00:00So you and I were texting back and forth a little,
00:02the blind spots possibly for us in this thing.
00:04So as you, the listeners are listening right now,
00:07ask yourselves, are these blind spots for you as well
00:09for the Houston Texans right now?
00:11We've not really, because I feel like
00:14because they've made so many changes
00:15and they've done a lot of things on the offensive line,
00:19have we gotten appropriately concerned
00:21that they haven't really addressed the center position
00:23with an actual either upgraded center
00:26or maybe even somebody who's played center before
00:29This is where, because when I'm trying to figure out
00:33what my blind spots are, I'm like, okay,
00:37I haven't made a stink about this
00:39and there's things that they have done
00:42to address the center position, but not directly.
00:45I mean, everything is a little bit of a workaround
00:48or a flyer, taking a flyer on,
00:50yeah, you know what, Kaelin Rutledge
00:51might end up being able to play center really well.
00:54Or maybe Wee Woo can play center.
00:55Maybe Jake Andrews develops.
00:57Hey, maybe Eli Cox, he's still around.
00:59Like, all of these things are possibilities.
01:03They've got at least five guys on their roster right now
01:05who have played center either in college,
01:09in the NFL, or at the Senior Bowl
01:12in the case of Kaelin Rutledge.
01:13But they never really directly addressed it.
01:16Right.
01:16I'm cool just with having as many potential options
01:21and the fact that there's a competition there.
01:23But if we get into Week 3 and Kaelin Rutledge sucks at center
01:28or Jake Andrews just isn't, you know, he's starting
01:31and he's not the guy, then it'll have been a blind spot.
01:34I just don't, I don't suspect that it's a blind spot right now.
01:37Okay. What about depth at running back?
01:39After, like, if David Montgomery gets hurt,
01:42we're right back to where we were last year,
01:44misusing Woody Marks probably.
01:45I think this has been a blind spot for me.
01:47You bring it up quite a bit.
01:49Yeah.
01:49I just, I fall into that trap of almost pretending like,
01:53ha, running backs don't get injured that often.
01:55It'd be like me as an Astros fan being like,
01:58ha, seriously, what, you expect them to have this many injuries?
02:01He can't be as bad as last year.
02:02No, this will resolve itself just fine.
02:05Yeah, yeah.
02:05Yeah, I don't, I'm not happy with the depth at running back right now
02:08because I feel like if you have two running backs,
02:10you only have one running back.
02:12There's only going to be, you are an injury to David Montgomery
02:15away from being back where you were last year.
02:18You know, or even if Woody Marks gets injured,
02:21you're relying on David Montgomery to take the lion's share,
02:24or all of the carries.
02:26Well, the last rookie running back that we got super excited about
02:29heading into year two was Damian Pierce,
02:31and it went downhill for Damian Pierce after his rookie year.
02:34Now, it was a completely different system
02:35because his second year was D'Amico and Bobby Slowick's first year.
02:39This will actually be the same system for Woody Marks,
02:41but you just never know with guys who have a great rookie year
02:44if it's going to translate into year two.
02:46And you kind of, what I would annoyingly bring up at times
02:50is that Damian had kind of fallen off a cliff
02:54in terms of his production before he got injured his rookie year two.
02:57I mean, it really might have just been a fever dream
02:59of that stretch of games where, man,
03:02teams weren't really worried about Damian Pierce.
03:04He's going off.
03:05Or the Texans in general.
03:07Yeah, once anybody tried to anchor down against Damian,
03:10okay, this is maybe more the actual version of Damian Pierce.
03:14Good point.
03:15Have we worried enough about Nick Caley's improvement
03:18as an offensive coordinator in year two?
03:20I think there's a little bit of a feel right now where I don't think people are
03:27overly enthusiastic about Nick Caley right now.
03:29I think people were overly enthusiastic about Bobby Slowick.
03:33My biggest concern going into the second year of Bobby Slowick
03:36was that they still hadn't really established themselves as a well-rounded offense
03:40and that there were some real deficiencies in the run game
03:44that were really going to jump up and bite him if they didn't get that going
03:46because of the system that he runs.
03:48I think with Nick Caley, people are way more hesitant to crown him the guy
03:53for obvious reasons.
03:56Right now, I'm not nervous about it,
04:00but I think he might very well be an adequate offensive coordinator in the NFL.
04:07Yeah.
04:07But that's not good enough.
04:08No.
04:09So I think that, yeah, I've had a little bit of a blind spot
04:12and just kind of maybe talking about C.J. Stroud more than Nick Caley,
04:19where Nick Caley also has a lot to prove.
04:22The thing that keeps me optimistic about Nick Caley is some of the more fundamental aspects
04:26of offensive football they did get better at last year.
04:29I think some of that also has to do with the dynamic you're talking about
04:31where maybe we haven't touched on Caley as much this offseason
04:36is the last time we saw C.J., he was having a performance
04:39where I don't think people were putting that on Caley.
04:42C.J. was just, you know, see those two games.
04:45Caley can't control the fact that C.J. can't hold on to a snap in the Pittsburgh game.
04:50Right.
04:50You know, like that's not on the offensive coordinator.
04:52No, and then some of the decisions that C.J. was making.
04:55In bad weather, and this is where I am with Caley,
04:58a lot of the excuses or at least explanations that you can make for C.J.,
05:02partly, you know, in that Patriots game, I would say partly,
05:06is that you can say the same about Caley.
05:09You know, you could argue, man, maybe Caley should have dialed up
05:12some easier throws for C.J.
05:14Sure.
05:15The problem is, maybe because of the weather,
05:17C.J. wasn't hitting the easy throws that he did dial up.
05:20No.
05:20And you get stuck in situations where it's second and ten, it's third and long.
05:24You can't run the football at all.
05:26It's hard to criticize the play calling specifically in those instances.
05:32So, like, for right now, the fact that the offensive line did stabilize,
05:37and I think by the middle of the season last year,
05:39they were playing like an average offensive line,
05:41and they still didn't necessarily have the right offensive linemen out there.
05:46So, that's where I'm optimistic that it'll get better this year.
05:51Number four, Stingley and Lasseter being fully available in 2024 and 2025
05:59feels like an outlier to me just based on Derek Stingley Jr.'s injury history.
06:03Yeah.
06:04And, I mean, he was banged up last year but played through it to his credit.
06:07And then Kamari Lasseter, just the style of football that he plays
06:10is one that it just feels like there's going to be a concussion protocol game
06:14for Kamari at some point because he's so physical
06:17or just the body's going to break down.
06:20That they've played practically full seasons for two years
06:24feels like an outlier, and I don't know that the depth behind them
06:27is something we should be comfortable with right now.
06:30Yeah, that's where the – and I feel like we've talked a good amount
06:32about the depth in the secondary, that you just still don't have anybody
06:36other than guys like you hope Jalen Smith works out,
06:38that if one of those guys goes down, what prevents you from being
06:42in the situation you were in with the Chargers last year?
06:45Yeah.
06:45Where Kamari goes out and, oh my gosh, it's an absolute disaster.
06:49Kamari doesn't play in the Colts game.
06:51Six snaps Kamari missed in that Chargers game,
06:54and it felt like he missed 56 snaps.
06:57Yeah.
06:57He was out for six snaps, and they just went right after Tremont Smith.
07:00If you add on to that, too, that they were playing – you know,
07:02Tremont Smith was playing next to, oh, whichever – which recent signee at safety.
07:08Kevon Wallace.
07:09Yeah, it was Kevon Wallace for that couple of games.
07:11He was cut like two days later.
07:12Yeah, yeah, yeah.
07:14So without knowing how much that might have affected Tremont Smith or whatever.
07:18Good point.
07:19Yeah, there's – there were things that they had to do defensively last year
07:24to make up for the fact that they didn't have a guy they felt good about
07:28at the other safety position that hopefully does – if everybody's healthy,
07:32that with Ree Blankenship in there, you can make life a little bit easier
07:35on the cornerbacks when somebody goes out.
07:37I want to make sure we hit this one before we get done with the segment here.
07:41When we talk about the offensive line throughout this offseason,
07:44we talked almost entirely about the interior because that's where all the moves
07:47are getting made.
07:49And then obviously right tackle, Braden Smith is, I would think,
07:53the front runner for right tackle, but maybe Trent Brown.
07:56We talk very little about Ariante Urseri, very little.
08:00And I almost feel like we're treating him like he is some rock-solid fixture
08:04at left tackle when the fact of the matter is he's a second-year guy
08:08who's had one okay season under his belt.
08:11Yeah.
08:11Are we treating Ariante Urseri like he's too much of a made guy right now?
08:16I think, yeah, that would be a blind spot that I'm guilty of
08:18because I'm very optimistic about him.
08:20Same here.
08:20But just like whether you're a rookie left tackle
08:24or if you're the young core for the Rockets,
08:26it's not always just a slam dunk given that a guy's going to keep progressing
08:31at the same trajectory.
08:33I'm very, very optimistic about Ariante Urseri.
08:36Me too.
08:36But, yeah, I probably shouldn't treat him like when I talk about the Texans'
08:40offensive line and say, okay, look, good.
08:41I can feel good about every single position.
08:43Ariante Urseri still does need to improve in his second year for you to really look at him like,
08:49oh, yeah, okay, that's a guy that you can be happy about.
08:52It's going to be there year in and year out.
08:54I thought he had a very promising rookie performance.
08:56Yeah.
08:56No, definitely arrow pointed up next to him.
08:58But I was thinking about this yesterday.
09:00I'm like, God, we hardly talk about him at all.
09:02Real quick, I have to bring this up because somebody brought this up.
09:05Somebody said that I was being too complimentary to the Texans about Ariante Urseri.
09:10And he said, the Texans could have had Josh Simmons last year.
09:13And I have to just point this out to people who don't realize it.
09:16The Josh Simmons, the guy that, yeah, the Texans could have drafted in the first round.
09:22And he left on a game day.
09:24He disappeared.
09:25He went MIA.
09:27And the coaches, hours before the game, didn't realize that Josh Simmons wasn't in the building.
09:32I know you might say, well, Seth, well, yeah, who can predict something like that?
09:36But the scouting reports going into the draft that year were that he's got some issues.
09:42Yeah.
09:42So I know I will never fault the Texans as multiple.
09:46Josh Simmons was a classic, should have gone in the top 15.
09:49A lot of teams said, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.
09:52No, we do not want this headache in our building.
09:55So the Chiefs took a chance on him.
09:57Yeah.
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