and a three, four defense, then you can, they still get
12:49some credit for just being big run stuffers. Um, I really, I, I, I love, I love the idea of having
12:56one of those three technique defensive linemen that can make the pro bowl. There's super athletic
13:03freak of nature playing next to Tommy Togiai. That's exactly the matchup you want. Um, or the,
13:09the pairing that you want. He's a hundred percent needs to be on that field and a big part of this
13:15team. I love the way he plays. Should they look, they did a great job in extending him early this
13:20season. They gave him, for those who don't know, they gave Tommy, they gave Tommy Togiai a one year,
13:25$3.3 million extension in the first two weeks of the season when he was inactive, he was a healthy
13:30scratch the first two weeks. And then for the rest of the season, he made it very obvious. He
13:35should never be a healthy scratch ever again. Should they approach him about maybe even tacking
13:40another year on with him? I don't think so. Cause I don't, I still don't think necessarily he's a
13:45guy that's going to, I mean, it'd be cool. They might do that. Um, I, his style of play is not
13:51one that gets super rewarded in the NFL anymore. So I think he's, he's one of those guys who can be
13:58really, really valuable to your defense, but you don't necessarily need to be pushing the envelope
14:02on how much you pay him. I'll give you a more advanced stats. Like the defensive tackle run,
14:07stop, win rate. Yeah. He was number one in the league by a really healthy margin. He was 4% above
14:13Quinn and Williams. Like he's just, he's my, my temptation when I saw Tommy Togiai the first time
14:19was okay, cool. He makes some nice plays, but really he's one of those guys that he's always
14:23where he's supposed to be. He understands where he fits in the defense. He's super strong and it's
14:27great for the linebackers to be able to play behind a guy like that because they can see everything a lot
14:32more clearly. Yeah. This year I, I, I realized I way underestimated how good he could be because
14:38he's not just that guy that's always in the right spot. He's also making impact plays while he's
14:44doing it. What, when you played the position, when something like this clicks to such an extreme
14:50degree, what is it? What is this? Cause he's a guy who's bounced around as a journeyman around the
14:54league. It's because he doesn't have measurables that flash and people are looking at, it's weird
15:00because the defensive tackle, it's, there's a huge value in having guys that are, are strong
15:07and are in the spot they need to be, et cetera, et cetera. Like there's a huge value in that,
15:13especially if you're trying to cost control your football team. Yes. But everybody's looking at it
15:17through a lens of, okay, I'm going to compare this guy to Quinn and Williams or any of the other guys
15:23who are more, you know, multi-dimensional players. Sure. And he doesn't measure up to those guys in
15:28the super elite status, but they end up undervaluing the guy who's more blue collar and does the blue
15:35collar stuff way better than the 350 pound run stuffers or things like that. And I think the
15:40Texans and D'Amico Ryans, especially as a, as a linebacker himself, probably really appreciates
15:45exactly how much easier Tommy Togiai makes the job for his linebackers.
Comments