- 2 days ago
ITL debates whether Houston’s offensive setup is in the right hands.
Category
🥇
SportsTranscript
00:00T.J. Huzmanzada and C.J. Stroud are very close.
00:03He's one of C.J.'s true confidants.
00:06But the gist of the part of the—
00:08Well, here's the audio.
00:09All right, here we go.
00:10For C.J., it's can him and his offensive coordinator mesh.
00:15That is going to be, for me, the biggest key I want to see in the preseason.
00:22Can they mesh?
00:24Like, I don't think people really understand how much play-calling matters in the National Football League.
00:31Calling the wrong play at the wrong time.
00:33Why are we running this play when we expect this defense?
00:36You know this play is not going to work against this defense.
00:39And so what they called analytics, we just called that scout when we were playing, you know?
00:44And so that's what, like, you watch that playoff game.
00:48C.J. is not—he wasn't perfect that game.
00:50But as a coach, when you see that he's not having a good game, why am I steady dropping back
00:56throwing the ball?
00:57We can't run no screens.
00:58We can't run a slant.
01:00We can't run some easy stuff.
01:02Why are we running dropbacks?
01:04Why?
01:06And you go, he just made bad—why are you calling these plays?
01:10And so can him, meaning the offensive coordinator, and C.J. get on the same page?
01:16All right, so I want to make sure that we understand what's going on here.
01:19Because to me, this was about as jaw-dropping, you know, a commentary on the relationship between Nick Caley and
01:28C.J. Stroud, as we've heard, period.
01:31Because a lot of people might get into the muck of, well, the play calling, and they did score a
01:37touchdown on a long pass,
01:38and maybe because they didn't have, you know, they didn't have Dalton Schultz.
01:42Dalton Schultz gets hurt in that game.
01:43They couldn't run the ball.
01:44Let's not get bogged down with the actual what he said about the play calling.
01:48Okay, because I do think that that is worth noting.
01:50It is worth noting, and we just noted it.
01:51To me, the story here is, can he—to C.J.—he said that to C.J.—the question is, can
01:59he mesh with Nick Caley?
02:00And that's when I went, okay, I want to hear more.
02:03And then he talked about play calling.
02:06A lot of people don't understand how hard the play calling is.
02:08Forget that particular game.
02:10Yeah, because I don't think that game is probably a good one to use.
02:12Right.
02:13This is about what we've speculated on and what we've talked about.
02:17Can they get along?
02:18Is he the right guy to call the right plays?
02:21He even talked about that.
02:23You know, talking, calling the right plays against a particular defense.
02:26Dude, this is—I mean, you don't want to be too, I guess—
02:31Alarmist?
02:32Well, no, like, not fair—too unfair to the situation, because we didn't—we weren't privy to the conversation.
02:39But this is about as close as we have gotten to, yeah, it's about Nick Caley and calling the right
02:45plays for C.J. Stroud.
02:47And I was like, okay, that's what we've thought wondered, and that's what—
02:51Or what C.J. is really thinking about this.
02:52And what C.J. is really thinking, exactly.
02:54That's the—this is the closest.
02:55Now, it could be totally different, but this is probably the closest real answer we got.
03:00I got to tell you, I got to tell you, Reggie, I was like, eh, let me hear what he
03:04has to say.
03:04I know he knows C.J.
03:05And I was just expecting to kind of scroll through, and then I stopped and went, wow.
03:09No, this is a bombshell, if you know the reason, then.
03:14This is—this could be—if this was specifically C.J.'s words, which, I mean, look, T.J. Houshminsada did a lot
03:19to tie this to C.J.,
03:21which is probably not the best—not probably.
03:23It's not the best look for your quarterback.
03:25No.
03:25Right?
03:25It sounds like there's a level of complaining going on on the outside,
03:29which is not good for a team that feels like they're trying to situate themselves for an opportunity to run
03:33to the Super Bowl, right?
03:34Right.
03:35On top of that, displeasure with the way that the offense is, is one of the things we've talked about
03:42a whole bunch, right?
03:42And it feels like you're not going to go—actually, not even feels like—any endeavor in which all parties involved are
03:51not pulling in the same direction
03:52is not going to be as fruitful of an endeavor as it should be.
03:55Point blank, period.
03:56And this is, at the very least, smoke to that degree of, mentally, they are not fully pulling in the
04:02same direction.
04:03Thank you, yes.
04:04That's exactly what I got out of that.
04:06It's wild.
04:07And that's without me going into trying to delineate who's right and who's wrong on this.
04:11But just this as some level of signpost that, yeah, we're not all synergistic here.
04:17We're not all pointing in the same direction and pulling in the same direction,
04:21which really sucks after a draft in which it feels like, hey, we're starting to settle on what we want
04:27as a team,
04:28which is we want to be tough and physical, and we also have this roster to where we think that
04:32we can run the football.
04:33We think that we can support this in the way that we want to, to build a team that can
04:37go and win a Super Bowl.
04:38And then fairly soon thereafter, we're getting T.J. Huchmanzada basically alluding to the idea that
04:44your quarterback and your offensive play caller, the two most important guys when it comes to putting offense together for
04:49a team,
04:49seemingly have something that is not allowing them to be on the same page.
04:53Can they mesh from a dude who seems to be close to one of these parties?
04:58It's not a question that should be asked.
04:59No, it should not be, and it's not a matter of, you know, have they equipped C.J. Stroud?
05:06I mean, we know C.J. Stroud is equipped much better today than he was at the end of the
05:10season
05:10in terms of the offensive line, which I'm sure fed into some of his frustration.
05:15But that's not the complaint that's happening.
05:17That's where I'm going.
05:18You know, like, he's better equipped to do the things that the Texans want him to do,
05:23but what we're saying, what we're hearing right here is, yeah, they want him to do that.
05:28I don't know how comfortable he is with that guy calling the plays.
05:32And in a vacuum, I'm not sure how comfortable I am with that guy calling the plays.
05:36That was something that we were trying to get a feel for as this whole thing went along.
05:40It ended up being suitable, I guess, but now you're going to have maybe a better foundation to see what
05:45he has.
05:45The thing that I cannot shake, though, is the idea that C.J. Stroud, and look, we all have our
05:51complaining about our work
05:52from one way or another, and we might talk to our friends.
05:55The idea that, one, this gets out, and two, if this is a big enough issue to you and you
06:00have not spoken at,
06:01well, not that we know specifically, but I feel like you need to go in there.
06:04If this actually is an issue, which I'm reading it as C.J. Stroud has some level of question as
06:10to how this communication needs to happen in-house, right?
06:13Unless he doesn't feel like he has enough juice to make that happen.
06:16Communication needs to happen in that building for that to be the case.
06:18This can't be something that gets litigated through T.J. Hushmanzada because you're not going to get it done, right?
06:24Maybe you go and you talk to whoever, whether it's D'Amico, whether it's Nick Haley himself, whatever.
06:28Take it to Nick Hacet.
06:29Hell, take it to Cal McNair, right?
06:31Not the healthiest thing in the world, but if you don't do it that way,
06:35there's a much smaller likelihood that this gets fixed if you're just stewing with this as opposed to talking directly
06:40out.
06:41That's not to say that it absolutely gets fixed.
06:42That's not to say that everything gets in line, but this can't be the way this goes.
06:46And I also would like to know when this conversation, this venting, so to speak, as we're interpreting it,
06:51or some sort of level of venting, when it took place.
06:54Because we've seen some very good signs of C.J. Stroud reaching out to every draft pick.
07:00And I get it.
07:00Maybe that doesn't mean a whole lot, but it's nice of the buy-in, so to speak, is what we
07:05talked about.
07:06Maybe if this was two months ago, things have changed.
07:11Maybe so.
07:12And there is more of a buy-in right now.
07:14But you're right.
07:15It does need to be voiced.
07:16I'm sure it has to some degree over the course of last season.
07:19There were clear frustrations.
07:20We saw it on the field.
07:21We saw it in C.J. Stroud's body language and facial expressions.
07:24That was a frustration.
07:26And you kind of put all these pieces together.
07:27You're like, maybe he's just looking to the sidelines saying, man, what are you doing to me?
07:31What are the chances that T.J. Huchmanzada just spoke out of school?
07:34I think very low.
07:36I think very low.
07:37All right.
07:37And now I'll take this to the other extreme.
07:39And again, I'm asking a question.
07:40Please don't jump me.
07:40What are the chances that he was put up to this?
07:43You get what I'm saying?
07:44Like, there's one possibility that, hey, this was told to him in confidence.
07:49And he got a little bit talkative in front of everybody in a way that he shouldn't have.
07:54That's the first question.
07:55The second question is...
07:56It's kind of the athlete's first type of deal, too.
07:58Right.
07:58Yeah.
07:58What is the possibility that C.J. was like, hey, we are now playing through the media in
08:05Chess.
08:05Whispers in Chess.
08:07Yeah.
08:07What is the possibility of that?
08:08I will say it's going to get...
08:09I think that's a big possibility.
08:11I think it's going to get worse if he don't play as good.
08:14I don't think it's a zero.
08:15That's for dang sure.
08:15Yeah.
08:16I don't like that at all.
08:17Wait till you start getting the Ryan Clarks of the world to start breaking C.J. Stroud down.
08:22I mean, he flat out said, to C.J., you know, not like I think that it's about the offensive
08:28coordinator and the play calling.
08:30You know, he said, to C.J., it's a question of if the offensive coordinator and the quarterback
08:36can mesh.
08:37That is not...
08:38That's not a little thing.
08:39You know, that is not a little thing when you are in, you know, this big of a season and
08:45you're still seemingly wondering if you have the right guy calling the plays?
08:50This is going to be fascinating the way this goes.
08:53And honestly, I think this could shed somewhat of a different light on the Gerard Johnson
08:59parting of ways, I guess, is the way that I'll say it, because we know Gerard Johnson,
09:04very, very familiar with C.J. Stroud.
09:06And I don't just mean like he knows him, right?
09:08They have a good work relationship, right?
09:10And I imagine he was an advocate for C.J. Stroud.
09:12We can go back to Case Keenum and the ways in which he was a C.J. Stroud advocate.
09:16How much does...
09:17How does he feel about the way that this is set up?
09:18And how much does that say about the organization, the way that they go, hey, we are supporting
09:22Nick Haley with Jerry Sapulinski, his guy now being the quarterback coach, and we're supporting
09:26his vision of this.
09:28Is that...
09:29Is it possible that that's like taking sides in whatever this might...
09:31Whatever this thing might be that I can't really even quantify?
09:34I actually do think that they are convinced of what they want to do.
09:38We've seen it in their actions and their words, most of their words anyway, that they want
09:41to run the particular style of offense.
09:43Nick Haley is here because of that particular style of offense.
09:45He has those connections.
09:48Now, I'll just take them at their word also that they're saying they wanted another voice
09:52that can maybe relay that, you know, because Gerard has had West Coast background.
09:57And maybe he, you know, somewhat sympathetic to what C.J.'s quote-unquote complaints might
10:02be.
10:03You know, maybe he should be able to run some other things, have some other play calls, etc.
10:06But I think the Texans are saying, no, you know, this is what we're going to do, and
10:11we need the buy-in.
10:12We're doing this regardless of whatever quarterback going to be back there.
10:15And so they needed another voice who could really emphasize this style of offense.
10:18But does that inherently set up a possibility of animosity?
10:23Is that like just the landscape of this setup?
10:26Yes.
10:26And so I will ask, you know I like asking this question or using this framework.
10:30This T.J.
10:31Huchmizade going on the speakeasy and basically saying it's a matter of whether they can get
10:36on the same page and mesh.
10:37Something, nothing, or everything.
10:40Oh, it's easily something, and I'm kind of leaning everything.
10:44Because if that's the case and it continues, well, everything is, you have to look at this
10:51team, everything about this team, differently, offensively in terms of play calling, and
10:57including Nick Kaley.
10:58You know, we're sitting here saying there's this difference of opinion on play calling.
11:04Hell, maybe C.J.'s right.
11:07You know, maybe he's right.
11:09We'll have to return to this, I'm certain, at some point in the near future.
11:13Something that easily could have just slipped past everybody, but T.J.
11:17Huchmizade might have started a little bit of fire.
Comments