- 2 days ago
Seth and Sean react to and assess Chris Simms' take on if CJ Stroud or Bryce Young will get an extension first and Ryan Fitzpatrick suggesting they may be better off trading Stroud and rolling with Davis Mills.
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00:01So, yesterday, Chris Sims, Chris Sims, who has been among the more bullish Texan analysts,
00:09he's not an analyst for the Texans, but among the NFL people out there that cover the whole
00:14league, he's been more positive about the Texans, I would say, over the last couple
00:17of years than most.
00:19He's been a proponent of C.J. Stroud over the last couple of years.
00:23Obviously, C.J. had a lot of people jump off the bandwagon after his performance in those
00:27two playoff games.
00:28Chris Sims and Mike Florio yesterday were talking about who they think gets an extension.
00:34Who's more likely to get a contract extension this offseason?
00:39C.J. Stroud or Bryce Young?
00:41Now, keep in mind, Seth, this wouldn't even have been a discussion probably up until even
00:47the middle point of this season.
00:49But Bryce figured a few things out this year, got the Panthers to the playoffs, got their
00:55you know, got their clocks cleaned in the playoffs by the Rams.
00:58But that's I'm trying to remember or I can't remember.
01:01They might know they were actually competitive.
01:03Yeah, that was a good take it back.
01:04They were competitive in that game.
01:05Yep.
01:06But here's Chris Sims on who he thinks is getting an extension, who he would give an extension
01:11to if you had to pick one.
01:12If C.J. Stroud just kneeled on the ball the whole game, Houston probably would have won
01:16the football game.
01:17Just kneeled on it.
01:18Every play.
01:19First, second down, third down, kneel on it.
01:21Defense will set us up for a field position at one point.
01:24We'll kick a field goal and win the game that way.
01:26Like, I'm joking, but I'm not joking.
01:28It was that crazy.
01:29It was that bad.
01:30So, I sit here now, I guess giving the edge to Bryce Young, but don't feel necessarily
01:34great about that.
01:35I mean, I know Carolina went into the year going, hey, we like where we're going, but
01:39we don't have our quarterback yet.
01:41We don't really know.
01:42We don't think we got the guy.
01:43We don't have the guy.
01:44Now, how he played better, definitely.
01:46How do they feel about that?
01:48I'm sure they feel better, but I wouldn't sit here and just go, oh, we're just golden
01:52at quarterback with Bryce Young.
01:53I'm not ready to say that yet.
01:56That's out there, man.
01:57Like, I look, I'm still overall positive about C.J.
02:02I'm concerned about C.J.
02:03Yeah.
02:04I would not pay Bryce Young.
02:05If I were, if I were, if I had to give one a four-year extension, it would be C
02:10.J.
02:10Stroud over Bryce Young.
02:11Yeah, I think that you still have a better overall sample size of C.J.
02:16Stroud just playing like a competent NFL quarterback.
02:19With Bryce Young, it was, he figured things out over the course of the second half of the
02:25season in a new offense, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.
02:29But I don't, yeah, I just, I feel, the biggest, honestly, when I watch,
02:34Bryce Young play and watching in that, that final game this year, his, he still has a lot
02:40to overcome in terms of his size.
02:41When, when he's standing in the pocket, there are guys, there's opportunities for him to
02:48throw that he can't get to just because he's too small.
02:52He doesn't see things over the middle of the field.
02:55Guys who are crossing, all of that, and that it can be overcome, and he's done some good
03:01things to overcome it, but it's the exception for a reason.
03:06You know, Drew Brees did a really good job of overcoming his height disparity, and he wasn't
03:11as short as Bryce Young, but it took incredible timing and rhythm and all of that.
03:17So I, I still see that as being a big obstacle for Bryce Young to becoming a genuinely good
03:23NFL quarterback.
03:24I think CJ's, CJ's limitations this year were as much about adapting to the new offense,
03:33him not being comfortable with his new receivers, the still playing behind an inadequate offensive
03:39line that CJ and Nick Caley actually, CJ and Nick Caley made the offensive line look better
03:44than they actually were the point where it was getting really annoying.
03:47Cause people wanted to talk about this offensive line.
03:49Like it was a Jack actually good offensive line and they weren't, it was that they did.
03:54They were better than last year and CJ was getting rid of the ball quickly.
03:57They weren't allowing as many tackles for a loss.
04:00So they didn't have as many second longs and third and longs.
04:04But there was still a lot working against CJ Stroud this year.
04:07Yeah.
04:08And that's the thing.
04:09The size thing would be the big thing for me.
04:11Like Bryce Young's always going to be five foot nine.
04:13CJ can fix some of the things that are put it, some of the negative things that have
04:19regressed him into this Bryce Young category for some CJ fix those things.
04:24Bryce Young can't fix five, nine.
04:26Unless he starts wearing lifts or stilts or something.
04:28I think the other thing too, about, you know, obviously Sims is exaggerating when he says
04:33CJ could just have knelt on the ball.
04:35I said the same thing.
04:36Like if he just, it is true.
04:37It probably would have been better if he had just knelt on the ball.
04:40Definitely in the first half it would have been.
04:42At some points you got to, at some point you got to get some first downs and that's
04:45what Sam Darnold did a good job of in the Superbowl.
04:48He didn't have a good game by conventional quarterback standards.
04:51The completed 50% of his passes for 202 yards, but that was the type of game where they just
04:56needed to get field goals and they had some nice boring field goal drives.
05:00The biggest difference between Sam Darnold and CJ Stroud, or at least one of the biggest
05:04differences was the Seahawks were able to run the ball really effectively.
05:08And it's not like they were a great rushing team this year.
05:11Part of that was, it just didn't feel like they, they rushed as much as they should have
05:15or could have.
05:16But when they needed to run in the playoffs, they were able to do it.
05:18And the Texans, the Texans did not run the ball well in that Patriots game whatsoever.
05:23Here was Ryan Fitzpatrick.
05:25As long as we're talking about CJ Stroud, this is on the Fitz and Whit podcast.
05:29This is Ryan Fitzpatrick and Andrew Whitworth who are part of Amazon's NFL coverage.
05:34They have a podcast together.
05:34So that's very good.
05:36This is Ryan Fitzpatrick throwing out a nice hypothetical sports talk radio trade involving
05:43CJ Stroud.
05:44I sit there and watch Houston play this year and I'm thinking, okay, what's going to be
05:49better next year?
05:50And maybe this happens in two years.
05:52Is it going to be better?
05:52Because you can't tell me that there aren't teams that are out there that would trade two
05:56first round picks and some more things for CJ Stroud.
06:00You're to the air and the Cardinals wouldn't be interested in that.
06:02Or the Jets or the Dolphins or the Steelers or the Browns or whoever it is.
06:06I just think if you're Nick Casario right now with Houston, it's like, all right, so
06:10I can have Davis Mills at $7 million and a bunch more draft capital, or I could have no
06:16additional draft capital and CJ Stroud at $60 plus million.
06:19I at least think there has to be a conversation about it.
06:22And I think he has to be thinking about that, watching Seattle do what they did and for their
06:26defense to really take them as far as they didn't dominate in that Super Bowl.
06:30All right, I think this is, he's showing his Harvard here.
06:33And by that, I mean it in a negative way.
06:35It's, he's getting a little too into finding a creative way to do things that's outside
06:42of the box that inevitably will lead to a housing crisis and a worldwide recession.
06:48This is when the smart guys try to be too smart.
06:51Like, what did you just say right there?
06:53Hey, why not trade away CJ Stroud?
06:55You've got Davis Mills.
06:57And is that the recipe to, it really, honestly, he's sitting there, right?
07:02It's, it's really a lot of shade at Sam Darnold more than anything else.
07:06It's it.
07:06Wow.
07:07They did it with Sam Darnold.
07:08Certainly the Texans could do it with Davis Mills.
07:11I, I wholeheartedly reject that notion.
07:14Yeah.
07:14Well, here's the thing.
07:15A couple of things.
07:16One, he rattles off a bunch of bad teams that would definitely give up two first round
07:22picks and more for CJ Stroud.
07:24If he's worth two first round picks or more, then he's worth keeping.
07:29Okay.
07:29Like that's number one.
07:30Number two, he gets way simplistic with the salary part of the whole thing.
07:36He's like, yeah, Davis for 7 million, CJ for 60.
07:38And I understand where he's going with it, which is the, you know, which, you know, the,
07:42the, the aggressive scenario for the Texans would be giving CJ that extension this off season.
07:47But the thing is the 60 million air that, that cap number like that cap hit doesn't really
07:55hit for a couple of years when you do these extensions with the quarterbacks because they
07:59still play under their fourth year and their fifth year option.
08:03And then comes the extension and they do a signing bonus shore, but that gets spread
08:07out over five years.
08:08It's not as simple as Davis for seven CJ for 60, which would you rather have?
08:15Would you rather have Davis and all that cap space and a couple of first round picks,
08:18or would you rather have CJ Stroud at 60?
08:21It's, it's, it's a little more nuanced than that, especially when that's the crux of your
08:25argument is 70 is seven versus 60 on the cap.
08:28So I don't want to get too nerdy on the cap.
08:30No, no, no, no, no, no.
08:31All you need to know, it's the exact same thing as when some guy from Harvard was telling
08:34you about how awesome collateralized debt obligations were back in 2008.
08:38You just didn't know, no, no, no, no.
08:40You're trying too hard.
08:41Nope, nope.
08:42Okay.
08:43Um, so, um, so, yeah, so that's, that's the chatter that's out there about CJ Stroud,
08:48right?
08:48And like the notion that somehow, Hey, you've got this awesome defense.
08:52You could just put anybody back in there at quarterback and win a bunch of games, whether
08:58you, even if you, if you don't like CJ Stroud and you don't think he's future, he's the
09:02future.
09:03It's not as simple as, wow, you're going to have an awesome defense every single year.
09:07Like by far, if you want to have as many chances to win a Superbowl as possible, you got, you
09:13want to have a top tier quarterback.
09:15Absolutely.
09:15You know, like it just, it's really, really hard to sustain this caliber of defense year
09:20after year after year.
09:21They might, the Texans might be able to pull it off and some teams have done it in the
09:25past.
09:25It's just, it's really difficult.
09:27So if you, you've got to try to extract or get the most out of CJ Stroud and see exactly
09:33what he is before you start doing something really crazy or out of the box, like trading
09:37them away and going with Davis Mills.
09:40Yeah, for sure.
09:41Like the base power text line, Stroud's physical tools are still just so much better.
09:45Exactly.
09:46Um, this is a little extreme.
09:47I wouldn't phrase it this way.
09:48I'll read the text and then follow up, but Hey, uh, he's leaving out the part where mill sucks.
09:53Okay.
09:55I mean, that's, he doesn't suck.
09:57Um, now I will say that when you make somebody, you're starting quarterback, like named starting
10:05court, like Davis started three games.
10:07That doesn't make him the Texans starting quarterback.
10:10It means he's a backup who got in to start three games.
10:13He was graded on a different curve for those three games than he would have been, had he
10:18been the regular starter.
10:19The fact of the matter was Mills was great in the fourth quarter of the Jags game in
10:25week 10, he was great on the last drive or two of the Titans game in week 11.
10:32He had a couple of good drives in that bills game, but really in the second half of that
10:37bills game on that Thursday night game, couldn't get anything done.
10:40He had much longer stretches of bad football than he did stretches of good football.
10:46He just, he did enough to win those three games and credit to him.
10:49He's a backup quarterback.
10:50He did a really good job as a backup quarterback.
10:52And the way they operated with him was, is not something that's sustainable over an entire
10:57season.
10:57He got rid of the ball really, really fast.
11:00He was hitting his first reads.
11:01And I credit Nick Cayley for that stretch also, because they did exactly what they needed
11:07to do to get enough offense, um, to, to win those games.
11:11And Davis did some really good things in the fourth quarters of those games.
11:14I don't want to take that away from him, but it, the, the style of passing game that they
11:20had there, that's not something that really does a whole lot for you over the course of
11:2417 games.
11:25Yeah.
11:25Yep.
11:26Um, a lot of people weighing in on this.
11:28Davis is limited.
11:29He's not elite.
11:29Sometimes you do need that.
11:32Uh, but, uh, well, no, going back to the good things that CJ did this year, like in the
11:38Kansas city game, wasn't a great game overall for CJ, but he made some clutch play in the
11:43fourth quarter that ended up mattering chargers game, et cetera, et cetera.
11:47That's the, when you're trying to focus on, all right, we need to really build on this.
11:52And, or if, if you've lost faith completely in CJ based on the playoffs, the, you can't
11:59throw the baby out with a, with the bathwater and ignore all of the really good things he
12:04did do in the fourth quarter of some of these games.
12:06It's just, you just got to hope that the actual sum total of him in this system improves
12:12next year.
12:12By the way, let me, let me back up on Fitzpatrick's take.
12:15I don't think there are teams willing to give up two first round picks for CJ Stroud right
12:19now.
12:19Those teams he named are all bad teams with high picks, high picks.
12:24And I, I think those are all teams that based on CJ's body of work the last two years, but
12:29particularly those two playoff games, really troubling.
12:32I, I think fan bases in those cities, probably be more excited about using a pick on a quarterback.
12:37I wonder, okay.
12:38So the fan bases might, but the actual GMs, and if let's, let's say it's a GM that doesn't
12:43listen to the whims of the fan base necessarily.
12:45Um, I think there, I think there'd be a good, a fair amount of them.
12:48I think CJ has done enough.
12:49CJ has done more over the course of three seasons in the NFL than a lot of the first
12:55round quarterbacks are going to end up doing.
12:57It is.
12:58There's, I think there's some GMs that might still very much be in CJ's corner and feel
13:02that the upside is there and that they like the risk of two first round picks on him versus
13:07the versus two on an, on a complete unknown.
13:10Well, it only takes one.
13:11So yeah.
13:12Like, is there somebody out there that does?
13:14Yeah.
13:14I would be, if I were a GM, I would be real GM of those teams.
13:19Cause the teams that Fitzpatrick rattled off, he said, Cleveland, Arizona, the jets, like
13:23he rattled the dolphins.
13:25I think he said, I mean, the dolphins are the closest thing to even a mediocre team out
13:28of those teams.
13:29He's talking about teams with top five picks.
13:31I've probably, it's a bad quarterback class this year.
13:34It's Fernando Mendoza.
13:35And then maybe no other guys in the first round in this draft from all the mock drafts I've
13:39been looking at.
13:40Um, the problem is that CJ has already burned three years of daylight.
13:44So you're not getting him.
13:45You're, you're doing that thing, Seth, the teams have been less inclined to do over the
13:49last couple of years, which is Micah Parsons being the noted exception, which is trade multiple
13:55high picks for the right to overpay somebody.
13:59And I think there'd just be GMs.
14:00It would be like, you know what?
14:01I'm just going to hang on to my top five pick.
14:03I'm going to take a left tackle, or I'm going to take an edge rusher and we'll figure out
14:08quarterback, you know, later in the draft or next year or something like that.
14:11You know, I was the Russell Wilson trade.
14:14Two firsts and two seconds.
14:16You're talking about the trade from Den, from Seattle to Denver.
14:19Yeah.
14:20Two firsts, two seconds for the right for Denver to give him $250 million.
14:25That was, I mean, that's a, like in hindsight, it's easy to say that was an overpay, uh, obviously,
14:31but that was, that was a really aggressive trade plus a huge contract.
14:37That's what this would be with CJ.
14:38I think there's a lot of GMs.
14:40Like if you took, if you, if you somehow created a scenario or is Russell Wilson and
14:45CJ Stroud right now, given the same performances and what Russell Wilson's age was at the time
14:50and everything, I think there's some GMs that would be much more high on the upside of CJ.
14:54Oh, for sure.
14:54Whatever Russell Wilson was in his, at this point in his career.
14:57Yeah.
14:57He's younger.
14:58I mean, you know, Russell Wilson was, you know, he was a decade into his career.
15:01It hadn't, hadn't been all that impressive of a quarterback for a while and came in an
15:04older player too.
15:05You know, CJ came in after three years of college.
15:07Russ came in, you know, Russ was already 23 when he came into the league, something like
15:12that.
15:12So, yeah.
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