00:00The legal tampering period begins today. NFL players can agree to terms today at 11 o'clock in the morning
00:10our time set. And so I want to get in to some wish list guys before we start finding out
00:17exactly who's going where we're actually already starting to find out who's going where that's been kind of the story
00:23of the weekend and the story of the morning so far.
00:26But let's give this a little bit of thought. Who are some of the players that we would like to
00:33at least be on the Texans wish list? If we just can't outright take these players, we at least want
00:40the Texans to be in on these players in NFL free agency. Seth, I don't know if you've got a
00:47name that you'd like to start with, but I feel like Tyler Linderbaum is right there. He's just right there
00:52waiting for all of us, right?
00:53Yeah, Tyler Linderbaum, 100%. And I know he's the big name in free agency at center just because especially in
01:00the run game, he does things athletically that not a lot of centers can do. And the swarm quotient is
01:07very, very high with him.
01:08But I think he opens things up both in the run and the passing game because of the plays that
01:15you can run with him. If you think about some of the things the Eagles used to do with Jason
01:20Kelsey, he's similar in that regard.
01:23He's not as great in one-on-one pass protection, but I don't worry about that as much because he's
01:29so good at distributing things, picking up games, all of those things that I, that, that is the one part
01:36of his game that I think might knock him out of some of the projections we're seeing him.
01:41He's not as much of a pure all-pro run and pass protector of like some of the truly great
01:48centers, but it's, he's, he's very, very good.
01:52But I also think that Cade Mays, the center from Carolina, doesn't get as much attention as, as Tyler Linderbaum,
02:00but would bring an element of, of size and strength and capability to the Texans.
02:07They just don't have it center right now. So either of those two guys, I'd be really, really excited if
02:12I found out that the Texans signed one of those guys.
02:15And I'm not, I just, I don't know how much Nick's going to want to try to be hyper aggressive
02:19and going after center.
02:20For those of you who missed it, by the way, Ed Ingram re-signs with the Texans. That's announced this
02:25morning.
02:25I saw it from Ian Rappaport. I don't know if anybody else had it first.
02:28No, Ian Rappaport is, I think, I mean, I haven't even seen it from Schefter yet.
02:31So we're, we're over an hour into that and that seems to be an Ian Rappaport exclusive, but it also,
02:37I'm glad you kind of reset that there with the Ed Ingram re-signing because it does put center all
02:44the more into focus.
02:45We, we know they've been trying to figure out left guard since I don't know how long, you know, it's
02:50been years while we've been trying to figure out the left guard position.
02:53But center is where you look at the guys that are available, specifically the ones that we just talked about,
03:00Tyler Linderbaum.
03:01And of course you mentioned Cade Mays, but it feels like there's a unique opportunity there.
03:05And Cade Mays, I'm glad you mentioned as well, because that's the one that I've seen most linked to the
03:12Texans.
03:13Like Tyler Linderbaum feels more like the pipe dream.
03:17If I'm being honest with you right now, Seth, if I were to find out by the end of the
03:22day or at any point throughout free agencies,
03:25whenever Tyler Linderbaum news drops that the Texans are going to be the ones to sign Tyler Linderbaum, I might
03:31fall out of my chair.
03:32I'm going to be shocked by it because I, I agree with you.
03:35I don't think they're going to be in the market for a center that expensive or for as highly as
03:40it's been put out there for what Tyler Linderbaum is supposed to make,
03:43upwards of $17 million a year, but Cade Mays being sort of a quieter, lesser known name,
03:51I don't think is going to command nearly as much.
03:53I don't know if it's closer to the 10 to 12 million range, maybe a little more than that,
03:58but that's somebody that hasn't been starting nearly as long as Tyler Linderbaum.
04:03Yeah.
04:03And it's just not nearly as well known or honestly as well proven a commodity as Tyler Linderbaum is at
04:10this point.
04:10It's really only been the last couple of years where Cade Mays, a sixth round pick in 2022 has really
04:16come along, but he has come along.
04:18So I'd be perfectly fine with a Cade Mays alternative.
04:22If he can't land the pipe dream, that is Tyler Linderbaum.
04:25The, uh, the thing about Cade Mays that's interesting is he's different than Tyler Linderbaum,
04:30just in terms of body size and his, and athleticism.
04:33Mays is a huge center.
04:35He's like 325 pounds.
04:37Um, one of the projected contracts I saw for him was three years, 22 and a half million.
04:42And I think that's, that's very reasonable and it would be an upgraded center.
04:46And I'd, uh, I'd feel really, really cool about that.
04:49Uh, who's, who's on your wishlist?
04:52So at the top of my wishlist, and this has been the case, I've been doing this on my podcast,
04:57on the B block podcast, and anywhere I've been able to preach the gospel, Seth, Isaac Ciamalu.
05:05See it and be about it.
05:07Just like, go, go get, go get the offensive line version of Troy Palamalu.
05:15And I'm not just doing that because the names sound alike and they're both Samoan guys,
05:19but they both also have that distinctive ponytail.
05:23Not too often you see an offensive lineman with a ponytail like that.
05:28And I feel like you got to really be a man's man on the offensive line to pull it off.
05:31And boy, does he ever.
05:33I know we've seen, maybe it was Sheldon Rankins, one of the Texans defensive linemen,
05:39put Isaac Ciamalu on his backside in the playoffs.
05:42I know that was sort of a recent image of him.
05:45But if you look at his overall body of work and you start speaking to the ideas
05:50and the principles that you speak to about the swarm-like mentality,
05:55and of course we know that comes from D'Amico's approach,
05:58this is a guy that I feel like fits along those lines.
06:02Isaac Ciamalu, go get him.
06:05And it fits with what I've always wanted, which is what the Astros did with Cuban players.
06:10I want to do with Polynesian players.
06:13I want them to be a mecca for Polynesian players.
06:17And we've already got a nice core of it on the team.
06:20I want to be Samoa East.
06:23I want to be American, American Samoa.
06:25That's what I want to be.
06:26I want to be the American Samoa of the contiguous America.
06:30Tommy Togiai and Isaac Ciamalu, the new faces of the franchise.
06:35I don't want to hear anything more about it.
06:37Bring these guys.
06:38And you've got arguably the strongest man on the team on one end in Tommy Togiai.
06:43Boy, does he look every bit of it.
06:45And then Isaac Ciamalu comes in as a bad guy.
06:48And, you know, I'm a sucker for a ponytail as a long-haired man myself.
06:52Bring in these two badasses and let's go.
06:55Faces of the franchise, the Polynesian guys.
06:57I, uh, and you mentioned one guy, uh, that I haven't heard a lot of Texans fans talking
07:03about at tight end.
07:05Yeah.
07:05I want to see Isaiah likely as a real, like if they don't, if it's not likely that they
07:10get Isaiah likely, I at least want him to be on their wishlist.
07:14Right.
07:14Like I at least want that to be somebody that they're interested in, that they're in some
07:19kind of competitive bidding war for, even if they don't land him.
07:23But this goes back to my earlier point that I was making you that I was making with you
07:27earlier, Seth, about the Dalton Schultz re-signing or, or extension, I should say, love the extension
07:34or at least I'm fine with the extension, but more than anything, more than I yearn for a
07:40Dalton Schultz extension or anything like that, when it comes to the tight end position, it
07:44is depth, a potential upgrade, and certainly a plan for the future past Dalton Schultz, particularly
07:52if there's a fall off this year.
07:54If after the end of this year, you don't feel the same way next year as you do right
07:57now, I want to feel good about a tight end.
08:00I'd like to just see some depth in that position group.
08:03So Isaiah likely is a guy that's got to be at the top of the list.
08:05Yeah.
08:06I felt like, uh, Kate Stover, I was really eager to see what he would do in his second
08:09year because he was still relatively new to even playing the position of tight end,
08:13only played a couple of years in college.
08:15And he didn't, he didn't take the leap forward that I was hoping to see in year two.
08:20And he's also, even if he does develop into a good, solid NFL player, he's not the same
08:25type of tight end as Isaiah likely.
08:28And Isaiah likely has got some things to his style where he's not a huge guy, but he breaks
08:33tackles.
08:33The run after the catch is really, really good.
08:36The, the swarminess is higher in him.
08:38And like, that's, as you know, that's what I'm all about is just bringing swarmy guys over
08:43to the offensive side of the ball.
08:45You tell me if you agree with this, Seth, and I've been sitting on this ever since the
08:50extension for Dalton Schultz over the weekend.
08:53Is it not odd that tight ends, not that they didn't want them to be more involved.
08:58I think they were just limited in options and what they could do with tight ends, but
09:01doesn't it seem like for the offense that they want to run, given the background Patriots
09:07offense, offensive coordinator, Nick Haley is a tight ends coach in his, you know, in his
09:12previous work, doesn't it seem like tight ends should be a, a, an X factor or a heavily
09:19featured at least in this offense beyond just, you know, the mundane responsibilities of
09:25a tight end, but, but, but as an actual like threat in the offense, when we talk about
09:29explosives or chunk plays or anything of the light.
09:32Yeah.
09:33Well, and I think that's, you, you hit on it right at the beginning, which is that they
09:36just, everybody got injured.
09:38Yeah.
09:38I mean, they went into week one.
09:39I remember talking to somebody after the first game last year versus the Rams, uh, from
09:44outside of Houston.
09:44And he said, man, I thought that I thought the Texans would be more tight end heavy.
09:48And I said, well, their second and third tight ends all got injured within two weeks of the
09:53regular season.
09:54Brevin Jordan went down, Cade Stover went down and they just didn't, they didn't have bodies
09:59to put out there.
10:00So I think that's part of it.
10:01I think the other though, the other side of it though, is if you look at what both the
10:07Patriots and the Rams have done, that's where Nick Caley has been, you know, with the Rams,
10:11when Sean McVay got to LA, people thought, oh, okay, well, this is going to be like a
10:16Kyle Shanahan offense and it's going to be really tight end heavy.
10:19McVay looked at his offense and said, we've got a lot more good wide receivers than we
10:23do have tight ends.
10:24And they, they, they looked like a different offense because he was going to use where the
10:28strengths of his team were.
10:29And I think that's where Nick Caley, from everything he's ever said, sounds like he's that guy that
10:35wants to be adaptable to his personnel.
10:38Cause that's what, that's what the Patriots were too.
10:40It's, it's hard to really define the Patriots during the Tom Brady era as any particular type
10:46of offense.
10:47You know, at one time it was like, oh no, they never, they don't throw deep.
10:51They don't throw the deep ball.
10:51And then they get Randy Moss and lo and behold, wow.
10:54Yeah.
10:54They throw the deep ball.
10:55Yeah.
10:56When they had two really good tight ends, they were a heavily too tight end offense when they
11:01didn't have two really good tight ends.
11:03Because one of them had some issues and then they, they had to change and they weren't
11:08as much of a, a tight end heavy offense.
11:10So I think that they're very capable of being it, but I don't think they go into the season
11:14saying we, we have to, we have to run an offense a certain type of way.
11:19They're going to go into a season saying, this is what we have.
11:22Let's see what we can make, how we can make it work.
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