- 6 months ago
Seth and Sean react to and assess what Ben Solak had to say as far as the reasons he's very optimistic about the Texans next season.
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00:00I've not listened to this Ben Solak yet, Seth.
00:02I'm excited to hear what he had to say.
00:04This was Ben Solak on Up and Adams with Kay Adams.
00:08Who, by the way, I kept seeing all these references.
00:11People turning against Kay Adams on social media this week.
00:15I don't know.
00:16I think there was a, it sounded like, from what I could tell, she had an awkward interview with Cooper
00:20DeGene.
00:21Oh, she did. I saw that.
00:23Was that what it was? Did she ask about one of his dead relatives or something?
00:26No, no, no. She asked about his relation, his, his rumored relationship with Nikki Bella.
00:31Oh, the wrestler?
00:33Yes.
00:34Oh, really?
00:35Yes. He is rumored to be dating Nikki Bella.
00:37That's been a heavy rumor for a couple of months now.
00:40She's been wearing Eagles gear.
00:42She's been, she's been like much more open about the possibility of it existing than he has.
00:47Okay.
00:48So she pressed him on it a little bit and he was incredibly awkward and closed off about it.
00:55And, man, if I was dating Nikki Bella, I'd be shouting from the rooftops.
00:59Now, the big thing about this relationship, Seth, is it's sort of a reverse Belichick, reverse craft thing going on.
01:07She's 42 years old. He's 22 years old.
01:10Okay. So that's more like Tom Brady and his girlfriend.
01:13As far as the quantitative.
01:14Alleged girlfriend.
01:15Yeah, yeah.
01:16Because he's 48 and she's 25 or something.
01:18That's a better analogy. Yes.
01:19So it's reverse where she's a, she's a cougar.
01:23She's a cougar.
01:24Yep.
01:24Going after a young stud.
01:26How old is he?
01:27He's 22.
01:28So there's a 20 year age difference there.
01:30Yeah.
01:30Good for him.
01:31Yep.
01:32It's not like, I mean, like she's modern 42.
01:34Oh yeah.
01:35Yeah.
01:35Back in our day, kids, a 42 year old woman usually, um, had like deep, like it looks like,
01:43it looked like she'd been smoking three packs a day her entire life.
01:46Cause most of them had had never done a day of cardio, right?
01:50Uh, if anything, she might've retained her, her really super flat eighties, but that was
01:55all the rage back then.
01:56Yeah.
01:57But, uh, it wasn't the same as 42 year old women today.
02:00No, it's certainly not the same as Nikki Bella, that 42 year old.
02:04Yeah.
02:04Yeah.
02:05So, but so Kay Adams is getting some heat over that, huh?
02:08I probably, yeah, I guess so.
02:10I don't know.
02:10I just kept seeing, it was one of those things where you see that something is trending, but
02:14you can't figure out why it's trending.
02:16Yeah.
02:16And all I kept seeing was people talk about how it sounds like people have had enough
02:21with her flirtatious style and then maybe dipping into a lot of non football type stuff.
02:27Yeah.
02:27So that, uh, I don't know.
02:29And I'm sure if there's one thing I know about social media and influencers, it's that,
02:34oh no, all of this negative attention is really going to hurt her.
02:38Yeah.
02:38Right.
02:38It probably helped her bottom line to an extreme degree.
02:40I just know we play a lot of audio from her interviews that she does.
02:43So I, I, I respect what she, I respect what she does.
02:46The only thing she did recently.
02:47Yeah.
02:48And we'll get to Ben Solak here.
02:49I promise.
02:50The only thing she did recently from the audio we played when she was interviewing, um,
02:54Emmitt Smith last week about, um, about Shadur.
02:59She, he, she asked Emmitt Smith, should Shadur be handed the starting job?
03:03And Emmitt's like, yeah, you know, you look at all these other quarterbacks and he lists
03:07off all these quarterbacks got drafted in the top five where they gave him the keys
03:11immediately because they got drafted in the top five.
03:13And she goes, Ooh, that gave me goosebumps.
03:15Right.
03:15And some of them hadn't been given the keys immediately either.
03:18That was the other part of it too.
03:19It was a, he was completely agreeing that it should do as a fifth round pick for whatever
03:23reason.
03:24It's just, it's different.
03:25Um, so, uh, yeah.
03:27So she was asking Ben Solak, not about his girlfriend, but about the landscape of
03:33Ben Solak dating Nikki Bella would be definitely something to talk.
03:36She would break that little dude in half.
03:39This is, yes, she is.
03:42Ben Solak.
03:42Oh my God.
03:44In two.
03:46Um, go ahead.
03:46Ben Solak.
03:47This is Ben Solak.
03:48Uh, very bullish on the Texans.
03:50The entire defense is going to be back.
03:52Uh, and they obviously had some, they were quite healthy this year and you always worry
03:54about the health, but that defense was one of the three lead defenses, right?
03:57Denver, Seattle, and then Houston.
03:59And then offensively, that was an unbelievably young offense, right?
04:02You have a rookie running back in Woody Marks.
04:04You have rookie young receivers in Jaden Higgins and in Jalen Knoll.
04:06You have no tank down for the entirety of the season.
04:08You have a rookie starting left tackle.
04:10They had the offensive line and they were shuffling the offensive line over the course
04:12of the year trying to figure out the best groups.
04:14They had multiple free agent ads, right?
04:15You have Cesar Stroud who's still a young quarterback.
04:17You had Nick Caley who was a first year OC.
04:18And over the course of the back half of the regular season, they were figuring stuff
04:22out and they were getting a little better.
04:23Running game was improving.
04:24Jaden Higgins was taking steps forward.
04:26They obviously got deleted by the Patriots in the snow.
04:29Bad game.
04:29It leaves a sour taste in your mouth.
04:31But in general, that offense was never going to be in its final form after one season.
04:35And I think that you're going to see some more investment in the offensive line this
04:38offseason.
04:39I think you're going to see a much better, more polished and controlled CJ Stroud over
04:42the course of next year.
04:43That plus just this defense, right?
04:45That defense is going to auto print you eight wins, nine wins.
04:48All right.
04:49Real quick.
04:49Can I just give Ben Solak one piece of advice?
04:52Slow down.
04:53No.
04:54I love it.
04:55You do?
04:55Yeah, you know that I was in my podcast at 2x speed.
04:59Oh, my God.
05:01I was honestly really impressed with him reeling all of that off because I watched it again
05:05to see if he was referencing his notes or anything.
05:09And I don't think he was.
05:10Looked off to the side a couple times.
05:11But by and large, he was reeling off all the names and all of those different factors just
05:16off the top of his head.
05:17So he's passionate about this opinion.
05:19He's been pretty passionate.
05:20He's speaking from the heart.
05:21Well, I think he's been a Texans fan since back in training camp.
05:24I talked to him at training camp in West Virginia there for a little bit.
05:27And he was actually, he was kind of giving some, I was voicing my concerns and he was
05:32giving some counterpoints to my concern.
05:36And he was right about some of them, wrong about others, which no big deal.
05:39Like everybody is.
05:41But the part there where I listened, you know, and I would object to, you know, throwing Jalen
05:47Nolan there as a rookie because, yes, he was a rookie, but he also wasn't a huge part
05:51of the offense.
05:52Christian Kirk was supposed to be a part of the offense and he wasn't.
05:57So Jalen Noel does have to get better, you know, because Christian Kirk likely isn't going
06:02to be back.
06:02But Jaden Higgins did come along as the season went along.
06:05The fact that you were relying at the end of the season on three rookies to be big parts
06:11of your offense.
06:11Jaden Higgins, especially without Nico Collins in that final game.
06:16Ariante Urshry, Woody Marks.
06:18I think, I feel bullish about all three of those guys.
06:21Those guys, especially, if you think about Ariante Urshry early last season, where he
06:26started off the season playing right tackle and then got to play his natural position at
06:32left tackle.
06:34His first or his second game was against Josh Heinz Allen.
06:39His second game at left tackle was week three against Rags.
06:43So he got a lot better as the year went along.
06:45Woody Marks, Woody Marks is the big one.
06:48If I'm going to break this thing into like things I feel confident about, things I'm shaky
06:53on, and things that terrify me.
06:55I think echoing what Ben Solek said, I think that defense is going to be a top five defense
07:00as long as they stay healthy.
07:02They were very healthy this year.
07:03But as long as they stay healthy.
07:05And then I think Woody Marks, I'm really confident that Woody Marks is at the very least a very
07:11good complementary piece of your rushing attack if they pair him with more of an all-purpose
07:17type of back.
07:17Yeah.
07:18You know, I think because they really didn't get to use Woody Marks as a receiver all that
07:22much in the second half of the season as he was learning how to be the main running back.
07:27And he's still got some improving to do in terms of just running in an NFL scheme and
07:33reading defenses and all of that.
07:35I just don't want to see him getting consistently 20 carries per game.
07:39I don't think that's how he's best used.
07:40Yeah.
07:40That's the first thing that jumped out at me about what Solek said right there was he,
07:46maybe I'm just reading too much into what he said.
07:49It almost felt like he was referring to Woody Marks as their lead back moving forward.
07:55Yeah.
07:55And I don't think that can be the case.
07:57I think Woody Marks did a nice job this year for the role that he was handed.
08:01I'm guessing if we were to give him truth serum, he would not have expected that he was going
08:06to get nearly the workload that he got throughout the second half of the season.
08:11And I think he did fine with it.
08:13I don't know that he holds up over 17 games.
08:15I mean, he came out of a lot.
08:17It was almost like a weekly thing, Seth, that Woody Marks would come out of the game for
08:21a few minutes with some sort of injury.
08:23Right, right.
08:24I'd much rather see him in space more often and a rhythm changer as a running back.
08:30But definitely, how many, let's see, he ended up with 24 receptions.
08:35I'd love to see him get 40 receptions a year.
08:37If you gave me that number before the season, if you had said 20, you know, 24 receptions
08:43for Woody Marks coming into the season, I would have taken the over.
08:47I would have guessed he'd have caught more balls.
08:49Yeah.
08:50Because that's why they drafted him.
08:51I would not have guessed.
08:52I would have probably taken, you know, I probably would have taken the under on whatever the carries
08:57were that he ended up with this year.
08:59You know, he had way more carries than I thought he would have.
09:01And he did an admirable job for the situation they were in.
09:04But he ends up averaging 3.6 yards per attempt as a runner on the year.
09:08You know, that's not rookie of the year style running or anything.
09:12And he'll get, I'm not saying that's his ceiling.
09:14He can get better.
09:15But they just need to find somebody other than Daria Gumbawale or whomever else to be the
09:22complimentary back there.
09:23Solak is about as optimistic, I'll call it, on the Texans being able to fix their O-line
09:31issues and CJ Stroud being able to fix whatever his issues are as any of the national people
09:36that I've listened to.
09:36I think that's the thing, too, is it's accurate what he said about the O-line stabilizing in
09:42the second half of the season, but you still see how dicey a proposition it was when Trent
09:47Brown, who's 33 years old, or is he 32, whatever he is, he's in his 30s, and he's had injuries
09:55in his career, he's had inconsistencies in his career, he's not available to you the final
09:59game of the season.
10:00You've got to move Titus Howard back out to right tackle, and you're back into that same
10:03old mess of, man, when they face physically dominant defensive tackles and interior defensive
10:09linemen, they really, really struggled last year.
10:12And that's something that, I don't know if just being in the system for one more year
10:16is going to all of a sudden make a difference for Jake Andrews, Drew Scruggs, and Jarrett
10:22Patterson, not to mention the, you know, Laken Tomlinson wasn't even played in the second
10:28half of the season.
10:30Ed Ingram may or may not come back.
10:32I'd love to see him back.
10:33I think he can be part of a really good interior offensive line, but you've got to shore that
10:37up.
10:38So that's where I'm shaky on that, the improved O-line.
10:41I don't think it's as much of a slam dunk that, oh yeah, they went from horrendous to
10:46okay.
10:47And then if we chart the graph upwards next year, they're going to be one of the best
10:50offensive lines in the league.
10:52Yeah.
10:52No, I'm, I'm with you on that.
10:53The, the part where he's just, he really just kind of just throws in at the end, like,
10:58I think CJ is going to be fine.
10:59I'm like, wait, wait, wait.
11:00Yeah.
11:00That's the thing that still terrifies me right now is that CJ as a passer after his concussion
11:07was still operating.
11:08Like he was doing some good things as a passer.
11:10I mean, he had, and he had some moments, even in games where he didn't look great for the
11:15first three quarters or statistically, the biggest thing that you want to see, or at
11:19least, at least you can point to is man, the clutch moments he had in fourth quarters to
11:24win games at times, the chiefs, especially like that.
11:28That, you can't take that away from where CJ's ceiling is.
11:33He does, he has the ability to really make some great plays in clutch moments.
11:38The fact that he just ran so sparely or so minimally after his concussion.
11:45And, and then the fact that in both the Steelers game and the Patriots game, he just did not look
11:53comfortable when pressured in the pocket.
11:55And some of the pressing, some of the turnovers that he made in both those games were like,
12:01like Ross Tucker said yesterday, uh, every, every turnover tells its own story that the,
12:07the story of those interceptions and those fumbles in the Steelers game and in the Patriots
12:12game, those were ugly turnovers at times.
12:14And if it's related at all to the concussion, that's what makes me nervous when he comes back
12:20and he's now had two concussions in his career.
12:22Yep.
12:23He had the first one.
12:23He came back from it.
12:24He had, you know, turned into a guy that ran more liberally the next season, but now this
12:29is a second concussion.
12:30It seems to have gotten into his head, pardon the pun.
12:33Um, and is, is that something that has lingering effects next September?
12:37Yep.
12:38Um, a couple other things from that Solak audio that we played just to circle back to the defense.
12:43I was just doing the chicken scratch numbers here on the, um, on a piece of paper with,
12:48with respect to the defense.
12:50And we're all saying this, this is going to be a top five defense again next year.
12:54And, and if all these guys are healthy, you pointed that out.
12:58If healthy, they should be, they're bringing everybody back.
13:00There's no, the, the only, the, probably the highest free agent they've got among the players
13:06that matter for this team on defense is Sheldon Rankins, who's probably their ninth best defensive
13:12player, you know, 10, you know, because to me, there's a big seven on this team.
13:17I'd even throw a big eight.
13:19If you want to throw a togei in there, but the, the seven, I'll call them who are all
13:24guys that were either at the pro bowl or people felt like should have been at the pro bowl.
13:29Jalen Petrie and Daniel Hunter, both not at the pro bowl, but played at a pro bowl level.
13:34And then the five guys who were there, Willie Anderson, Jr., Kamari Lasseter, Derek Stingley,
13:39Jr., Kalen Bullock, Aziz Alshair.
13:41I think those are the seven most important players on defense for the Houston Texans.
13:45They missed a combined total last season.
13:51Those seven players missed a combined total of five games.
13:56Petrie missed three with a concussion.
13:58When CJ was out with a concussion, they were concussion brothers for three weeks.
14:03Kamari Lasseter sat out week 18.
14:06And then Aziz Alshair missed the game against the Raiders, I believe it was, with a knee injury.
14:15That's it.
14:16Those are the five games that were missed by, they're not going to, they, I can, I feel
14:21like I can say almost factually, they're not going to get that kind of injury luck next
14:24year.
14:25Right.
14:25You gotta, you gotta plan for, or be ready for worse injury luck than that.
14:29They're very, I don't know, lucky or they're good at not getting injured, whatever it might
14:33be.
14:33I would love to see, uh, maybe, maybe all of them come back wearing guardian caps this year
14:38after Jalen Petrie had such success.
14:40That's what I wouldn't, dude, one of the best hits of the decade was delivered by a guy
14:43wearing a guardian cap.
14:45All right.
14:46Does that add to the visual for you of that hit on Rasheed Rice at all?
14:49It does.
14:50Him wearing the guardian cap.
14:51Dude, you got, you let that guy in a guardian cap do that to you?
14:55That's not what I meant.
14:56I just thought.
14:56There's a little bit of, uh, you know, the guardian cap, it's going to be kind of like
14:59seatbelts.
15:00Back in the day, kids, uh, lots of people didn't wear their seatbelts.
15:04I'll tell you that majority of people didn't wear their seatbelts, especially men, uh,
15:08like my dad who insisted that a, you wanted to be sure that if you were in an accident,
15:13you'd be thrown clear instead of trapped by your seatbelt in a potentially watery grave.
15:23That's, that's happened before we're so like one out of every 2 million accidents, it happens
15:28like the guy was actually lucky.
15:29He wasn't wearing a seatbelt.
15:30He got thrown from this fiery vehicle.
15:32You know what happens when you get thrown clear is you got to remember the car is following
15:36the same path that you are.
15:38Oh, that's true.
15:39Hey, I'm thrown clear.
15:40Oh no, I'm getting landed on by the car.
15:45That's true.
15:45Or, or your head is lopped off as your body gets thrown clear.
15:49Yeah, that's true.
15:50Yeah, my dad was adamant.
15:52He was so pissed off about the, uh, the fact that they were making it mandatory.
15:56So I think that, yeah, much like the seatbelt over time, uh, people stop looking at it
16:00as a, you know, not a manly enough thing.
16:03I, I long thought that, well, long thought ever since the guardian cap became a thing
16:08that the league would come up with some rule that if you were in concussion protocol, you
16:12had to, you would have to wear it for at least one or two, at least one or two weeks
16:15after
16:16you get cleared.
16:17That seemed like it would make sense.
16:19I mean, there's almost no way to not, it's, it's never going to look as good as a helmet.
16:24It'll, it'll, it'll gradually look less goofy, you know, as far as you're not going to notice
16:31it as much.
16:31I've, I've already kind of started not noticing it.
16:34Um, but the, the problem is it's always, it's never going to be like a glistening sweet,
16:40you know, you know, helmet.
16:43Yeah.
16:43I don't think anything of it as far as like the aesthetics of it so much so that the game
16:48that Petrie came back, the first game he came back and played in with the guardian cap,
16:53I think was the Colts game.
16:54Uh, cause he came back the same week CJ did, if I'm not mistaken.
17:00And I asked him, but he was our post game guest and I asked him about it.
17:04Just what the thought process was.
17:05And I, we got texts to the show.
17:06Like, why are you shaming him for wearing the guardian cap?
17:08I'm like, I didn't even know that there was guardian cap shaming to go on, right?
17:12You were just asking about the, about, I figured it was a way to ask him about his
17:17concussion the last three weeks without saying, how are you doing from the concussion?
17:22You know, I remember, and I got to see, I'm still a little bit annoyed with Titus Howard
17:26because Titus Howard early in the season, uh, answered a question from, I think it was
17:31Jonathan Alexander is either Sam Warner, Jonathan Alexander wrote a story about those neck collars
17:37that I think every white tight end wears, but including Dalton Schultz.
17:41Yeah.
17:41I forget what they're called, but they're supposed to reduce your chance of concussion too.
17:45And Titus basically said he would never wear one because it doesn't look tough enough.
17:49Yeah.
17:49And I'm like, all right.
17:50You're not the, this is.
17:52He would go on to get concussed this year.
17:54Yeah.
17:55Does it look tough to miss a game because of a concussion?
17:58Not that they, not that that collar would have a hundred percent prevented it, but why
18:01are they not taking everything?
18:02Why are they not taking all measures possible to avoid getting concussions?
18:06Yeah, man.
18:07I don't care.
18:07I don't care how dumb you look.
18:09I used to get a lot of crap for wearing big thigh pads.
18:12Uh, but like, like, like on the front there, those big, yeah, yeah, yeah.
18:16Like a lot of guys don't wear a thigh pads at all anymore.
18:18Yeah.
18:19And I would wear big ones is cause I had so many deep thigh bruises in my life that I'm
18:23like, I don't want to be messing with that.
18:25I'm just going to, I'm going to take all the precautions necessary.
18:28Uh, this is a, this was a, do the Texans have to worry about this trend, Sean?
18:32Okay.
18:32Right now, since 2022, the Texans are third in this category players shot per NFL roster.
18:45So the 49ers, um, they've had three players who have gotten shot since 2000.
18:51Okay.
18:52Let me see if I can name them.
18:52Ricky.
18:53With a bullet.
18:53Shot with a bullet.
18:54Right.
18:54Ricky Pearsall.
18:55Okay.
18:56Uh, Keon White was the, the one that just got shot.
18:59Yeah.
19:00Like two days ago.
19:01I can't think of who.
19:01No, Robinson.
19:02Oh, oh, Brian Robinson.
19:04Yeah.
19:04Yeah.
19:05Yeah.
19:06I always can't, I cannot get my Byron's and Brian's straight.
19:09So I'll let you do it.
19:10Uh, yeah.
19:11Then the jets had two players.
19:13Okay.
19:14Chris Boyd and, uh, Reynolds.
19:16Oh, that's right.
19:17Chris Boyd, Texans legend got shot.
19:19Where'd he get shot?
19:21Uh, like both what part of the body and what, what project?
19:25I don't know on either of them.
19:26Yeah.
19:26I don't look it up.
19:26I'm too, I was too busy looking up the Q collar.
19:29Yeah.
19:29Dalton Schultz wears.
19:30It's called the Q collar.
19:31I don't, it does not protect against gunshot wounds.
19:33No, it does not.
19:34No, it does not.
19:35Especially in your neck.
19:36I would imagine it's a, it's a, it's a, uh, Nathaniel.
19:42Okay.
19:43Number three.
19:43Oh yeah.
19:44Tank.
19:45Tank Dell.
19:45That's where the, that's how the Texans are third.
19:47Good job to the rest of the league where zero players have gotten shot.
19:50Yeah.
19:50That's pretty good.
19:51That's pretty good.
19:52Uh, although the, the text line is going to be blowing up.
19:55Like, uh, Joe Mixon shot himself in the foot.
19:58I saw it on Facebook.
19:59I saw it on Facebook.
20:01Uh, uh, New York jets cornerback, Chris Boyd was shot in the abdomen.
20:05Ooh, man.
20:07That's where Tony Soprano got shot.
20:08I know from reservoir dogs is that's one of the worst places.
20:11Dude, this is like a mop hit outside of Manhattan restaurant following a dispute with a bullet lodging in his
20:17lung.
20:17So in the abdomen into his lung, he was hospitalized in critical condition, later returning for treatment due to complications,
20:25but he's recovering.
20:26That's what that says.
20:27So that was, that was fairly late.
20:29All six of those guys lived in their fine.
20:31They lived to tell about it.
20:32Yeah.
20:33Yeah.
20:33Yeah.
20:33Yeah.
20:34And tank, I don't think tank's going to get shot again.
20:36Uh, odds are he won't.
20:38Yeah.
20:38That's.
20:39Well, he's staying out of Florida.
20:40Remember he is.
20:41Yeah.
20:41Remember his, uh, his trainer told him, what's God trying to tell you?
20:44Yeah.
20:45Stay out of Florida.
20:46Stay out of Florida.
20:46That's good advice for anybody.
20:47I would say stay out of Florida.
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