Mike Freeman’s 10-Point Stance: Texans’ Mistake Looming Larger as Playoffs Near

(The Texans are toast, Luke Kuechly’s future, and the greatest NFL coaching tree of all time.)

    

1. The Texans Can’t Win with Brock Osweiler

You are the Houston Texans. Your defense is fast and talented. You have a solid running game. Your offensive line isn’t bad. You have (or had) one of the best wideouts in football. In many ways, overall, you’re not a bad football team. 

Except for your awful, horrid quarterback that you pay $18 million a year and will give $37 million guaranteed. Other than that, all is fine. 

So what do you do?

What does a team do when its franchise quarterback is the obvious weak link?

There’s a good chance the Texans capture the AFC South, which is akin to winning a lottery where the grand prize is a flaming bag of dog poo. The division is awful, but hey, a division title is a division title.

Still, there are some positive things happening in Houston. The defense is ranked in the top 10 in the NFL, and the rushing attack ranks fifth.

Yet Houston has the third-worst passing offense, and it’s all due to Osweiler, who has been part Jay Cutler and part JaMarcus Russell.

Osweiler has been so bad, he has turned one of the NFL’s greatest receiving weapons in DeAndre Hopkins into Johns Hopkins.

So back to the original question: What do the Texans do about Osweiler after they likely make it into the postseason? Truthfully? Nothing.

The Texans are stuck with Osweiler for their potential playoff run. The options behind him—Brandon Weeden and Tom Savage—are poor, to put it kindly. As bad as Osweiler has been, he’s likely better than what’s behind him.

Another problem is the eye-popping contract they gave Osweiler, which has left them in classic slave-to-the-salary-cap mode. Benching Osweiler would be an admission the team made a colossal blunder in signing him to such a large deal.

In short, the Texans can’t bench him and can’t get rid of him. They’re stuck with each other.

This situation is unusual but not unprecedented. In 2001, the Ravens gave Elvis Grbac a contract that included $11 million guaranteed. He lasted a single season.

Going that extreme route with Osweiler, though, would leave the Texans on the hook for $25 million in dead cap space next season, a hole no team wants to create for nothing in return.

A playoff appearance is no small thing, but if the Texans are forced to watch Osweiler throw footballs into the dirt and 10 feet over the heads of receivers in January, that buyer’s remorse they may already be feeling is going to sting just a little more.

    2. Luke Kuechly Has His NFL Brethren Worried

It didn’t take long after the heartbreaking image of a concussed Luke Kuechly being carted off was shown across the country for the texts to pour in to me from players. Four veteran players sent messages expressing how they weren’t just concerned for Kuechly; they were scared for him.

The players all knew Kuechly, and each described him, in various ways, as one of the most honorable players they’ve ever known. That’s why they all said they hope Kuechly thinks hard about his future. This is the second straight season the Panthers linebacker has missed at least three games with a concussion.

“He needs to think about not 30 years from now but five,” one of the players wrote.

All believed Kuechly should sit the remainder of the season, and one player even said Kuechly should strongly consider retiring. Kuechly is 25.

A decade ago, maybe even five years ago, this conversation wouldn’t have happened. Players would have lauded Kuechly’s toughness.

Now the head trauma awareness is so heightened, whenever some players see others suffer from multiple concussions in a short period of time, they don’t ignore it. They address it.

    

3. Jeff Fisher Was Stuck in the 1990s

The best coaches, no matter the sport, from Bill Walsh to Bill Belichick to Gregg Popovich, all adapt. They adapt their schemes. They adapt their coaching style. They learn from college …

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