00:00Let's get to this Bill Barnwell article. He did a deep dive on free agency. The work that we've
00:04all been thirsting for for the last however many years did a deep dive on. And I think it's
00:09interesting, especially because the approach the Texans have taken in free agency under Nick
00:14Casario has come under various degrees of scrutiny through the years, depending on what the team has
00:20needed. You know, they don't they don't do enough early. They don't get aggressive enough. They
00:24don't sign enough big ticket guys. They're signing all these cheap guys. There's been all sorts of
00:28different criticisms or assessments through the years. Barnwell comes up with a scoring
00:34system where he goes back for the all the top 50 free agents for each year from 2013 through
00:402022. So all the way up through a period of time where we've now been able to at least
00:44come to some sort of quasi conclusion on everybody. Yeah. His scoring system is goes from zero,
00:52which is disaster to up to six, which is all pro caliber superstar for a little bit of a little
01:01bit of context. Trent Williams signing with the 49ers was a six. He's been the best tackle in
01:08football since he got to the 49ers. Conversely include these trades as free agency. Yeah. Trade.
01:14Yeah. Transaction. Okay. Yeah. Conversely, Brock Osweiler, a zero for the Houston Texans. And that
01:22was that was Brock Osweiler. They ranked it. It was the top 30 by value, the top 30 money deals,
01:29and they adjusted for salary cap. Brock Osweiler's was the seventh most expensive deal in that in that
01:3510 year period. And he was a disaster. He was a disaster. Scored zero. Scored zero there. Three
01:42just and also three, you know, because if the players shouldn't feel like if they don't get a
01:47six, they suck. Three means you lived up to expectations. So kind of right in the middle
01:51there. So there were 500 free agents that Barnwell assessed for that decade, 2013 through 2022,
01:5941% of them have scored either a three or higher, meaning 59% of them were either somewhat disappointing,
02:08very disappointing, or Brock Osweiler disaster level. Yeah, that's I really liked this article.
02:16And look, as Seth mentioned, teasing it, there's 40,000 words in this thing. It is a long article,
02:21but the parts that you can kind of cherry pick out of there, I think for me as a Texan
02:26fan gives
02:27me more understanding as to why Nick Casario approaches free agency the way he does.
02:32Well, the one, the one that you put in there that I think that makes the most sense that I
02:37think most
02:37people figure this is the way it is. It's that the, the, the, the deals that were ranked 26 through
02:4550. So the less expensive deals actually ended up having a much higher hit rate or were much more,
02:52it ended up being a better deals than the most expensive ones. That's right. And that's a classic
02:57cautionary tale of, you know, thinking that you won free agency in the first couple of days of free
03:02agency. That's where a lot of the stupid money is being sent. That's where you're wildly overpaying,
03:07you know, like the amount of money they're paying Tyler Linderbaum, man, it's, it's really hard for
03:12that to really be thought of as a good deal. Unless they, a, unless the Tyler Linderbaum remains an
03:19all pro center, which is very possible, but it's also got to be part of a complete and total
03:24offensive resurgence for you to really consider that a slam dunk to spend $10 million more per
03:30year than other, anybody else is spending on centers. Yeah. The, um, I thought it was interesting
03:35to this, this isn't a big shock, uh, but the free agents Barnwell looked at their age, divided them
03:43up into tears of, you know, 24 to 27 years old, 27 to 30. I think he did 30 plus
03:49by far. The biggest
03:51hit rate is with guys, essentially guys that are getting their second contract. Yeah. 24 to 27
03:57is the, uh, was the biggest, was the biggest hit rate. I just can't, I came away from this article.
04:03You know, if, if you, you know, and if you buy into these numbers, the ratings were subjective
04:09Barnwell rating. So like six doesn't mean you had a PFF score of X, Y, Z. It's just Barnwell looked
04:15at the totality of each guy's career and, and gave them the label. And I trust his judgment of it
04:20as
04:20much as it looks like it just matches the eyeball test. Correct. Yeah. Correct. I came away from this
04:26article feeling, feeling a better understanding of why Nick Casario shops the way he does that he's,
04:34he's other than Daniil Hunter has never been going top of market on guys. They go top of market on
04:40guys
04:40that they've had in the building, including Daniil Hunter, who they've given two extensions to since
04:45he got to the building. Um, so I think they're always going to be shopping in the player 26 through
04:5050 range, not the one through 25 range. Boy, I'll tell you what the one, um, when you spend big
04:57money on a non-marquee quarterback, it can go pretty well. Like Kirk cousins, I'd say that,
05:03but that went okay to the Vikings, not to the Falcons. Um, Tom Brady, the bucks was spectacularly
05:09successful. Phillip rivers to the Colts. It was just a one year deal. So I don't know if I even
05:15include
05:15that, but when you get, so like, those are the most expensive deals in that 10 year period, but then
05:20you
05:20get to Nick Foles, Brock Osweiler, Sam Bradford to the Cardinals, um, all zeros, Teddy Bridgewater
05:30to the Panthers case Keenum to the Broncos. Like the, it just, it's a, those are some case wasn't a
05:38spectacular failure to the Broncos just because it wasn't a gigantic deal. Um, but it's big enough
05:44at the time to be 11th on this list though. Yeah. Oh, that's true. Yeah. I forgot. Yeah. I got
05:49to
05:49adjust for the decade there. Two years, 36 million bucks. I mean that, that I would,
05:54the percentage of money that case Keenum made in his career, the lion's share of it came on that
05:58deal with the Denver Broncos. I would imagine. Cause other than that, he's been a, he's been a
06:02backup his whole career. Um, but he was 11. So he had the 11th biggest deal. And again,
06:07it's proportional relative to what the cap was at the time. Yeah. Case got a two, at least
06:12out of six disappointing, right? That was disappointing. It wasn't a disaster. Like
06:16the other ones, uh, some of the other disasters, a little bit lower. Mike Glenn into the bears.
06:21Oh, remember that? Remember how angry bears fans were about that? That was one from the get-go
06:26that you could have called. Yeah. And I feel like they replaced him almost right away with somebody.
06:31God, it might've got replaced that year. Yeah. No, I don't think he started a bunch of games for the
06:35bears, but they, and Glennon is just, man, I hate to go on looks, but Glennon is just the guy,
06:39you look at that, you know, Seth, before I bet on a quarterback or a head coach, I like to
06:44look at
06:44their, at their headshots. Yeah. It was a Glennon. That was remember Glennon. They, they drafted
06:50Trubisky. Oh, that's right. Yeah. They drafted Trubisky and Trubisky started, uh, the fifth game
06:56of the season after that, after that, they had given Mike Glennon the 24th highest, uh, biggest free
07:03agency deal that, that in that decade. And that was true. That was the best year the bears had
07:07with Trubisky, a quarterback. I want to say he was, I think they won like 12 games that year.
07:12Sorry. I interrupted you. I wanted to know that's okay. I don't remember. No, I was just saying,
07:15if you go look at Mike Glennon's I, I, before giving that, that would be my rule too. Before
07:20giving three years, $45 million to somebody, go look at their, their headshot in the media guide,
07:25include the neck. Yeah. Well, yeah. And you're going to need serious portrait dimensions.
07:31Davis Mills has a long neck, but he's good, but it's muscular. He wears it. Well,
07:36it's almost, uh, scary. However, like if he didn't work out or do the neck flexion machine
07:40or anything, he might end up looking a little bit like, like, uh, like, like the Scarlet
07:46Ibis there that we're talking about. Yes. Yeah. Glennon, uh, here's what they say about
07:51what Barnwell says about Brock Osweiler after backing up Peyton Manning and taking over as
07:56the starter in Denver. Yeah. Digest that for a minute, kids. Peyton Manning got benched for
08:01Brock Osweiler at one point by Gary Kubiak. Uh, Osweiler was benched for the legendary
08:06quarterback in the post season. Osweiler signed with the Texans through more interceptions than
08:11touchdowns. It's really hard to do in the NFL these days. He was the only, the only quarterback
08:16in the history of quarterbacks throwing footballs to Deandre Hopkins. They couldn't figure out how to
08:22get the football to Deandre Hopkins. That's right. Deandre Hopkins was a quarterback skeleton key
08:26that any, any, any quarterback using Deandre Hopkins could unlock his potential just by
08:34throwing it in Deandre Hopkins general direction. And Brock Osweiler couldn't do that. It was
08:39atrocious. What was worse is that's where a lot of his picks were going. He's thrown it to Deandre
08:44Hopkins. Not only can he hit Deandre, he's hitting the opposition in the hands. You look at various
08:49other quarterbacks who just showed there and did their best work, just heaving the ball in the
08:53direction of Deandre Hopkins and Osweiler couldn't figure that out. What the hell?
08:57Now the one, the one of the 30 names on this list of the 30 biggest contracts in that decade,
09:04um, the one that probably hits closest to home for Texan fans outside of Osweiler would be number
09:1025 on the list. Christian Kirk, four years, 72 million to the Jags in 2022. But Texans picked up
09:19the tab on the last, on the, uh, traded, traded a seventh round pick for the right to pick up
09:24the
09:24tab on the last year of that deal. And took it, which had a hefty cap hit attached to it.
09:28That
09:28was a big one year deal for Christian. 16 million bucks, right? Yeah. 16 million bucks. So it's
09:36going to be, that'll be a weird, you know, 10, 15 years from now, that'll be one where you're
09:39sitting around, uh, at a bar just trying to name random Texans. And if you bring up Christian Kirk,
09:45a lot of people are going to be like, Oh yeah, that's right. Yep. I remember that year.
Comments