More Fallout from Caserio Presser, Rockets-76ers, Stroud on the Move?

Thursday on The A-Team, Adam Wexler and Adam Clanton continue discussing CJ Stroud's struggles in the postseason, react to a possibe trade scenario for the Texans, examine further fallout from the Nick Caserio presser, and much more.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Team Sports Talk seven ninety wex Ac Josh Jordan with
you until Rockets launchpad interrupts us. Starting at five o'clock today,
you've got the Rockets and the Philadelphia seventy six ers.

Speaker 2 (00:15):
It's a reunion of sorts.

Speaker 1 (00:17):
Got Daryl Morey once upon a time, constructed these rosters
every single year, and with each passing year it gets
further and further away.

Speaker 3 (00:26):
Now.

Speaker 1 (00:27):
I enjoyed the time that Darrel was here because he
was so open with the media. And this is not
a shot at rafel Stone, but they're just so completely
different with that aspect of their jobs, and it's you know,
we we loved our visit with rafel.

Speaker 2 (00:42):
They've had the same desires. Oh for sure. If you
were in the finals with the Thunder, we want you.

Speaker 1 (00:50):
Well, how about this? And Daryl will be the first
person to tell you this. And I do think it's
no small thing. Darrow was never allowed to tear everything
down and oh basically got to do it in his
first year or two. Also because that's what the roster dictated,
That's what James Harden dictated. If he'll being honest.

Speaker 2 (01:09):
Even if James Harden, like obviously if he wanted to
be here, you would have had to build around him
continuously as he was getting older.

Speaker 1 (01:16):
But yeah, who else was on the team at that point,
because because Russ technically demanded his trade first.

Speaker 2 (01:22):
Like there was nobody left there was like you would
have had to really like obviously Daryl did build the
team from scratch so to speak with James, uh, but
at that stage it was no with him wanting out, like, Okay, perfect,
we will rebuild the team. And just like the Texans
were able to rebuild the team by trading someone who
didn't want to be here for draft picks that they
turned into excellent players, that's exactly what the Rock was.

Speaker 1 (01:43):
Well, but here's my question on that, since since we
just brought it up and didn't expect to.

Speaker 2 (01:48):
Three years of trash into what they are today.

Speaker 1 (01:51):
Oh well, how about this, if if less Alexander is
still the owner when everything everything happens the same way
it happened.

Speaker 2 (01:59):
Okay, they lose.

Speaker 1 (02:01):
In excruciating Game seven and twenty eighteen, Chris Paul's hamstrings,
got Foster all the stuff, et cetera, et cetera, and
then you know, James Harden demands they go get Russell Westbrook,
which you think I would think Les would have been
on board with because he loved adding superstars.

Speaker 2 (02:15):
Right. Well, so all of that.

Speaker 1 (02:17):
Happens, and then D'Antoni leaves, and Daryl leaves, and then
James demands a trade all do you think Less would
have let Rafel provided he was the guy, actually doesn't
really matter who the guy is. Do you think Less
would have finally said, Okay, for the first time in
my tenure, we're gonna do an actual stripe down rebuild.

Speaker 2 (02:33):
I mean, you might have been able to basically say, look,
I'll go at it both ways and you can give
me your input. Here's our trade that will rebuild us
into a winner if we do a good job of drafting.
And here's the trade that might maybe keep us competitive
but probably not Championship Calber unless we make ten other moves.
Which one would you like? And if he would have said,

(02:55):
my people are telling me Ben Simmons is good, let's
do that, then we'd all be screwed. Yeah, I'll tell
you this.

Speaker 1 (03:01):
There are a lot of things that went down during
the course of this rebuild we're talking about, and the
number one thing I thanked my Lucky Stars for. It's
kind of like not having kids with an ex wife.
You're not really fond of dodged a bullet there. I'm
not saying I don't.

Speaker 2 (03:16):
Have an X one. I wasn't saying me.

Speaker 1 (03:18):
Okay, I wasn't saying you either. I was just saying
not me. But anyway, that is a dodged bullet right there.
You know he's I just saw this weekend he was
selling one of his properties.

Speaker 2 (03:31):
Dodged bullet. What you're the one with the gun. What
do you mean you're the shooter?

Speaker 1 (03:38):
Yeah, but if they had gotten if they had gone
with the Ben Simmons package versus what they ended up doing,
and by the way, package very loose term. That's not
a package. That is an albatross you are welcoming into
your organization.

Speaker 2 (03:51):
If you were really trying to lean into adding current talent,
you would have been more into talking to other teams
with talent maybe that they could offer you, instead of
just well, this is it. It's either the Ben Simmons
deal or a much much much better deal that obviously
has worked out to a certain extent. They haven't challenged
for a title, but they certainly appear to be a

(04:12):
perennial playoff team. Near the top of the standings of
the Western Conference. Of course, again, while one of the
greatest teams ever assembled in the Western Conference, it was
Golden State before, it is Oklahoma City now, it's the
Sixers tonight, it's the Pistons tomorrow, and then back home
for the Grizzlies on Monday. Texans and everybody else in
the NFL except for four teams into their off season.

(04:36):
The Texans probably will be making coaching changes and probably
will be making coaching changes with some of the people
closest to c. J. Stroud. It was probably not the
offensive coordinator. There may be other changes there, and we
heard of a couple of interviews getting lined up for
people involved in the Texans organization, both on the personnel

(04:56):
side and on the coaching side. So we'll get into
that a few more moves around the NFL from a
coaching perspective, The team that also calls Texas home has
a new defensive coordinator, very young defensive coordinator, but very
well respected, and I think we will see in the
coming hours and days that most people think this is
a very good hire for the Dallas Cowboy. So we'll

(05:18):
get into that a little bit. There was a little
bit of other NBA news with a we're talking about
big players being traded at some point in time. The
honeymoon's long since been ended, but what's happening in Milwaukee
is probably going to be the driving storyline in the
league for the next thirteen, fourteen, fifteen days leading up
to the NBA's trade deadline. Both of those things are
out there. There's definitely some items with the future of

(05:40):
the Texans that we did not get into yesterday, regarding
what Demiko said earlier this week or Nick Cassario had
to say yesterday. And we're another day closer to a
lot of fans here in Houston visiting with their Astros
from Corpus to the Woodlands to Austin and tomorrow all
around Houston with the caravan going on, and of course

(06:00):
Sports Talk seven to ninety will bring you Astros Fan
Fest from Dykin Park on Saturday, both morning and afternoon,
be on the air at eleven and taking you through
four o'clock. Expected to sit down with pretty much everybody
that's out there from the Astros perspective. We should have
a chance to talk to Jeremy Pania early in the afternoon,

(06:20):
hopefully Carlos Korea about midway through the afternoon. Nothing final yet,
but likely we'll talk to their elite best in baseball
side of the infield. Maybe something to discuss with the
two of them when we get there. And everybody else
in their excitement about I forty five not just going
through Houston, but stopping in Houston for one, two, three years,

(06:45):
we'll see. It's got that Bregman deal. It was. The
Bashett press conference was earlier this week, his new team
with the opt out after year one, and he was
presented with that question that I'm sure Alex was when
he first signed with the Red Sox. Like every player
should or would be met with from the media when
they signed a deal like that. A question was simple,

(07:06):
is this something that you and maybe your agent regard
as a one year deal? And before he answered, uh,
the I don't know if who was on the podium
with him or at the table with him answering questions,
but it was Mets personnel or his agent, and they
jumped in and tried to answer that question. First, It's
just he's not a Boris guy, right, No, it's the

(07:26):
I would definitely have recognized him. Yeah, Scott was there
about you, we're going to be I mean, if you
don't think the Mets are the best team in New York,
that is just a bogus statement, and everybody knows it.

Speaker 1 (07:39):
You're way too good at that one. It's so easy
when guys have names like that. I thought you were
going to make a big apple joke. No, no, no,
we'll get some more. I'm sure in there there are
a few other Boris guys to sign, and obviously it's
just a it's an interesting storyline, and in light of
where we are to spring training, the best player available,
I believe is Astro's left hander from Bervalde.

Speaker 4 (08:00):
Mm hmm.

Speaker 2 (08:00):
There are a lot of reasons why he's sitting at
this point, a lot of reasons why he's wondering where
he's going to unpack his bags for string training and
there's going to be a Florida I mean, I could
only envision a scenario where he does that for a
not very good one year deal if that, and I
don't know how that could be his best offer, because
I'm sure there's other teams that don't want to commit

(08:21):
long term to him that would give him a one
year deal more lucrative than Houston.

Speaker 5 (08:25):
Uh.

Speaker 2 (08:25):
I mean, if the Astros are into it, they can
get to a certain level. I think it might make
them do other make other moves to do that. But
they've signed the fourth or fifth best pitcher on the
market this offseason. People forget so Emi was considered one
of the fourth or fifth or sixth best available starting
pitching options in the free agency and the Astros are

(08:47):
the team that they make added him.

Speaker 1 (08:48):
It makes you feel better if Fromber does the part.
But what if, because and again a lot of times
this stuff happens see Kyle Tucker, because of a bit
of a perfect storm. If you if you're Jim Crane
and you don't think you're going to be having a
twenty twenty seven season anyway, why not just open up
the bank for one year of Fromber and have a

(09:10):
sick three man rotation in which every guy could potentially
be competing for a cy Young If things fall right.

Speaker 2 (09:16):
Here, you're still looking at if if they sign him
for some lower deal but it pushes them over the
tax level, then it's really not for that amount of
money because now you're into the tax and then you
don't want to be a repeater for all these things
play into it, and even on Fromber's side, Yeah, I
gotta get I gotta get a deal with somebody. I'll
sign a one year deal here or there. Well, then
what who's Who's He's not signing with anybody next off

(09:37):
season because nobody is. That's a really bad place to be.
That's why some of these one year opt out deals
might not be what we think they are because of
what lies ahead in Major League Baseball. Potentially by the way,
nobody gets paid if there's a lockout. It's not just
like nobody gets paid. Somebody was asking me in this earlier.
I mean, if everybody was getting paid, they would say,
what's the point? Go ahead, lock us out? You mean

(09:59):
I get without doing any work. You know.

Speaker 1 (10:01):
It's sad about this, though, And I'm not talking about
the players, and I'm certainly not asking anybody to feel
sorry for them, because they're highly compensated and most of
these guys, not all of them, I get it.

Speaker 2 (10:12):
Baseball is the ultimate journeyman sport.

Speaker 1 (10:14):
But a lot of these guys will be Okay, it's
the stadium workers, it's the personnel on the front office,
it's the everybody on the staff of the Houston Astros
and any other team out there. If there's a lockout
and the twenty twenty seventh season is missed completely, that's
also the entire time none of these people are getting paid.

Speaker 2 (10:33):
Yeah, even the COVID season should have opened the eyes
to that. As many people that worked in these capacities,
well the people that work for these stadiums obviously, other's
just flat out out money. There's no dates for them
to work. And people that worked for the respective Major
League teams whose season was put on hold for months
they needed to felt like they needed to. These billionaires

(10:54):
felt like they needed to cut costs. I'm gonna be
cutting employees.

Speaker 1 (10:57):
I'm gonna be very careful about how I say this
because I want to share too much. I had a
conversation within the last month with someone that would know
this sort of thing, and he mentioned the COVID situation
and how teams handled that. This is a major League
Baseball person and he said, we have already months ago

(11:19):
advised workers that this is going to be a lot
like how COVID was. You know, people were being furloughed,
people were taking lesser money, all that kind of stuff
was happening around the entire country in every type of profession.
And this person was like, look, we have told our
staff you need to prepare like that's going to happen,
and we're not kidding. Because that's all I needed to

(11:41):
know if you had any doubt. And then when Kyle
Tucker signed his deal, that's when I was one hundred percent.
We're not having a twenty twenty seven season. It's going
to be a long summer. I hope you. I hope
you and I have a nice plan of how to
entertain because it's not going to be talking about baseball.

Speaker 2 (11:54):
I have zero doubt about it.

Speaker 1 (11:57):
So it's another reason why you want to enjoy this
upcoming twenty twenty six Astro season as much as possible.
It's a good chance you're not going to see baseball
until twenty twenty eight at the soonest all right, probably
not going to talk a ton of baseball today. We
will talk a ton of football. Matter of fact, I
don't think this is hyperbole. There is plenty more fallout

(12:18):
again my words, I'm not speaking for WEX here. Fallout
from the Nick Cassario presser yesterday and specifically what I
want to play next. This is not what you want
to hear from your general manager. Provided this is how
the season right there.

Speaker 2 (12:35):
This is not what you want to hear from your
general manager. Next on the eighth, too, Let's get right
into it as we continue with what is next for
the Houston Texas as they make their way through the
off season, await the free agent period, await the NFL Draft,
and then hit the field for their offseason workouts with
a third straight season of attempting to be better than

(12:58):
just getting to the divisional right there obviously been there
three straight seasons, but this will be the third straight
off season they will be attempting to do better than
that first off season. Prior to all this, they obviously
did much better than that. They were one of the
laughing stocks of the NFL. And then they won the
division and won a playoff game and made it to
the division round and that was great. And that's where
they have remained for each of the two seasons that

(13:19):
have followed, with the same coach, the same quarterback, the
same elite defense, and obviously the same people running this
football team, Nick Casario in charge. So he moves into
yet another off season teas that this is what you
don't want to hear from your general manager. You don't
want to hear from your owner. If you're Buffalo, We're
fine hearing with the owner here, and he hasn't had

(13:41):
anything to say this offseason, or do I think the
tee or Hannah or anybody else inside the organization needs
to But the general manager, Yeah, absolutely, and he met
with the media yesterday. So we'll just hit you with it.
I assume what we're gonna hear because I'm not even
sure what it is is what you do not want
to hear from your general manager. It's Nick Asario.

Speaker 3 (14:00):
I'm not really sure the question.

Speaker 6 (14:01):
I'd say we had one of the best teams in
the league, so I mean we went out there and
competed with every team in the league that we played,
So I mean, I don't I'm I'm not sure what
the what the question is.

Speaker 7 (14:11):
You know, the offense went to their statistics, didn't take
a huge jump offensively, and.

Speaker 6 (14:17):
I'm wondering the most important statistic is winning games, so
we want that's worth one.

Speaker 4 (14:22):
But you lost in the division round game.

Speaker 2 (14:25):
You ultimately want to get farther. Do you feel like
you could have done more to get to that.

Speaker 7 (14:29):
Point or were there circumstances that you felt were out
of control.

Speaker 6 (14:33):
We had a good enough team to win any game
we played. In the end, we didn't execute well enough.
You can't turn the ball over five times in the
divisional playoff, rund. I mean, taking care of the football.
Is this single most important stat correlated to winning?

Speaker 2 (14:46):
I mean, look it up. It's the truth.

Speaker 6 (14:48):
If you don't turn the ball over, you enhanced your
chances of winning. It's eighty five to ninety. I mean,
so that's the most important stat, turnovers, taking care the football, like,
look around the league.

Speaker 2 (15:03):
It's good tease. I just happened to disagree. What do
you mean. I was watching Bobby, I was sitting in
the front row, actually yesterday, listened to him say that,
and I couldn't agree more, could not agree more with
what he said. Now, you gotta be careful. I'm not
saying it. I don't think nick was saying it. What
do you mean? We did everything necessary? Look at our
offensive roster. We were perfectly well suited. This is Ursery's fault.

(15:26):
This is called Popovitch's fault. This is CJ's fault. This
is the other nick Ce's fault. It is saying any
of those things. He wasn't saying they're so good. The
only reason they lost is because of this. What he's
saying is his words, literal words, were good enough to
beat anybody they played. And I could not agree more.
They absolutely were. In the very number one reason above

(15:47):
all else was they turned the ball over. They could
have lost in the trenches because they did. They could
have done all sorts of things, which they did in
this game and in the Steelers game, but they lost
because of all the mistakes that they made that they
cannot make and can be avoided. They just didn't avoid them.

Speaker 1 (16:03):
Here's why I disagree that is in and of itself,
it's it's the truth if you don't turn the ball
over or not. But it's not because, in other words,
you're good enough to win that game, because your defense
is good enough to win that game, because that's what
happened in it for the majority of the Pittsburgh game.

(16:25):
You still made a lot of mistakes on offense, and
you were still able to win, in large part because
your defense scored two of the touchdowns.

Speaker 2 (16:33):
The margin victory. ME mean, how about if you don't
make your mistakes right? But that's why I say till
the fourth quarter to blow them out. Yes, very true.
But that's why I said, going into the New England game,
you know what, let's just have CJ. Stroud play twenty
five percent better. In that statement alone, and this isn't
Nick Cassario, this is me that said that. In that

(16:54):
statement alone, I already feel like you're somewhat behind the
eight ball. You're hoping for the best.

Speaker 1 (17:00):
And you just can't do that and consider yourself a
bona fide super Bowl contender. You can talk about how
your defense is a super Bowl caliber defense and you'd
be one hundred thousand percent correct, But I just feel
like you're playing with house money if you're looking at
any game in the postseason with that attitude.

Speaker 2 (17:16):
But yeah, and my point would be, you're basically what
you're saying, if you don't have the best roster, Nick,
then you can't say it. And that's fair if that's
what you think. I mean, only one team has the
best roster. I don't even know which of the four
remaining are have the best roster. I don't think this
stat is a coincidence. I don't even know if Nick
was aware of it. Which are the four teams that
lost last week in the playoffs in the NFL, obviously,

(17:38):
Houston was one of them. Uh geez, you're gie uckla
like Chicago and San Francisco. Guess which four teams have
the worst turnover margin in the playoffs and so far
all four of those, all four of them. They're the
only four teams that are minus three or worse, all
four of them. And you look at their specific games.
You know, San Francisco's lost to Seattle just that afternoon,

(17:58):
they were a minus five. Chicago in their game against
the Rams, well, they didn't have any takeaways. So each
of the three giveaways that they had, they were all
interceptions from Caleb Williams, including one in overtime. Was they
were minus three five for the postseason all the team
was in their game, they were a minus four. Josh Allen,

(18:19):
this awesome MVP quarterback. I mean, if Brandon Bean could
have pulled the chair out from under Terry Pagula so
he could have handled the press conference by himself, he
would have said the same thing. We had a good
enough team to bead every team we played, but you
can't turn the ball over.

Speaker 1 (18:33):
Okay, but now do New England for me, and just
do last week, you don't have to do. I mean
they didn't play the week before, but they did, they'd
be at the Chargers. Oh that's right, I'm thinking of
a Denver.

Speaker 2 (18:43):
Sorry, they turned the ball over five times in the postseason,
or three fumbles and two interceptions, so they had five
giveaways and they had six takeaways. So they were a
plus two last week.

Speaker 1 (18:55):
So that's a disingenuous thing to say. Not you, I'm
talking about Nick, Well, we just turned the ball over
too much.

Speaker 2 (19:00):
If you hadn't. I mean, if he adds the word consistently,
is it okay? Like it's both better turned it over,
you turn it over two more times than the other team,
So he does. I mean, if you want him to
add all those specific words, you can't turn the ball
over more times than the other team. You can't turn
the ball over two more times than the other team.
He could add that. I don't think it's necessary because

(19:20):
the bottom line is just don't turn it over, which
is again, I'm gonna scream it even louder. The further
out of the regular season and playoffs, we again and
further into the offseason, they are telling you this as
loudly as possible, and I don't know how it impacts
their decision on what they're doing with CJ strout Demiico
doesn't want to turn the ball over. What is in
his playbook? What is on his big board when he

(19:41):
brings everybody in the team auditorium and here's our twenty
twenty six plan. Have you guys seen this before? Yeah,
because it's the same opening slide I had in twenty
twenty five and twenty twenty four and twenty twenty three.
Don't turn the ball over, run the football, play defense, ready, break,
you can go do whatever you want the rest of
the offseason.

Speaker 1 (19:58):
Sixty six percent of that dry erase boards plan is
getting shot in the foot by your own gun one afternoon.

Speaker 2 (20:06):
No, this is the only game that it's ever happened
while CJ has been the quarterback in Demiko's been the
head running the football did not happen this year. We're
talking about turnovers.

Speaker 1 (20:15):
We're talking about the plan now because you change the subject,
because it's true though I don't think turnovers. I mean again,
they took care of the ball so well all season,
which makes it even more of like a glaring thing.
It makes it look even worse than it actually will Actually, no,
it doesn't. It was bad as it can get, but
it just looks worse I think in the grand scheme
of things, because you didn't do it all season long,

(20:36):
and specifically because CJ didn't do it like you could
talk about.

Speaker 2 (20:40):
I don't like the offensive line. It was patchwork.

Speaker 1 (20:42):
He didn't have enough time to throw, or his brains
were scrambled and he had shaking feet and all that
kind of stuff, and all of that factors into the
fact that he still didn't turn the ball over until
the most important two games of the year, and you
could only escape with a win in one of them.

Speaker 2 (20:55):
And again, one of those turnovers was what he marks fumble,
the only second half turnover. They could not run the ball.
That's a huge factor. This makes it even more difficult
to do both A obviously run the football, you were
very unsuccessful, and then when you can't be your quarterback
is likely going to drop back and throw over and
over and over and over and over and over and
over thirty eight times. They're probably gonna lose games where

(21:16):
he throws forty seven passes unless it's a four overtime
playoff game. This was a zero overtime playoff game, and
he attempted forty seven passes, doesn't even include the couple
of scrambles, and clearly the three times that he was sacked,
and that's fifty dropbacks plus that's losing football. Everybody knows that.
And again you'd have to have some crazy other things
going on where you want your quarterback dropping back fifty times.

(21:38):
They have a two point two yards a rush in
that game, and as I continue to make my way
back through the Demico Ryans era, I feel fairly confident
that's going to hold true. That's something that they've never
done before, not in three years, not in six or
five previous postseason games. A two point two yards per rush.
I figured there'd be one outlier there. They played Indianapolis

(22:00):
in twenty twenty three and averaged less than two point
two yards per rush in those games that year. That
was it. This is like beyond belief. So again, there
is some personnel to the answer that you should be
pushing back on. If you're happy with your group offensively,
forget about what CJ did. If you're happy with the
ten other players you're sending out there to play offensive football,

(22:20):
odds should be pretty good that you're going to be
able to run the ball at least a little bit,
at least you know, sixty five yards, at least three
yards of pop, at least twenty carries for seventy seventy
five yards. It doesn't have to be great, but it's
untenable at two point two yards of carry. It's untenable
when your starter has ten plus carries and less than
twenty yards. That means it doesn't mean he played poorly,

(22:42):
which he happened to. Also, it means there wasn't anywhere
for him to go because the five or six guys
you lined up in front of him to block couldn't.

Speaker 1 (22:51):
All right, we're going to take the hyperbole of this
segment and ratchet it up about ten billion. Next segment,
Best of X comes your way. A former Texans quarterback
wants to do what we'll tell you, Actually he will.

Speaker 3 (23:07):
Next the eight on Sports Talk seven ninety.

Speaker 1 (23:13):
And you didn't really care for what you heard from
Nick Cassio in any way, shape or form during yesterday's
press conference. I can't imagine that you're gonna like too
much what you hear from one of the franchises. And
I'll just say it, WEX he's an iconic former quarterback.
I mean, when you think back on the.

Speaker 2 (23:31):
Age, you get this brock Osweiler sound. That's not cool.

Speaker 1 (23:35):
So we think here in the National Football League that
if you can't win the turnover battle in the National
Football League, you probably shouldn't be a National Football League quarterback.

Speaker 2 (23:45):
But just like the person we are going to hear
from and several ex Texans quarterbacks, he makes a living
talking about football.

Speaker 1 (23:54):
On the college side. He packed twelve games that nobody watches.

Speaker 2 (23:58):
He did. I think he was in the for the
UH Cougar's Oregon State game earlier this year. That you say, hi,
I didn't have a chance to because when I finally
saw that he was there, I was working. I couldn't.

Speaker 1 (24:10):
Did you get to know him well when when he
was quarterbacking here in the National Football League in Houston?

Speaker 2 (24:15):
Good to know him well?

Speaker 1 (24:16):
He said that every time he's supposed to say NFL,
he would say National Football League.

Speaker 2 (24:21):
Well, that makes his answers longer, so he can say less.
He's not a radio host trying to fill time. So
it's not him no, and it's not woodworking specialist Tom Savage.
Can you name every quarterback in team history? I bet
you could. It's not Kent Graham. Nope, it's not Tony Banks,
it's not David Goone, not David Goone. I know it's
not field Yates because lost day when they had their

(24:41):
NFL program on ESPN in this studio, I can now
finally acknowledge his haircut and jawline and scruffiness.

Speaker 1 (24:49):
Yeah, he does look like David Karry. Thanks for joining
me from six months ago. When I started saying that,
I just didn't think it.

Speaker 2 (24:54):
I just kept watching him on TV thing it's because
he grew his hair out and looked like but when
he had the crew cut, he looked like David Carr,
the rookie. We don't We're not gonna hear from Graham Mertz.
We're not gonna hear from Case Keenan. We're not gonna
hear from David Mills. Tony Banks, yeah I mentioned him. Okay,
not gonna hear from Brian Hoyer, nor is anybody else. Actually,
he's still a backup, isn't he. We're not gonna hear

(25:15):
the I'm sure still rehabbing Deshaun Watson. I hope he's
rehabbing for the rest of his life. We're obviously not
gonna hear from someone who's still very involved with the
NFL wants to do everything he can for the players
and their benefits moving forward. So we're not gonna hear
from Shauber. All right, let's get to it.

Speaker 1 (25:32):
Fitsmagic on his podcast with Friend of the Show Andrew Whitworth.

Speaker 2 (25:37):
What do they call it? Fitsy Magic and probably fits
in Wit. Yeah, but it's something with WIT's name. There's
there's a little fine print above it on the logo. Anyway,
they were talking about the CJ. Stroud situation. You are
not going to believe this, or maybe you will. If
you're CJ.

Speaker 8 (25:55):
Stroud's agent. You're going in there and saying, look all
the other big time quarterbacks they got paid after their
third year, and we want sixty million dollars a year.
I just think that the people in that building that
are around him every day, c J. Stroud, they're the
ones that are going to have to make a decision
on this guy. Is this guy we want leading our building?
Who knows what CJ Stroud does? I mean, if they

(26:16):
don't give him the contract, is he going to sit
and wait and say, guys, I'm not showing up until
you pay me because that's probably the advice that his
agent is going to give him. And so you look
at their year overall, Davis Mills steps in does a
great job placeholder for CJ when he was out with
the concussion.

Speaker 2 (26:31):
For those weeks.

Speaker 8 (26:32):
Did it feel like it was a huge drop off
when Davis Mills was in?

Speaker 7 (26:36):
No.

Speaker 8 (26:36):
I just think that this is one to keep an
eye because I think it could get ugly this offseason.
But if you have hesitations about CJ being the face
of year franchise, this is me not knowing anything. I
think there's a chance maybe you trade him this offseason. Okay,
so where to begin? Yeah, that's exactly the sin. It's

(26:57):
a lot to unpack. As they say, the part where
he said me not knowing anything, because that's how you
feel about that statement. Right, Well, let's just go right
to the end. Tell me it's not hard.

Speaker 2 (27:10):
Go ahead, it's not hard, and what you're getting in
return and it's trade him? But why are you doing
that to get better at that position? Right now?

Speaker 6 (27:19):
Yes?

Speaker 2 (27:19):
Year with this defense? Look, I'm here for it. Who
is who's playing quarterback for the Texans next year? That's
better than c J. Strout?

Speaker 1 (27:27):
Well to hear him say it, it could be Davis Mills. Yeah,
he's a moron. Wow.

Speaker 2 (27:32):
That was another part of if you want to go
to that part. Did you see a drop off when
Davis Mills was out there? And Big Wit chimed in?
Those are the small words and Fits and Wit. That
is the title of their Podcat Fits, Magic and Big Witch.
He said no, that was his contributions to the fifty
second clip. Well, what was he going to say? Yes?
They mean I would probably say yes if I cared

(27:52):
about people's thoughts on my analysis of football. I mean,
there's plenty of numbers to look at if you want
to go through them all, and someone actually just posted
them the other day. I don't think people realize while
they were winning with CJ at the end of the year,
his numbers weren't very good. And as soon as Davis
Mills dove into the end zone against Jacksonville, he played
like Davis Mills. The rest of the time he was

(28:13):
out there, he played like Davis Mills. Before the fourth
quarter against Jacksonville, he had one quarter of oh my god,
this is great and to men, he led all the
other quarters of he looks like the Texans backup quarterback
that's not in a competition with the starter, and he's
never been in a competition with the starter, and he
shouldn't be in competition with the starter. And every negative
I have to say about Davis Mills right now still
doesn't mean you could have considered putting him in on Sunday. No,

(28:38):
And to be clear, I am not coming from that standpoint.

Speaker 3 (28:41):
I am not.

Speaker 1 (28:41):
That is not my opinion. I don't agree with doing that.
It's not about this in lieu of CJ. Shroud. We
want Davis Mills back out there, and everybody that was
saying that during the game on Sunday, I just can't
get with that.

Speaker 2 (28:54):
I'm just a we gotta do something. We got thirty
minutes left of football. We can't let this game, let
this team, let this season slip away. And if we
believe we can, it's not even a spark, it's a
can we get a couple of first downs over? Yeah?
Can we give our you know, flip the field even
a few times? Just anything? That is what we're seeing
out there. The reason it's not hard to trade c J.

(29:14):
Stroud is the same reason it's very hard to go
get one of the big names you want. They're all
making money.

Speaker 1 (29:20):
So all these people that are like me, you know,
Joe Burrow wants out make a call. Josh Allen may
or may not one out after what he's seen the
last twenty four to forty eight to however many hours
seventy two since that. I mean, the organization all of
a sudden is very much in flux in Buffalo. And
it wasn't on Sunday afternoon. It wasn't.

Speaker 2 (29:39):
Josh Allen is not available, I know, but let's just
say for the sake of Ark and Joe Burrow be
available because he's not happy in Cincinnati, and he hasn't
really made any attempt to hide it. He's so you
believe they will say, look, you don't want to play here,
so we just can't have him holding out, so we'll
trade him. It's Cincinnati. Anything's possible, anything's pause. That's a
really good answer.

Speaker 1 (29:59):
But I would be surprised if they said, well, we
have a franchise quarterback and this is not a Deshaun
Watson situation, because that should still be looked at as
incredibly unique.

Speaker 2 (30:09):
Yep, because it never happened before. I'm not talking about
the lawsuits I'm talking about that, I'm not playing here
this many years into my career, and I'm sitting out
an entire season with you.

Speaker 1 (30:19):
The only thing you can do compair that to is
both ELI and John elwayd But that's before they played
it down for those franchises that we're gonna drave.

Speaker 2 (30:25):
In other words, they had the same NFL statistics as
I did well and Shawn didn't. DeShawn was great, Sean
was an amazing quarterback.

Speaker 1 (30:33):
How many other franchises are going to say to a
youth pastor, here are the keys again. Very unique. That's
part of why it's the biggest reason he wanted out.

Speaker 2 (30:42):
Yeah to the fits, he comment about, you got to
look into trading him. If you're telling me you're moving
on from CJ so you can start moving forward with
Joe Burrow. Obviously, I'm not gonna stand in the way
of that idea, but I don't believe it is a reality.
I believe the reality is you're telling CJ and everybody
on this team we're better off without him. And who's

(31:03):
that better off in the building now? Because I don't
know where that player is coming from, and I'm happy
to look for it and I have, and I'm wondering
what teams could do this and where does it land
them in the draft? And with that arsenal, could they
move up in a draft, because I sure hope it's
not this draft, because if you're trying to build for
the future with some kid quarterback who's played no years
or one year, then you're gambling on in a huge way,

(31:27):
much more so than gambling on CJ for another year
or two.

Speaker 1 (31:33):
We're gonna leave it at that for this segment because
we're already a little bit late on the break, but
I want to pick this up when we get back.
Plus another former Texans quarterback apologizing to CJ.

Speaker 2 (31:42):
Shroud.

Speaker 1 (31:43):
There's a lot going on today with former Texans quarterbacks.
That's next, all right. So we have successfully, I think,
avoided any scenario where the Texans would realistically trade CJ.
Stroud this offseason all again, and I saw it at
The problem is when you start talking about the numbers,
because if you are gonna if you're gonna trade him somewhere,

(32:05):
it's gotta work financially more than almost anything else, because
if you're getting better at the quarterback position, then you're
either presumably trading for a guy who's making a whole
lot more money, and that's why he's better than CJ.

Speaker 2 (32:18):
Stroud. Also making more money than Will Anderson, Yeah, a
lot more, a lot more, which more than Derek Stingley Jr.

Speaker 1 (32:25):
And here's the thing, the only scenario where I could
see this, and again we're talking about ball security, not
necessarily this guy is head and shoulders better than CJ.
Stroud and or it's affordable. Actually, and there is no ore.
There is a free agent out there.

Speaker 2 (32:43):
I don't know who it is, but I'm pretty sure
I know how he plays well, you beat him in
the postseason. He's bad at football, as my guess.

Speaker 1 (32:51):
Would Aaron Rodgers be better at football simply by being
on this roster versus Pittsburgh's.

Speaker 2 (32:57):
That's great for a year. I know, then what well
you're going to be trading CJ.

Speaker 1 (33:02):
Stroud in that scenario, I would assume for a boatload
of picks to who whoever?

Speaker 2 (33:08):
I know, I mean dead serious. I know it seems argumentative,
but who wants to give up a boatload of picks
for CJ. Stroud for one year of limited salary and
maybe a second year of not too crazy salary? As
they then make their decision on if he's their long
term answer. If you think the Texans are ready to
move on from him, which I don't not think that
they are because they're not sure about his future, then

(33:30):
you have to find some team that is sure about
his future. And as fitz he said, if he thinks
this is actually agent driven and he would sit out
and then you're more compelled to move him, Well, why
is he sitting out because you won't give him a
long term deal? Then why is he going to play
for the team you traded him too, unless they've already
agreed to give him that long term deal. So this

(33:51):
new team, they're not questioning whether he's their quarterback of
the future. They're confirming that he's their quarterback of the future.

Speaker 1 (33:59):
What if a team that had the number one pick
in the draft looks around and says, all right, we
have the number one pick in the draft. We need
a quarterback. We don't think that this draft is strong enough.
In other words, Fernando Mendoza does not tickle our fancy
compared to adding players around an established guy like CJ.

(34:21):
Shroud who might enjoy a change of scenery, and we're
willing to give up some by the way high in
those rounds draft picks, even if it's not the number
one overall pick. I don't know what the deal would be,
and we're not having to pay him yet. He still
has a prove it deal or prove it year ahead
of him.

Speaker 2 (34:38):
But so you're getting the Raiders' number one pick in
twenty twenty seven and some other picks because you're not.
You didn't say they were going to trade this year's
number one, right right, I wouldn't think they would, But.

Speaker 1 (34:52):
Now you're using that number one pick on a different
position other than quarterback, if they.

Speaker 2 (34:56):
Probably would trade it, just not to Houston. That's true.
They're gonna trade for c. J. Stroud keep the number
one pick, which is now not for them a quarterback, but.

Speaker 1 (35:07):
Maybe their second round this year as part of the deal. Yeah,
all that's the first pick in that round. I mean,
I would prefer if. I mean, I'm happy to entertain
this conversation. You can do, That's all I'm saying. Let's
look at it from this side.

Speaker 2 (35:20):
Can't you do better? Like your c J. Stroud is
the number two overall pick, has been to the playoffs
two games apiece all of his years and he's gonna
get moved for the thirty fourth pick in the draft
and some other stuff, the thirty ninth pick, the forty
second pick.

Speaker 1 (35:35):
I don't know where the Raiders arena finish. The fact
that we're having this conversation about trading C. J. Stroud
is unthinkable three years ago.

Speaker 2 (35:42):
I honestly still think it's unthinkable four days after what
just happened. But you also can't ignore what just happened.
I'm not gonna ignore it, but I don't think this
team is in better shape with the roster that they
have in place for more than just twenty twenty seven
to say, well, let's see with what Aeron Rodgers.

Speaker 1 (36:00):
Can do for a year or maybe if you're about
to commit fifty million per or whatever to Will Anderson Junior,
you're about to have this defense basically return in every
facet that you would like. And you have some of
those guys already locked up before Will, so it's time
to win. Yeah, well can you do that with the
quarterback you have? Yes, you're sure. I believe that you can.

(36:22):
Regarding all other options, this is the one I would
tell and you have to absolutely positively either go sign
Breise hallet running back and draft some very good rookie
offensive lineman.

Speaker 2 (36:34):
But if you if you just go out and sign
Aaron Rodgers, you don't have to do either of those
two things, right, I mean Aaron Rodgers behind this offensive line,
let's see it. I'd love that.

Speaker 1 (36:44):
Aaron Rodgers behind this offensive line is not going to
throw that one pick.

Speaker 2 (36:48):
Yeah, it's just one day, like he hadn't done it
in any of the other games he's played pretty much
his entire career. That stakes were, hire, all that stuff.
I get it. So I can't say he would never
do it again. He might do it again, But I'm
still down with moving forward on the CJ train.

Speaker 1 (37:01):
If you were Aaron Rodgers, would you want to come here?
Let's just ask that question absolutely in a heartbeat. Well,
who wouldn't want to play for this team?

Speaker 2 (37:07):
I'm not at exactly Herbert would want to play here.
Maybe he should. That's just one of the two more
hours we're gonna give you today, leading you into Rockets basketball.
More from what are the Texas Gonna Do? Oh my God?
Next quite the opening hour of the program, ending with
US sending number seven elsewhere at a former Houston quarterbacks

(37:32):
request potentially, But that's where we are here on a
Thursday edition of the A Team. Wex Ac and Josh
here with you. Two more hours of this hour of
Rockets basketball pre game coverage with both launch Pad and Countdown,
and then it's time to see the Rockets into a
fourth consecutive victory. Possibly. They've got the Philadelphia seventy six
ers tonight. They've yet to lose a game against the

(37:53):
East this season on the road in their buildings, and
they have another one coming up tomorrow night against Detroit.
Back home for Memphis to begin next week, Rockets wrapped
up their five game homestand with three consecutive victories, went
four and one overall. The lone loss on one of
their several visits in front of the national television audience
to the Oklahoma City Thunder. A visit in front of
the national television audience on Sunday for the Houston Texans

(38:16):
was well, it was a hit. You could say. Three
consecutive seasons with the Texans appearing on the Disney Family
of network, some form of fashion has been very very
good to that family, and it was the best they've
ever had, the best football broadcast for that network since
they began broadcasting NFL games non Super Bowl, and that

(38:38):
goes back to nineteen eighty seven. That's how many people
were locked in on what unfolded as a crazy performance
by the Texans offense, a performance by the Patriots offense
that was very imbalanced. There were a handful of plays,
certainly passes from Drake May for touchdowns that looked awfully good.
There were also a bunch of plays where Drake May said,

(38:58):
I don't need the football here than you guys have it,
just kidding, we're going to land on it, and the
Texans and Patriots into the fourth quarter of a one
score game. Texans in the second half of a one
score game, driving and trying to put themselves in a
better position, and turnover number five occurred. Patriots are at
practice this week. The Patriots are getting ready for a

(39:20):
Saturday flight to Denver this week as the two seed
in the AFC, so where they should be just based
on what happened during the regular season. It's the number
one seed, it's the number two seed. Granted, we know
what they're up against this coming Tuesday or coming two
o'clock game on Sunday, same time as last week. They're

(39:40):
up against the team that's starting a quarterback hasn't played
for them this year. He's been with them all year,
and he played in the preseason, but he didn't play
football for them this year because of the backup quarterback.
For a quarterback who played all seventeen games healthy enough
to play all seventeen games, and then he played an
eighteenth game healthy enough to play the entire game, meaning
he also took a snap with a broken bone, and

(40:03):
then they said, well, because of this broken bone suffered
on this second to last play of the game, a
broken ankle is going to sideline bone Nicks, who, according
to Sean Payton, was already set for surgery this week,
which has occurred. And so it's a onto Jarriott Stidham
for the Patriots defense, who didn't really so called in
my opinion, mayn handle CJ. Stroud as much as they

(40:24):
manhandled the Texans offensive line, so they could manhandle their
offense in general. They didn't let them run the football
and they did not let them hang on to the football.
If they have a repeat performance of dominance on the
interior with their defensive tackles, who by the way, were
awesome this year, maybe the best in the AFC. I
saw a couple of posts about this today. The four

(40:46):
teams that registered the best pressures from their defensive tackles
during this season, they are playing for the four teams
that are still playing football. We know quarterback plays everything,
we know shutdown corner are the next best thing, or
they tell us, we know edge rushers are the next
thing you have to have. But the four teams basically

(41:07):
with the best interior defensive line are the four teams
still playing football this weekend. And it absolutely played out
in those games. Definitely in the game we focused it
on because that's where the Texans were at their worst.
Couldn't run the ball up the middle, couldn't keep guys
out of the pocket, couldn't do the things they wanted
to do. The interception for touchdown was a play that
was blown up by the defensive line. It's a good

(41:29):
place to have good players. Patriots have those. Yes, they
do pains me because I honestly don't. I mean, I know,
I should think the Patriots are going to go in
there and win this game simply because the quarterback mismatch.
But the Denver Broncos defense, much like the Texans on
Sunday is right there at the top of the league, and.

Speaker 1 (41:51):
They are playing at home, and if Jared Stidham cannot
play like CJ. Stroud, they've got as good a chance
to win that game at home as the Texans did
in New England.

Speaker 2 (42:01):
Yeah, Texans were a slight underdog a week ago, and
the Broncos playing at home, are that slight underdog. To
the Broncos a little bit larger, to the Patriots a
little bit larger. They're a four and a half point dog.
But it does go into clearly the quarterback position. They're
going to be favored of that game if Bonix is playing,
I do believe, But I do think there is a
much better chance of the Broncos winning than it seems

(42:25):
like most people are giving them as we sit here
on Thursday.

Speaker 1 (42:28):
Yeah, that's good because I don't want to see New
England in a Super Bowl again, and nobody else does
either outside of Boston. So let's get to the continuing
tour of former Texans quarterbacks saying things about the current
Texans quarterback. We're already in the first hour. Touched in
or you know, touched the base. Yeah, checked in, touched
base heard from Ryan Fitzpatrick weighing in on it, Texans

(42:53):
might have to explore trading.

Speaker 8 (42:56):
Not knowing anything, I think there's a chance maybe a
trade him this offseason.

Speaker 1 (43:00):
Yeah, easier said than done. Even if the Texans were
considering that, which I don't think, it could be pretty easy.
Do you guys want him? I don't care what you
give us. That could be easy, which they would never say. Hey, Nick,
what do you What do you think was the last straw?
Why do you think Callan Hannah told you to get
out of here?

Speaker 2 (43:16):
I don't know. Maybe it was the CJ deal. Maybe
it was the deal where we we just we just
had to move on from and I didn't really get
much in return. Say what you will.

Speaker 1 (43:23):
There are a lot of videos of CJ Stroud crawling
around right now that are super cringe worthy in light
of what he did on Sunday talking about how he's
the best, one of the top five quarterbacks in the league,
all this kind of stuff.

Speaker 2 (43:35):
Thing like that's out there this week. Oh yeah, he's
one of the top five quarterbacks in the league according
to him earlier in his career. Oh from CJ. That's yeah,
that's fun. Would you think I meant no I just
didn't hear that part of it. I'm like, who's saying that.
Nobody's saying he is not saying that today. He said
it when he was good. It was true. Yeah, same difference.
All right.

Speaker 1 (43:55):
So you mentioned one of them. We were talking about him,
Brock Osweiler, and I saw this. Yeah, there's basically any
number of quarterbacks, including former Texans quarterbacks, could have done
what for example, dan Orlovsky was asking CJ to do

(44:18):
on Sunday, Just don't screw it up.

Speaker 2 (44:20):
We're not asking you to win this game. We're just
asking you not to lose it. And he did lose it.

Speaker 1 (44:25):
And that's a big reason why we are having these
conversations that they're not headed to Denver this weekend. All
those things we already know all that, that's obvious. But
I think dan Orlovsky felt bad about how he characterized CJ.
Stroud and how hard he came down on him earlier
this week, to the point where he felt the need

(44:47):
to public publicly apologize.

Speaker 9 (44:50):
Before I do that, you know, I want to go
back to Monday morning, because on Monday morning, after the
Patriot Texans game, I went on and said Houston wins,
that game with thirty and one other quarterbacks. I want
to publicly apologize to c J.

Speaker 2 (45:02):
Stroud. I crossed the line. I don't ever want to
do that in this role.

Speaker 9 (45:06):
When I started eight years ago, it was making the
commitment never go on TV and say away they won
because the quarterback played good, or they lost because the
quarterback played bad, and so I've been called out on
it accountability, full stop. Shouldn't have done it. There's ways
for me to say that in regards to c J.
Stroud did the one thing he couldn't do and that's
why they lose the game. I don't want to take
away from New England's defense as well, So full stop,

(45:27):
that wasn't cool.

Speaker 2 (45:27):
Of me and that was wrong with me. Different way
for me to communicate that. And he did it because
he has become a little bit more like the most
highly seen and highly paid voices on that network. Man,
you're too good at analysis and too subdued with your delivery.

(45:50):
Can you amp it up a little bit? Yell more,
say more outrageous things, be more fly off the handle guy,
because those are the guys we put on all of
our shows, more and more and more, even though this
is what happens when you do that, And I don't
think of other I don't know that everyone agrees, but
I do think he has done more of that in
the last several months than he ever did, as he
ascended correctly up the ladder for what he was actually

(46:14):
delivering in terms of material.

Speaker 1 (46:15):
Yeah, because what he was actually delivering was sound analysis
and not jack assery like his coworker Ryan Clark, who
I can't believe is still employed for like fifty different
reasons right now.

Speaker 2 (46:26):
What Dan's apologizing for I don't even think is that crazy,
but it's pretty obviously not the truth. Well, fourteen quarterbacks
help their teams get to the playoffs. All fourteen of
them have good enough seasons to do it, even Aaron
Rodgers on one side, probably the worst AFC quarterback in
the playoffs. But there's another eighteen that are watching. There's
another ten or twelve teams that could can't wait to

(46:49):
get rid of the quarterback that they used most of
the year. The number is probably more like twenty or
twenty two at most. And as he introduced his apology there,
he knows there's a billion different wayss like you said,
twenty five percent better than he did against Pittsburgh. That's
a winning performance probably, and he didn't. He played seventy
five percent worse. And it's just there's a lot easier

(47:12):
ways to make a very good point, and it's obviously
I think it gonna be taken. The thing is everybody's talking
about the nonsense that he said, which unfortunately is what
they want from their people. I think it's nice that
he acknowledged that that's not what he wants to do,
but he still did it. Yeah, he did, and he
also doesn't probably need to apologize, but he did well.

Speaker 1 (47:32):
That's because that tells me a lot about Dan. You know,
he's he is in my opinion. I said this earlier
today when I saw that he's by far the best
analyst for the NFL that that stupid network trots out
there every day, and it's not particularly close.

Speaker 2 (47:49):
I actually think they have a lot more analysts that
are very good. They just don't don't put them on
very much. They save them for this show, or they
are only on here, they ask less of them, or
they're probably contractually obligated to do so little that they
don't ask them to do.

Speaker 1 (48:02):
Give an example of someone who seldom used that you
think it does a good job, like like Orlovsky.

Speaker 2 (48:10):
I mean they're trying to be specific to someone who analyzes,
I guess quarterbacks. Yeah, it's probably actually there aren't that
I would still there he is, and that's who I
immediately thought of. I like him too, I think it
does a good job. Just watched him the other day,
I'm like, what are you talking about, dude? Oh he
said something that was just wasn't what I was expecting.
So now I was hesitating to include him that. Here's

(48:32):
the thing about Dan Dan Orlovsky.

Speaker 1 (48:35):
You're never gonna listen to what he says one way
or the other and think to yourself, he doesn't watch
the games. He absolutely watches the games plural, not just
the game he's talking about it. When are you given time?
He watches the league, He studies the league, he studies
the quarterback position specifically, And that's all you can ask
for for him, a guy like that.

Speaker 2 (48:54):
So on that note, the other things we could apologize
if we wanted to. Man, they lost the game because
yes and no, because there are other parts of this
team that aren't good enough and didn't play good enough.
That is part of why they are at home and
that is where we go next.

Speaker 3 (49:13):
The A team on Sports Talk seven nine.

Speaker 2 (49:15):
Are not say anything on air. It should be a
lot easier. I can't man pay less on air attention
to the stuff you pay attention to unless it's like
coming from some source that everybody hears and everybody's going
to pay attention to. It can be yelled into the cave,
can't it. I am mildly I'm mildly happier when.

Speaker 1 (49:41):
I see that the site that this drivel was churned
out from has not that many followers, relatively speaking. It
still has like thirty six thousand followers, but it's not
like some account that has like millions of followers.

Speaker 2 (49:56):
And I just oh again.

Speaker 1 (50:00):
The only reason I even consider bringing it up is
because it's about the NFL.

Speaker 2 (50:04):
It's about football.

Speaker 1 (50:05):
But I just can I just a psa one sentence
and I'll be done and we can move on. Like
everything you disagree with in twenty twenty six is not fascist.
I'm sorry, Like that's the most overused word on the planet,
and the NFL definitely not fascist.

Speaker 2 (50:20):
Luckily, it's a word we pretty much never used on
the show. I think that's time one, I swear so
we were talking about the Texans, and you talk about
the Texans pretty much consistently throughout this week, and I
don't think that's going to end because of the way
that their season ended, I think rightfully. So I'm trying
to think through each of the teams that lost, you know,

(50:40):
the way the Bears lost, They're that's going to sting,
even though they just got to this plateau. They were
a last place team a year ago. They've got a
first year head coach. He's among the five finalists for
Coach of the Year. They probably think they could.

Speaker 1 (50:54):
Have done a couple things differently in that one particular
game and they'd be playing this weekend as the two
seed on the road at Seattle. They were in overtime game,
they had the lead late. That's how their season ended.
Niners were a little bit like the Texans. They've been
here a couple times. Kyle Shanahan's been here a bunch
of times now. They had to fight through probably more

(51:14):
injuries to significant parts of their team than anybody else
in the NFL that was also successful. There probably were
other teams that had injuries like this, but they weren't successful.
The Niners managed to still be successful. Partially because they
did something the Texans did. They were forced to turn
things over to their backup quarterback, and all they did
was win football games. They weren't undefeated with Mac Jones,

(51:35):
but they won the great majority of their games. I
believe they only lost one of his starts here in
Houston against the Texans, but their season ended in an
exceptionally disappointing way. But they were also never in their game.
It was seven to nothing before they even saw the football,
and it just the grap just getting game wider and
wider and wider. Known the Buffalo Bills also like Houston,

(51:55):
and we've seen how they've reacted to losing a game
in a similar manner where they'requarterback. Feels like the biggest
reason that could have been avoided and why they lost,
Like could the Texans avoided getting mauled up front? No,
these are the guys they had available. They had three
extremely important offensive players give them a combined total of
like thirteen snaps. I never did my snap counts for

(52:17):
the playoffs. I'm sorry it's wrong of you.

Speaker 2 (52:19):
Dalton Schultz didn't play after the first quarter, and obviously
Nico Collins and one of their five offensive linemen. Starters
did not play at all, so they were down a
few players. They're not gonna be able to change that,
and they aren't gonna be able to change who was
out there. But just like Buffalo, they could have changed
how often their quarterback gave the ball the other team.
I know there were three other turnovers for Josh Allen,
but the turnover at the end of the half is intexcuseable,

(52:41):
and I don't I mean, I know why people blame
Sean McDermott, because the best thing a coach can do
there is the best thing for his team. Well, he's
got the MVP, he's got arguably the best player in
the entire league as his quarterback, who's been in these
situations hundreds of times. So you're telling me the coach
should have taken a knee and said, we don't have

(53:03):
any time outs or sixteen seconds. What are we gonna
do from where we are? And you could be right,
Or he could trust his all world quarterback, who's shifty
and as capable of turning something into nothing as anybody
out there. You can trust him to not turn the
ball over on what could otherwise be the last play
of the half by carrying the ball loosely and running

(53:24):
for it. But that's what Josh Allen decided to do,
and it cost his team three points in a game
they lost in overtime. I don't know if Sean McDermott
also got fired for that, but that's the Texans vibe
from the only way we don't advance based on what
just happened in the last three hours, it's because our
quarterback gave the football away too much. There were clearly

(53:45):
other factors. James Cook had a fumble. What he marks
out of fumble. Lots of similarities here. The Texans got
mauled up front. I believe I said that in the
last couple of minutes.

Speaker 1 (53:54):
Yes, yes, And that's a big, big part of why. Again,
when you listen to Nick casseerra yesterday and you hear
exchanges like this, and it's a little bit in long form,
but that's okay because I want to I want to
include kind of well all of the context. I want
to I want you to know what he's being asked
and how that back and forth kind of goes. Because

(54:16):
when you're asked about an offensive line that I just
don't think you yet. You drafted a guy, and he
was good. I think Ursies was good this year. I
think he's going to get better. And I think you've
got your left tackle, which admittedly is the most important
position on the squad, but it's the least you can
do when you traded your starter at that position and
by the way, got a high second round draft pick.

(54:38):
In the final analysis of things, I want more of that,
and I don't want I don't want bs from Captain
Word Salad aka Nick Cassario when he's asked about it.

Speaker 2 (54:51):
Just you know, use your judgment, tell me what you think.

Speaker 1 (54:53):
When you hear Nick Cassario being asked about the twenty
twenty five Texans offensive line.

Speaker 6 (54:59):
Repetitive group, we felt that it would be improved, you know,
in an the end, we end up with like one
player that started who had I know, Titus played multiple positions,
but Titus was really the only player. The rest of
the offensive line was a number of new players are
changing spots. I mean, overall, I'd say that group certainly improved.
I think Cole did a phenomenal job with that group,

(55:20):
him and coach Unzer, and we ended up kind of
like we talked about, though, are using everybody you know,
and eventually it kind of settled down once Tate was
able to kind of settle in the left tackle. Tate
played really good football. I'd say he made some young
football player mistakes and there's some things technique wise that
he can certainly improve. You know, we felt once Trent
got healthy that Trent would go out there and played

(55:42):
pretty good football, and he did. You know, I'd say,
you know, Jake Andrews gave us a good level of play.
You know, he probably played honestly hurt, probably played on
one leg for about half the year. Just kind of
speaks to his toughness. And then Ed, I mean, Ed
had a good year. He probably had his best year.
He's a free agent, you know, kind of to see
how that goes. So, I mean, overall, certainly improved. You know,

(56:05):
there's always things that we can do better, but we
got contributions from everybody. You know, Blake had to go
out there and start against the Chargers, played pretty good football.
Me and j Patt, we've always kind of viewed him
as a swing guy, kind of inside, sort of that
sixth seventh offensive lineman. That's kind of the role that
he had. So we have some players who will be
free's in that group. We have some players are under
contract for next year, so you know, I'm sure there'll

(56:28):
be some different players in that group next year. But
we also have some guys that you know under contract
that are coming back, so you know, looking forward to
kind of putting that group together. But I mean, overall,
like they were improved. I think the past protection was improved,
certainly was improved relative to last season. So it's always
a combination of factors involved. It's personnelity, scheme, there's a
lot of different things. It's not one particular thing. But

(56:50):
overall that that group played you know, pretty competitive football,
you know, from kind of start to finish.

Speaker 1 (56:57):
All right, that's it, listen, that's all. Let me break
this down very simply. He just did no, he didn't
do anything of the sort. He answered the question.

Speaker 2 (57:05):
He was asked.

Speaker 1 (57:08):
If you were to go do this press conference over
and someone were to ask Nick Cassario, hey, what did
you think about the defensive line this year? What'd you
think about the defense in general? He's not dancing around
for a minute eighteen seconds talking about competitive this and
this guy that and' gonna we've improved, improved and proved improved.

(57:29):
These guys were frothing at the mouth, pit bull ass kickers.
That's what you say about the Texans defense. You know why,
because there's no doubt about it. There's no holes in
the unit. And I'm not asking him to have no holes.
It's an NFL roster. It is a living, breathing thing.
It's evolving. I get all that, but you didn't go
discount been shopping for your defense. You had stud stud

(57:51):
stud stud stud every position. We're gonna kill you tonight
and there's nothing you can do about it. That's why
we always talked about leading up to this game. We're
not trying to put all these exotic packages in. Here's
what we do. Here are three plays. Kill your quarterback,
defend the ball, and kill your quarterback again, and you
can't stop it. The offense they've improved, I don't want
to hear that this year. It's time for that to

(58:14):
be over with. You have a super Bowl caliber defense,
Your special teams is awesome as well. And your quarterback,
if you want to give him this percentage of the
blame or that percentage of the blame, fine. You have
to fix this offense, not just an offensive line. You
have to fix the offense this year. I realize, Joe Mixon,
that's every team goes through this stuff. But you have
to do better. You just have to if you're really

(58:36):
serious about winning. If you're not, then just come out
and say so.

Speaker 2 (58:39):
But I think he said everything he just said and
then either began it with or ended it with, but
we've got to be better up there. Everything would be fine, right, No,
I don't know, no, no, no, no, like he you don't.
I think people here or read some of the clips
that get sent out via transcript. You know, sometimes during
a press conference, I'll take a little bit of what
he said and put it out there. It's not his

(58:59):
entire answer. This was almost his entire answer, so you
did get more of it in full, and they just
they hear what he says and like, oh my god,
this sounds like he's fine with what they have on
the offensive line. I actually read that from somebody. I
don't think they're even going to make changes. He's telling
us that Jake Andrews played on one leg and played
pretty good football. Well, guess who's our starting center again
next year. I mean, he thinks the five guys that

(59:20):
he just watched get mauled by the Patriots are the
same same five guys that they should want out there
next year. We're screwed.

Speaker 1 (59:26):
But what do you always hear about when it comes
to the offensive line for any team, not just the Texans?

Speaker 2 (59:30):
Continuity? Would it?

Speaker 1 (59:31):
Honestly, I'm asking you dead, would it surprise you if
the Texans did that?

Speaker 2 (59:37):
Yes, a great deal, would think, yeah, yes, it would
be so. But it surprised me last year that they
did what they did. They had no continuity zero, Yeah,
because they were passworking the whole thing. Well, they found
three starters for next year if they keep them all,
I don't like these three starters. I want Howard and
ingram Urseri's the only guy I would bring back next year.

Speaker 1 (59:56):
I'm not even kidding. They'll be worse. Why because they
didn't play together. If you have never players.

Speaker 2 (01:00:02):
Okay again, trading CJ and redoing the offensive line in
four spots. Explain to me how they're gonna do that
this offseason.

Speaker 1 (01:00:09):
Look, there's a lot of that going around right now.
If if Ryan if Fitzpatrick can talk about trading CJ. Stroud,
I don't think it's just so out of the ordinary
crazy for me to say should probably overhaul your offensive
line that you just said got mauled.

Speaker 2 (01:00:25):
Should the Texans overhaul their offensive line? Next on the
A team, The A team on Sports Talk seven.

Speaker 1 (01:00:32):
Ninety is the eight team Sports Talk seven ninety.

Speaker 2 (01:00:36):
I'm trying to luwer my blood pressure. You know, we'll
know where the problem is. Like we can say CJ
had a bad game or a bad postseason, so should
we consider this? And we can say once Nico Collins
not a part of the wide receivers, it's not a
very threatening group. And Joe Mixon didn't play at all
this year, so clearly there's some things they probably want
to do in the backfield. And Dalton Schultz was very
good this year, and then the tight end usage in

(01:00:58):
the postseason was crap because he left after a quarter
in the last game. The offensive line is a little
bit different story. The question of arcs and the issue.
The only real issue that unfolded this year was they
couldn't put the five best linemen out there on the
field very often. They did it like seven times. They
played nineteen games, and Sunday wasn't one of them. They
were embarrassingly bad at figuring out who their best linemen were.

(01:01:21):
And it was unfortunate that ed Ingram was unavailable in
week one. He started the entire training camp. He was
on the number one group for good reason the whole
time he was here. And then he and Braxton Barrios
got hurt in the time between the last preseason game
and the first regular season game at practice, and so
Cam Robinson has to start. And they stupidly said, well don't.

(01:01:43):
You don't have any experience of right tackle. You're not
really a swing tackle, so you can have the left
tackle job. You've played elsewhere badly in the NFL, and
we're gonna bump Ursery over to right tackle. He's gotten
reps this preseason over there. We thought he might be
the swing tackle. Instead he won the job at left tackle.
But our best five lineman with who's a lable today,
we're gonna bump you over there, and Howard's been bumped

(01:02:03):
all over the place. And Brown wasn't ready to play
health wise until much later in the season. Andrews missed
a game early in the season. They started Lake and
Tomlinson for half the year, and then when they let
him go, he played zero more NFL snaps this year,
might not play any next year. They were splitting time
with him during the year because he wasn't very successful.
He couldn't go all sixty five good reps. So let's

(01:02:25):
give some of those to Juice Scrugs. Scruggs was a
healthy scratch for their first postseason game. The quality of
players they had was low, and then their inability to
recognize that at any point during camp, let alone during
the season, it crippled them to a certain extent. It
took him half a season to figure out and have

(01:02:45):
healthy players to put the right group of five for
this year. And that right group of five still isn't
good enough to do the things that Nick Cayley should
want to do with this offense, that Demico Ryans should
allow them to do on offense. And it's the same
number one prior they've had essentially every year that Nick's
worked here where they've cared about winning, So throw away
the first two years. Every year they've cared about winning.

(01:03:07):
In the draft in the offseason, the focus should have
been finding offensive linemen that can play at a plus level,
that should be considered among the better players and help
them make a better line. Number one offensive line in
the AFC is playing this weekend. They're protecting Jared Stidham,
And there's a number of different ways the personnel side
of the Broncos were able to find those players. The

(01:03:28):
best attempt to find players that can really play, by
Nick Cassario, have been strictly through the draft. Trading for
ed Ingram worked. But you should not have seen that coming.
He was a reserve. He got benched in Denver that
are in Minnesota, excusing that's why he was even available.
But you've drafted four players in the first two rounds

(01:03:48):
for your offensive line, and if they were correct, your
offensive line would be set. Titus Howard would be playing
one tackle, Ursary playing the other in some combination of
Blake Fisher probably bumps inside the guard, Juwe Scrugg snaps
the ball and Kenyan Green plays the other guard spot.
But not only is that absolutely outrageous to even hear

(01:04:09):
me say three of those four players that they've drafted
can't start in the NFL. Maybe two of them don't
belong in the NFL. The answer is kind of out there.
On Kenyon Green, he was a practice squad player this
year in the NFL, rarely active for NFL activity, and
jew Scruggs. I just told you his story. Blake Fisher's
the Texans offensive lineman that comes in for twenty snaps

(01:04:32):
a game because they don't have a blocking tight end,
so they play tackle eligible all the time. I know
he was one of the players that Nick just mentioned
in that exceptionally long SoundBite. Blake Fisher played some tackle
against the Chargers and had to go out there and
start against the Chargers. Played pretty good football. I don't
disagree in that one particular game. It wasn't a nightmare

(01:04:53):
performance by any means. It was pretty good football. But
we're how many years in he can't start at tackle
for you in the position of we're trying to win
and we all know it.

Speaker 1 (01:05:04):
So I think, you know again, I would like to
think that if he addresses the offensive line the way
I would have him address the offensive line, which is
early and often in the draft, as you kind of mentioned,
I'd like to think that halfway through the twenty twenty
six campaign. I'm sitting here and I'm happy because at

(01:05:24):
least he tried. But if the second part of the equation,
which has always been the other part that can get
you when you're actually trying and you're not bargain bin
discount shopping and all that kind of stuff. If they
can't play like the three of the four guys you mentioned,
I'm not going to be happy, and furthermore, CJ's not
going to be happy. And what I mean by that

(01:05:45):
is I still struggle with this aspect of the Texans,
and I hate that we've had to have this conversation
for basically twenty three years.

Speaker 2 (01:05:52):
We'll think you.

Speaker 1 (01:05:52):
Would never have a you have never had the franchise
just go balls to the wall. We've got to have
an elite, top five offensive line. Ever, except for if
you want to say, when the zone blocking scheme was
implemented under Kubiak, that's the only time in twenty five
nearly years you've had a really elite offensive line.

Speaker 2 (01:06:15):
And even then it took time, which they they're all
going to take time. They have never under Nick Cassio
acquired a proven offensive line.

Speaker 1 (01:06:24):
You mean like in a trade or just in any
way you say acquired, and I think draft right, not
proven free agents in the NFL.

Speaker 2 (01:06:33):
He plays at a high level in the NFL. He's
how much of that. They're not available though they're always available.
Every team has them. And they're free agents every every
single offensive line, and we've got this offensive line and
he's awesome.

Speaker 1 (01:06:45):
Why would we let him walk out the door if
for no other reason that our cap situation can't can't
handle breaks.

Speaker 2 (01:06:50):
Go look at the Bears what they did last year
to this year. They spent a ton of money in
via trades with Thuni and via signing free agents and
the Texans. It's not always going to work, but I'm
just saying they literally have never done it.

Speaker 5 (01:07:01):
Now.

Speaker 2 (01:07:02):
He came in with both Tunsall and Howard here, and
obviously Tunsall has been moved on from and Howard's been
extended and likely will be back next year and played
at a level of it suggests he should be. But
they're the manner in which they've gone about putting their
offensive line together for three consecutive off seasons. Heading into
a year where CJ. Stroud is their quarterback, this will
be year four of that. They have not acquired a

(01:07:24):
proven I'm not saying all pro, I'm not saying pro wolcyle,
I'm saying proven. They have not acquired a single that
I can recall proven offensive line. Probably the player with
the best resume that they've acquired is Trent Brown, but
the reason why they added him this offseason is because
he's a huge injury risk and hasn't played that level
for quite some time. He did go out and get

(01:07:45):
Shaq Mason, he did go out and get Marcus Cannon,
and I think you could say they were both proven,
but there's a reason why they were available because the
teams that they were with did not believe there was
good football left in them. And in both cases, they
could not have been more correct. Shack Mason's first year
I think looks so good because his second year was
so awful. Awful, played zero snaps in the NFL after

(01:08:08):
the Texans let him go after two years of starting
every game he was here for. That's the closest I
can say to acquiring a proven lineman, and the Cannon
trade was even worse. Plus he paid them both once
they walked in the door. It's just it's been an
achilles heel, it's been kryptonite. He's put effort into it.

(01:08:28):
In the draft. I keep pointing that out effort's great.
You know, I really lambass teams and gms like Chris
Ballard who don't have a quarterback and are doing nothing
to fix it so often. Granted, drafting Anthony Richardson is something,
but we're eight years in on not having a quarterback
and that's the only thing they've done to try to
fix that situation. Long term, Cassario has committed draft resources

(01:08:50):
to finding offensive lineman, just he and his staff have
been bad at it.

Speaker 1 (01:08:54):
It's and again, I, like I was telling you during
the break, I don't know who's ultimately it's with cal Hannah,
Janis whatever.

Speaker 2 (01:09:04):
That can't be the answer anymore. You can't just be like,
what is that going to know from where they were
this year? If it's the same improvement they go from
twenty ninth to twenty second this year, what if they
go from twenty second to thirteenth. You need to have
a one in front of your ranking for me to
be even remote happy. That's a thirteen. I'll take the thirteenth.
It's better than what they were doing. Oh my gosh.
We talked about this on the air a couple of

(01:09:24):
weeks ago, and I could not believe this was a
real thing happening with one NFL team. It's the most unbelievable.
Are you kidding me? With a very good NFL franchise.
We'll talk about that next Thursday edition of the program.

Speaker 1 (01:09:38):
Space City Home Network simulcast underway as well, we will
make way for Rockets basketball. Well, actually I will because
WEX has got the launch pad for you beginning at
five o'clock when the simulcast ends, and then we'll have
you ready with the network coverage at five point thirty.
Tip Off is at six from the City of Brotherly Love,

(01:10:00):
as the Rockets will take on the Sixers tonight and
then a back to back Tomorrow night with a Pistons
team that is a amazing and b is going to
be much harder to defeat on the road, and without
Steven Adams.

Speaker 2 (01:10:13):
Maybe also without Aaron Holliday. He's not going to play
tonight either. He's got back spasms. We'll see about his
availability for tomorrow. Obviously has not been part of the rotation,
but the Rockets and their twin will obviously get to play,
presumably they both are healthy when they get there, and
the Rockets play tonight against him coming up on Friday night.
That's usually very fun and a big storyline usually around

(01:10:35):
the NBA. It's not the first time twins have reached
the NBA, nor the first time that they've played against
one another, but at this level and where they're both
headed and on the teams that they play for, two
of the best teams in the NBA. It's been a
fun story since both of them in are the league.
At the same time, I mentioned something about a I
can't believe this is going on in the NFL or
really anywhere, but it is. I mean, I wouldn't. I

(01:10:59):
would have said, no way if you had told me
that there's an NFL team that is concerned about the
energy per unit charge that drives current in a circuit.
But there is one. Okay, they're very concerned about electromotive force.
They're very concerned about the substation that's right near their
practice facility. And they are the home of this year

(01:11:19):
Super Bowl San Francisco forty nine Ers. They had a
lot of injuries this year. This topic was actually brought
up by US a couple weeks back. There's been a
couple of people that are on the scientific side of
things out in the Bay Area and also are aware
or fans of NFL football and their team, the San
Francisco forty nine Ers. They brought up the fact that
this substation that is very close to the practice facility,

(01:11:45):
the training facility and Levi Stadium for the forty nine ers,
And it was brought up that this substation that's been
there and was made larger and expanded in twenty five fourteen,
there's some emissions. There's some exposure that you could have

(01:12:05):
to EMF, which I just referred to earlier, that's electromotive
force EMF. Could it potentially affect humans? Could it affect
the injury issues that are happening with this football team
that still made it into the final eight, but we're
trying to get there without Nick Bosa, towards ACL without
Fred Warner at a broken ankle, which probably is not

(01:12:28):
one of the injuries they'd be looking at quite as
much in this regard, but George Kittle's achilles injury that
took place the week before. It's not about where the
injury took place. It's about is there some sort of
effect on their muscles, their tissues of their body that
is making them a little bit more susceptible to an
injury just simply because they go to work every day

(01:12:51):
where they work in such close proximity to a substation
that gives off these EMF and John Lynch, their general manager,
said yesterday when he had their version of Nick Cassio
end of season media availability, we will basically we will
leave no stone unturned. We will definitely be looking into it.

(01:13:11):
I thought his words about it were pretty funny, you know,
because it deals with allegedly the health and safety of
our players. I think you have to look into everything.
Been reaching out to anyone and everyone to see does
a study exist other than a guy sticking an apparatus
underneath the fence and coming up with a number that
I have no idea what that means that we know
it exists. I've heard it debunked. I don't know. They

(01:13:32):
really don't know. That's how I treated it when we
brought it up a couple weeks ago, like they would
have thought about this from the onset they This wasn't
year one practicing there, This was year one of having
this kind of rash of injuries. I don't think they
would have overlooked it. I don't think if it really
is truly going to be able to be proven scientifically,

(01:13:55):
that it's impacted their players who spend so much time
near these miss and they wouldn't have heeded this, they
would have done something about it. They would have said, well,
we can't have this here or expanded, or we need
to move our practice facility. You're a numbers guy, right,
I am a numbers guy. You can't how many free
agents do you think we'll sign with the Niners this
offseason in light of this information? Zero? I'm kidding.

Speaker 1 (01:14:17):
You can talk about the onset. I mean, it's like
building the house. You're trying to think of everything, but
there's always the unknown, and I guess more so the unexpected. Yeah, well,
we knew that the airport was nearby, so we didn't
build in that area because of the noise. We knew

(01:14:37):
that you can still play football noise. Yeah, but there's
so many things that are obvious. This isn't one of them.
But because I asked you if you're a numbers guy, Okay,
now that we have this issue, maybe is.

Speaker 2 (01:14:51):
It just nonsense?

Speaker 1 (01:14:53):
Like the medical professional told the Washington Post, which is
just the last bastion of journalism.

Speaker 2 (01:14:59):
By by the way, I don't think you can. It's
a it's a terrible rag.

Speaker 1 (01:15:06):
I don't think you can it is I don't think
you can just ignore numbers just boom, boom, boom, like
twenty guys on injured reserve this year.

Speaker 2 (01:15:16):
I was having this conversation last night, and I was
talking about what the result? Why were all these players injured?
If the NFL knew why, then they would be handling it.
And it happens all the time. It happened to the
Texans a couple of years ago, and we're like, okay,
so the athletic and performance staff, who's in charge of it?
And most often you're talking about a group of people

(01:15:37):
that have probably been with that that team, handling the
strength and performance training for that team for five, six,
ten years, and for four or five nine years they've
had typical number of injuries, and then one year they
have all these injuries, and many of them are of
similar varieties, and they say, well, it's got to be them.
Let's fire them, Let's find a new person, Let's find

(01:15:58):
a new group of people. Let's lean on a different
athletic and training and performance staff, and maybe some of
our doctors we need to move on from. They didn't
forget how to doctor and how to train nine years,
and maybe they could be a little bit behind. Talking
about the strength of training staff on the newest and
latest and best and what they believe in. But usually
you're not behind. You just don't necessarily believe in it.

(01:16:18):
And some people doing it work, some people doing it
doesn't work, I mean to a certain extent in its
years in the making, Like the Astros obviously decided finally
that there was something that needed to be done with
in their performance side of things and letting people go
this year, and you have to add the how did
they get back to the field part of it, that

(01:16:40):
was a huge issue. That doesn't seem to be an
issue at all here. I don't think any team has
an issue with their return to play procedures. Guy towres acl,
this is how long it's gonna take. The doctor that
has nothing to do with our team is going to
do that, and we've got a perfectly good regimen for
them to go out and rehab. Like when a team
has a rash of injuries, everybody's looking for the answers

(01:17:00):
to why, and people lose their jobs because of it,
and it's almost never their fault in my opinion.

Speaker 1 (01:17:05):
But a rash of injuries in one year is not
the same as a rash of injuries since the day
you set foot into this proximity of this facility, and
that's the numbers we're talking about.

Speaker 2 (01:17:15):
Well, it was there that they've been training there since
the eighties. Now they've been training there since twenty fourteen
with the expanded operating station, So I think the numbers
there might be a little different.

Speaker 1 (01:17:26):
I don't know what the numbers are. They skew rapidly
starting in that exact year.

Speaker 2 (01:17:32):
Did you sign older players? Did you sign players with
injury history?

Speaker 1 (01:17:36):
Well, I mean yeah, you can make an excuse for anything,
but the numbers are the numbers. Hey, what are the
injuries for your team versus everybody else out there on average?

Speaker 2 (01:17:43):
I thought this league was meant for parody and one
of the thirty two they're just up against it. They
are not competing on a level playing fet. You heard
it here first.

Speaker 1 (01:17:50):
Wex wants to spread the wealth when it comes to
injuries in the NFL.

Speaker 2 (01:17:53):
Oh, you could take one away either one. We'll hit
the four o'clock. Our next.

Speaker 3 (01:18:00):
A team on Sports Talk seven four o'clock.

Speaker 2 (01:18:02):
Our Adam Wexler. Adam clant here with you, and we
heard from him earlier because he was pressing Nick Cassario
on a question about whether or not personnel moves of
greater nature could have been made during the off season
to assist the offense and having a little bit better
season this year. Played that audio for you earlier. Now
we have him right here in the flesh on the phone.

(01:18:24):
Jonathan al m Alexander from the Houston Chronicle, the Texans
beat writer for the Chronicle for the last several seasons
on the road with the Texans through these two cold weather, offensive,
unhappy performances, but one of them was a win. And Jonathan,
we certainly appreciate you, not only your time today, but
also the work you put out and your time with
us throughout the last couple of seasons. We were both

(01:18:46):
there yesterday front row participants. We were at Nick Cassario's
press conference, and obviously the topic they seemed at the
front of at least our minds and I think fans
minds six questions worth of interest. Curious if you think
we actually got an answer about the future of Joe
Mixon and that he's already had his last carry for
the Texans, not explicitly said by any means by Nick,

(01:19:08):
but curious on your opinion of that.

Speaker 4 (01:19:12):
Yeah, I mean, for me, I think he was still
kind of being kind of coy. They still seem to
not know what the future holds for Joe Mixon, just
given the nature of the medical condition that he was
dealing with. And you know, the Textans are typically organization
under Cassario that likes to give away too much. So

(01:19:35):
you know, I think we probably won't know Joe mixon
future with the Texans, and for another couple of months
probably too. It probably gets closer to free agency, and
when the Texans feel like they have to make a decision.

Speaker 2 (01:19:47):
They don't have to make a decision to say goodbye
to c J. Stroud anytime soon. Fourth year of his
contract is next year, if if your option is a possibility,
there's even franchise tags after that. Should neither of these
two upcoming off seasons net him a long term contract extension.
Is it absolutely preposterous to envision an offseason here in
the next couple of months where they trade c J. Stroud?

Speaker 4 (01:20:10):
I don't think so. You know, I've seen that floated
around quite a bit, but you know, to me, that
just doesn't make any sense. I think, you know, CJ.
Star had a terrible playoff game, Don't get me wrong.
Four interceptions, but it was an indicative of his entire
twenty twenty five season where he showed improvement. And you know,
they know what he's capable of when he's playing at

(01:20:30):
his best, when he when he is protected, and they've
just got to take responsibility and figure out our ways
to put him in a good position to succeed. So
you know, I don't envision them trading him.

Speaker 3 (01:20:46):
I don't.

Speaker 4 (01:20:46):
I don't think that there are a lot of options
for them to have a replacement. So I think we'll
see see de Strout here and it takes million four
next year.

Speaker 2 (01:20:54):
I need to add one more follow up, if you'll
allow me, Jonathan, if we had had a live broadcast
right before or kickoff one fifty nine this past Sunday
and I asked you the very same question, you would
have hung up on us because it's so preposterous, like
why am I talking to these idiots? Right?

Speaker 4 (01:21:10):
Yeah?

Speaker 8 (01:21:10):
Yeah?

Speaker 4 (01:21:11):
Absolutely? Minus last game, you would have said that CJ.
Shot was better in twenty twenty five than he was
in twenty twenty four, So do you negate what he
did in twenty twenty five altogether? Now you don't now
playoff games are important, don't get me wrong. This will
factor into the decision and how much Texans decide to

(01:21:31):
offer him. If they do decide to make an extension,
this could This could potentially change whether they would have
made an offer versus just to shot and to extend
the fifth year option. But the Texans, you know, are
not going to allow just this one game to dictate
how they feel about their quarterbacks.

Speaker 1 (01:21:53):
Do you go and draft offensive lineman and sign a
stud running back? Or do you go go and sign
an offensive lineman's available and draft a stud running back?

Speaker 7 (01:22:06):
I mean, I think whichever option makes the most sense.
I think both of those positions or positions that they
have to take care of, and if they want to
be successful, you have to add playmakers to the team.

Speaker 4 (01:22:19):
And then number one, the most important thing for a
quarterback to be successful is for you to protect him.
And guard has been a revolving door for the Texans
for the past two years and even this year left
guard they didn't figure out left guard unto midway through
the season, Lake and Thompson's no longer on the team,
just Scrugs did not step up. They have to move

(01:22:39):
tightestower Mike right tackle to left guard, so they have
to figure out their two guard situations. Ed Ingram is
also a free agent. There's no guarantee that he's going
to be back, so how they address it, it just
depends on who you love better and whether it's in
the draft or free agency.

Speaker 1 (01:22:56):
And the other thing would be, like, how much do
you assess at this point?

Speaker 2 (01:23:00):
You know, the the play of C. J.

Speaker 1 (01:23:02):
Stroud too, you know, directly corresponds to the quality of
the offensive line, because there was once upon a time
where Wow, he's doing this in spite of subpar offensive
line play, and then he's like, you know, slowly but
surely regressed.

Speaker 2 (01:23:15):
And so now I'm like, I don't even know.

Speaker 1 (01:23:18):
I don't know what to think going into twenty twenty
six because I don't know what they're gonna do, and
I don't know if it's even gonna matter, because I
do think part of his regression has been he's gotten
a little shaky in the pocket because he hasn't had
protection over the years. But yet Sunday happens and it
looks more like it was his fault.

Speaker 4 (01:23:37):
Yeah, you know, I think it's a little bit of both.
I mean, you look at a few of those turnovers,
particularly the Woody Marks won the pick six that through
the they were the direct result of the offensive line
getting beat at the line of Scrimmich. So the offensive
line did call some of the turnovers. But I do
agree in the sense that you know when the pressure,
when there's an intense amount of pressure on Crout, he

(01:24:00):
tends to struggle. Teams have seemed to figure out that
that is his weakness, and the Texans haven't yet quite
adjusted to that. He occupates a lot better when he
doesn't have protection, and that's like most quarterbacks, but he
definitely has They have to figure that out. They need
to either have to build in answers or give him
more weapons or protection to compensate for that weakness that

(01:24:22):
he has.

Speaker 2 (01:24:23):
Song with Jonathan Alexander, the Houston Chronicle beat writer for
the Houston Texans change in the offseason on the offensive side.
From a coaching perspective, what's happened a bunch here for
the Texans last year? Obviously a new OC and a
new offensive line coach promoting from within. Do you anticipate
and he changes to the offensive coaching staff? Jerrod Johnson
has gotten a request for an OC interview with the Dolphins,

(01:24:46):
not new for him, as that happened last offseason as well.
He's been here throughout CJ's development here would you expect
not specific to him, but also about him. Do you
think there will be offensive coaching changes this offseason?

Speaker 4 (01:25:00):
I just don't think you could running back with the
same offensive staff given that there weren't many There weren't many.
There weren't many improvements made on the offensive side of
the ball. Something has to give because they ran it
back with the same offensive staff last year, and even
though there were certain improvements, particularly in turnovers, the stats

(01:25:23):
didn't take a huge jump in total yards and points
per game. So I think something has to give and
something has to change, and there's a need for a
new fresh ideas in perspectives for detection. So yeah, I
think there has to be a change. Now where that
change is I actually don't know, but something has to happened.

Speaker 2 (01:25:43):
And similarly, do you think the makeup of their quarterback
room also might change a little bit. The veteran in
the room is obviously Davis Mills, and as a backup quarterback,
and including his on field performance that was perfectly fine.
They rostered a third quarterback the entire season and Graham Mertz,
who may or may not have even been healthy enough
to go out there at the beginning of the season,
probably was at the end. But I don't disaster if

(01:26:04):
that's happening. Do you think there's a need for a
different third quarterback next year? Maybe even if it isn't
a developmental player.

Speaker 4 (01:26:13):
All right, there could be a need, but I don't
think that will happened, given that they made the investment
in Graham Mertz already a six round pick, and they
rostered him the entire year. Like you said, they gave
Davis Mills an extension. Now they could put a veteran
on the practice squad next year. That could be a possibility,
But as far as Grammertz and Davis Mills goes, you know,

(01:26:36):
I anticipate those guys continuing to be on the roster
in some form of fashion.

Speaker 2 (01:26:41):
We've hit you with all of these questions, Johnathan, I'm
curious if you you'll think about some of the storylines
you'll need to follow and have a handle on. What
do you think sits in front of this team? Is
maybe the top or top couple of things that they
have to consider as the offseason begins.

Speaker 4 (01:26:58):
Yeah, you know, I just think the biggest thing out
for me, like we mentioned a little bit earlier, is
you know, they have to figure out how to help
j shild elevate his game. You know, they're in the
process of investing a lot more into him. They'll likely
pick up that fifth year option just given the history

(01:27:19):
of of of what teams have done in the past,
and he's there number one investment in the potential face
of this franchise. And I know Nick Caserio said it's
not one player, and it's not one player, but there
are tiers to the level of importance positions in the NFL,

(01:27:42):
and quarterback is the number one and it's hard to
come across the quarterback, as Nick Caserio learned. And given
the fact that they have somebody who has performed at
the top level in their building, they have to figure
out how they can get him back to that level

(01:28:03):
or a level that will help them win a Super Bowl.

Speaker 1 (01:28:07):
So is Joe Mixon's injury the weirdest thing you've ever covered?

Speaker 4 (01:28:14):
Yes, because because of so little details about it and
the way Nick Casario talked about it yesterday, being that
it was something that he's never seen before. I've never
heard of someone referred.

Speaker 5 (01:28:32):
To something like that, and for him not to play
an entire season and maybe not even next year, just
kind of underscores how serious the issue this is for them,
especially when it wasn't anything he was doing that it
was aristomable.

Speaker 2 (01:28:48):
Very weird, unique as the word that nick U's situation.
To be sure, plenty of other things to discuss. I'm
sure we'll need to beckon you again this off season.
Really appreciate you joining us throughout the year. Obviously, as
I mentioned before, wore great stuff as their beat writer,
contributing and coming with some pretty entertaining stories throughout the season,
including several on CJ. Stroud. So we appreciate what you're

(01:29:10):
doing for the peeps here that love their Texans and
joining us here today.

Speaker 4 (01:29:14):
Absolutely, you got it.

Speaker 2 (01:29:15):
Jonathan m Alexander, beat writer for the Houston Texans. There
for the Houston Chronicle. As the off season is now
into its fourth day, brutal, brutal, brutal stuff. We'll continue.

Speaker 1 (01:29:26):
We're getting you ready for Rockets basketball coming up at
the top of the hour, but plenty of meat left
on the bone before we get there. Texans wise and
other that's coming up straight ahead. And Alexander of the
Houston Chronicle joining us last segment. I like that he
confirmed Joe mixon injury, probably one of the strangest things

(01:29:47):
he had covered, at least as far as the Texans go.
I didn't really specify, you know, ever or just with
the Texans as you asked him that.

Speaker 2 (01:29:55):
I was trying to think of anything that happened with
the Carolina Panthers when he was covering them, and nothing
came to mind either. Wait, what years was he there?
I mean that was where he immediately came from.

Speaker 1 (01:30:04):
Okay, do you know how long he was before? I
couldn't tell you. For a certain couple of years, Caroline
has been pretty uneventful as far as their football team goes.

Speaker 2 (01:30:15):
I mean it was pretty cut and trying. Man, this
Matt Rule era stinks.

Speaker 1 (01:30:18):
He's yeah, like they basically after the Cam Newton era,
it's been slim pickens.

Speaker 2 (01:30:25):
So yep, Cam Newton and Jake delone the best they've
come up with.

Speaker 1 (01:30:30):
Well, they each got to the Super Bowl. It's pretty good,
and an AFC championship beforehand. You know, things that Texans
have never done.

Speaker 2 (01:30:38):
I mean, isn't part of it Jake's fault? Part of
what I mean. He was here during one of the
playoff years.

Speaker 1 (01:30:45):
Yes, yeah, he was like the eighth string that year
because everybody kept getting.

Speaker 2 (01:30:49):
Hurt exactly, it's Jake's fault.

Speaker 1 (01:30:52):
Well, he was the starter on a team that went
and lost here in Houston to the Patriots. Had some
highlight plays in that game. That was their second, I believe,
because the Rams was the first? Whose they and what
was the first Patriots championship? I'm sorry I didn't I
wasn't clarifying my question.

Speaker 2 (01:31:09):
Well, aoh, yes, when Tom Brady's defense carried him to
his first Super Bowl victory, and then they had this one.

Speaker 1 (01:31:15):
So you know what the highlight of that radio row
was that year at the George R. Brown Convention Center.
Because we've done it twice now the highlights for me?
Was it a person? Yes, it wasn't man. Yes, it
wasn't Jimmithy, although I did talk to him. An athlete, yes,
active at the time. Yes, And okay, now what sport?

(01:31:39):
Pro wrestling?

Speaker 2 (01:31:40):
So there's a pro wrestler who was still grappling with
other men oiled up in tights in twenty four, two
thousand and four, and he was there and you took
a picture with him. I believe I was. This is
twenty three, it's pretty easy. Was it Stephen Austin? But

(01:32:00):
you're that's you're very very warm, very very hot. Actually
was he?

Speaker 1 (01:32:04):
They shared the main event, so he was very much
at his peak in this era of time.

Speaker 2 (01:32:09):
Yeah, so I don't I don't know who the other
one is. It's so obvious. I can't run.

Speaker 1 (01:32:13):
Oh So the crazy thing about that year, did you
ask him what was for dinner?

Speaker 2 (01:32:19):
In other words, did I smell what he was cooking? No?
I didn't ask him that.

Speaker 1 (01:32:23):
What's crazy, though, is like, you know he was this
was like, he's the biggest movie star in the world
now that's not named Tom Cruise or Denzel Right.

Speaker 2 (01:32:33):
No, I was gonna say something very similar as I
I thinking about the movies he's been in, not all
that are super mainstream or were huge hits, and then
the television show on HBO that he was in. I
like pretty much everything he's done. He's come out with
some of everything, but a lot of things that smaller

(01:32:54):
roles or lesser promoted. And I'm like, that's a good movie.

Speaker 1 (01:32:58):
Yeah, Yeah, he's it's pretty pre I would consider him
like guilty, pleasure, cheap. It's you're gonna you're gonna get
something out of it, even if it's.

Speaker 2 (01:33:10):
Not carry Awa Jungle Cruise. He was very good in
the movie where he's Jumanji. Very good. Yeah, he was
very good when he had to see about getting his
son out of jail.

Speaker 1 (01:33:22):
He was very good when he and Kevin Hart filmed
a Halloween commercial together. He was very good when he
You don't get the full sized candy bar, you get
the tiny ones.

Speaker 2 (01:33:32):
They're like you, they're bite sized. They've they've been side
by side a few times. It's funny when they get together. No,
what I was stunned about though, this is too This
is February, well, probably late January to be honest, because
February first was the game because it was on my birthday.

Speaker 1 (01:33:47):
This is late January two thousand and four. This guy
has been in some movies, movies including The Scorpion King,
and he's main evented WrestleMania's. He's pretty big, but he
was nowhere near as big as he is now. But
like he's walking around at the George R. Brown Convention
Center on the concourse at Radio Row and again this

(01:34:08):
was the first year the second year was way more
jam packed in that hall that we were all in.
There's like nobody even bothering him. He was there now again,
this is a funny aspect of the story. He was
there when he still had hair a little bit, but
it was going away. You know what he had with
him his hairstylist. You know what her job was giving

(01:34:30):
him a haircut, no cutting it because this was like short,
so it's like she there was nothing the style it was.
Basically her job was to edge up his receding fade
every two days. They both told me this. I was stunned.

Speaker 2 (01:34:45):
That is a good story.

Speaker 1 (01:34:46):
And there's like I think there might have been one
other person. He did not have a huge entourage. Nobody
was walking. That's why I was able to get to him.

Speaker 2 (01:34:53):
Just an FYI, we put a rundown together every day
to talk about certain things. Sound bites WW to play
this was. I don't see Dwayne on it anywhere nowhere
near now. What is in the rundown that we have
not gotten to is how much Nick Cassario defended his
quarterback to the teeth is that press conference couple years ago?

(01:35:14):
Number two overall his guy same way.

Speaker 1 (01:35:15):
That would you say, it's the same fervor with which
Charlie Cassley used to defend David Call see his first
to have a pick. It wasn't Tony Bassali. Probably similar fervor,
like when you know the team should probably move on
from a guy. And I'm not saying that about CJ
at all, but when you know it before everybody else

(01:35:36):
in the organization finally does it, it's kind of sad.

Speaker 2 (01:35:41):
Even the guy you hired to give you an answer
on it gave you the wrong answer.

Speaker 1 (01:35:45):
Do you think Dan Reeves when he was a consultant
told Gary or told the team, Hey, no matter who
you hire, you gotta hang on to this mental midget.

Speaker 2 (01:35:54):
So before we get to what's going to be said here,
I want to bring us visualize the consultant role that
Dan play. This is as Sario or as Castle. He
probably saw the writing on the wall. That's why you
bring in a consultants more or less effective than the
Bob's in office space. I mean pretty effective. Look at
the kind of work they got out of the employees

(01:36:14):
after they visited. But I was trying to like, let's
go inside at the time. This is Bob McNair's office
and he's got Charlie Casserly in the seat. You have
a desk, and you got two three chairs in front
of him, and that's where Charlie sitting. Bob's sitting at
his desk. The consultant is Dan Reeves. He's sitting in
the office, but he's behind Casserly, so he's facing McNair.

(01:36:36):
But Charlie can't see him. He knows he's there, but
he can't see him because he's sitting behind him. And
Bob's asking Gary, I said Charlie. Charlie and Gary are
both there, and he's asking them. As we make this
transition out of the dominator area and into the St.
Pius era, you call him that, and Charlie's still kind
of hanging on. Comes some good drafts and not so

(01:36:56):
good drafts. He asks them point blank, do you think
we can win football games with David Carr as our quarterback?
And they both give a similar answer, different words, different viewpoints,
but the similar answer of yes, I think we can,
and I think, you know, giving him a little extra money,
having team friendly and making him happy here, we can
do things with this quarterback that's gonna put us into

(01:37:19):
a push for the playoffs for the first time ever.
And Bob's looking both of these men in the eye
while they say that, and as they're wrapping up their
final comments apiece, he just kind of leans over in
his chair to get a good look at Dan Reeves's face.
And Dan's like all the memes we saw earlier this
week for a number of different reasons. Oh don't like that.

(01:37:40):
I'm not gonna work here anymore. Ye, I absolutely next year.
I think that's the the work done by the consultant
that regard. But yeah, listen to you. No, it wasn't.

Speaker 1 (01:37:54):
And I often wonder, and I've said this many times
on this show, if the combination of Gary and the
vaunted play action naked bootleg offense with his own blocking
scheme and an Arian Foster thrown in at running back
and Andre Johnson at wide receiver and Kevin Walter there
to block, of course, and never catch a pass.

Speaker 2 (01:38:13):
Just passed in regular season history and.

Speaker 1 (01:38:15):
From TJ Yates biggest one that TJ threw. I wonder
if Vince Young and Gary would have made sweet football love.

Speaker 2 (01:38:24):
I will say this, there's no joking, there's no tongue
in cheek. This is a one sincere Vince Young's career
would have been awesome in the NFL for twice as long.

Speaker 1 (01:38:38):
If not more, if he didn't go that one place.
That's a good way to put it. I was putting
him here. But I think he could have gone a
number of different places. Oh yeah, that weren't Jeff Fisher's
team with Norm Chow and but ad it just it
was he could have clearly done things differently even after
he got.

Speaker 2 (01:38:53):
There the Titans, where you go to have your football
career ruined. I just it was. It was a bad
situation that there were something he really could not have
done anything about. But nonetheless, we're here as we get
to this latest sound bite, we'll popping in on the
other side. We got a few more segments with you.
We got what's up with that coming up, and this
will certainly fit there. We we can't pass along the news

(01:39:15):
that's one there is one less head coach opening Oh
yeah in the NFL. Got hired four years as a
defensive coach on the Baltimore Ravens staff, then down to
the college ranks, then these last two years on Jim
Harbaugh's staff in LA with the Chargers. Jesse Minter is
the new Baltimore Ravens head coach.

Speaker 1 (01:39:36):
That would have been like, not even in the top
ten of choices I would have thought they would make.

Speaker 2 (01:39:41):
I think he's done the type of had the type
of path to getting this opportunity that is very normal.
Several years as a DC, both at college and the
pro level. Probably got a you know, a good tutoring
on how to do things the right way with who
he's worked under, John Harbaugh is one of them. In Baltimore.
There's some familiarity there.

Speaker 1 (01:40:01):
And again I say this with the utmost respect as
someone who covers and follows the Texans.

Speaker 2 (01:40:06):
I hope he falls flat on his face. We shall
see what's.

Speaker 3 (01:40:14):
Up with What's up with that? What's up? I say
it was up.

Speaker 2 (01:40:25):
That, as is the case often here on the program
or lead into the on air conversation, is an off
air conversation that fits. What's up with that? Okay, but
we'll talk about what we had planned here A few
items if you will, Yeah, Thursday's signature segment. I do
want to get to what we did not mention yesterday,

(01:40:47):
which is odd considering the subject matter has to do
with Jay Moore's wife. We'll get to that here momentarily, Man,
Jmore Genie like another funny thing since I mentioned it
about at least to me about the I usually find
movies that Jay Moore is in entertaining, even though he's
not necessarily the driving force.

Speaker 1 (01:41:08):
No, but Bob Sugar is one of my favorite all
time characters. That's why when he autographed my Jerry Maguire poster,
he signed it Clanton you wanted more Sugar.

Speaker 2 (01:41:19):
Why didn't he sign it Clanton? You complete me? Because
that wasn't his line. That was Tom's line. You've ever
heard him talk about him and Tom shooting.

Speaker 1 (01:41:28):
That movie, Yes, it's awesome, and him like how Tom
is so o Listen, you can say what you will
about Tom Cruise. That guy's a movie star first and
foremost in every sense of the word.

Speaker 2 (01:41:40):
And he seems like a genuinely nice guy.

Speaker 1 (01:41:42):
I know we don't know these people, but I'd put
him against a bunch of other people that are famous.

Speaker 2 (01:41:46):
He came into a building many many years ago, No, Jay, okay,
because he was in the radio game and he's programming
even aired on these very airways.

Speaker 1 (01:41:56):
Believe it or not. When he saw me, he bare
hugged me. I believe it said thank you brother, brother,
and I was like, what did I do?

Speaker 2 (01:42:04):
So we mentioned this earlier and it still fits in here,
Nick Caserio, we send the card in. Let's go ahead
and take c J. Stroud here with a number two pick.
Have him help got us into the postseason in year one,
got us into the postseason in year two, got us
into the postseason year three, all with wins in the
opening game and then a loss on the road in
the next game. Most stinging, most recent, but yes, CJ.

(01:42:24):
Stroud was clearly a topic of conversation on Wednesday when
we met with him, the general manager, Nick Cassio, And
among the many things he said is the following about
c J. Stroud, his quarterback.

Speaker 6 (01:42:36):
Look, if we want to go game by game, like
we don't win the Kansas City game without CJ.

Speaker 2 (01:42:39):
Stroud. I mean, so again, that's one game.

Speaker 6 (01:42:43):
All right. Look, he'll be the first to tell you
he didn't play well on Sunday. All right, I'm not
going to sit here and tell you play well either,
Like he knows that. So in the end, all right,
got to learn from it. What can we do better?

Speaker 3 (01:42:55):
All right?

Speaker 6 (01:42:55):
And then we'll moving forward, all right?

Speaker 2 (01:42:57):
And see you look at his body of work.

Speaker 6 (01:42:59):
This guy's been a damn good quarterback in this league
for three years. I mean, it's the truth. So again,
he wanted to look at everything into totality and every
player look at their situation and it's always case by case.

Speaker 2 (01:43:12):
So much shorter answer he gave there to a little
bit different question. A couple questions before that, I had
asked him how he thought Stroud handled the different hurdles
this season, the slow start for the team, both the
own three start and they were still sitting at three
and five, his own concussion, then obviously the postseason performances.
He gave a much more lengthy answer, but only a

(01:43:35):
little bit. It was about CJ. That's when he talked
about how awesome this division is about to be because
of what each of the other three teams are now doing.
He obviously complimented Robert Sala, called him a hell of
a coach. Likes what they're doing with Tony, James and
Liam mentioned all three by name in Jacksonville. But to
this particular CJ. Stroud answer about his do when you

(01:43:55):
consider him The question was about do you look at
his collective performance rather than any particular game that he
just played three days ago, and that's how he gave
his answer. And that's why, even though it's just what
he said, just what's public, I fully believe this is
how they view CJ. Strout as we sit here in
advance of the first decision that will be made picking

(01:44:16):
up the fifth year option, followed by the second decision
that will be made not extending him for the long
term this particular offseason, both of which I think will happen,
and both of which will partially happen because of that
that he just said.

Speaker 1 (01:44:29):
You know, one aspect of CJ that we haven't talked
about specifically us on this show, and I've heard people
mention and I've had, you know, personal text messages, messages
that kind of thing about this topic. What's your opinion
on his body language, just in general, but especially when
things don't go well.

Speaker 2 (01:44:49):
What's the opposite Let me ask you this, what's the
opposite or close to opposite body language that you would
see if it wasn't what he was doing. Is it
someone who you know the first, second, third, fourth intercept
it is does he come to the sideline and throw
his helmet down? Does he get in somebody's face or
does somebody get in his face and he react accordingly
to it because I know what his body languages and

(01:45:11):
it's very limited. He's definitely appeared just very unhappy and
just sat there and kind of soaked it all in,
faked it all in. Again.

Speaker 1 (01:45:20):
Let me clarify, I'm not asking him to look happy
after the fourth interception, but you know, when Mahomes has
things not go his way, when lamar like Derrick Henry
this season, when he fumbled that ball at the very
tail end of was It Week one, I believe like
he lost them the game very clearly. They were driving,

(01:45:40):
they were gonna score, they were gonna win that game.

Speaker 2 (01:45:42):
How did he How was he supposed to know both
of those head coaches were gonna get fired? Buffalo Baltimore.
That's funny. He goes over to the sideline. Do you
remember what he did? Helmet throw, assaulted that helmet.

Speaker 1 (01:45:54):
In fact, I'm surprised it was a one piece after
he was done with it.

Speaker 2 (01:45:58):
And even just that, the decision to throw the football
after the Harrison Bryant trip and you should have eaten
it or dirted it, and that gets picked for sick
and I'm not asking to throw his helmet, by the
way right, he made a clearly bad decision, But the
things that led up to that bad decision on that
very play, like come on, man, don't get blown into
the backfield so far that you trip the player I'm

(01:46:19):
throwing the ball to, Like there are other things there.
But this is his body language in this particular game
was very similar to the body language he's had in
almost every game. He's not a big, huge fist pumper.
He's not a big, huge raw raw guy. I think
in games where he's played poorly, and remember this is
you know, he's played almost every game for three years.
I think forty five starts. He's now started six playoff games.

(01:46:41):
He's just into the fiftieth game or so. He's had
zero games even close to this poor of a performance.
He's had bad days, he's had turnovers, he helped to
contribute five fumbles just the week before. It still wasn't
like this. I guess it's just I g yes, it does.
I do think people are not wrong in paying a

(01:47:05):
little attention to his body language.

Speaker 1 (01:47:07):
I guess it's just I don't want the Texans twenty
twenty five season to be the precursor to the ultimate
let down twenty twenty six season that so many teams
go through when they suffer a loss like this, where
everything was laid out in front of you. It looked
like you were not only gonna do things you hadn't
done before, you were gonna really potentially do things you

(01:47:29):
hadn't done before.

Speaker 2 (01:47:30):
Were fifty to seventy guys in the locker room, maybe
it's forty or so that come back much of the
coaches to have clearly to be good forty. I present
it that way to say, don't do you believe those
people that will be back next year that we're here
for this year, this particular loss, many of whom were
first here for some of the others absolutely view it
the way you just described. They've lost in the same

(01:47:50):
round on the road in the playoffs three consecutive years
to three different teams. How they recovered from the first two,
got them right back to where they were the year before.
Do you feel like they've fe it's different? I know
reaction to it, they're feeling about it.

Speaker 1 (01:48:03):
I know one of them for certain, will and he's
going to be having a lot more money in his pocket.
His name's Willy Anderson Junior that that's kind of scary,
the guy that did what he did this year being
extra motivated.

Speaker 2 (01:48:16):
But I hope that's what it is. He will have
a difficult time, not impossible, difficult time of being better
in twenty twenty six than he was in twenty twenty five.
Five finalists named today for Defensive Player of the Year
in the NFL. He deservedly was one of them. I
mentioned there was a story from the West coast with
a team that bounces the ball. That's not the La Clippers. Yes,

(01:48:39):
we'll talk about them next.

Speaker 3 (01:48:44):
The ad on Sports Talk seven nineteen.

Speaker 2 (01:48:47):
Always a good time to write a big, long, detailed,
investigative report article on the fifth best team in the
Western Conference.

Speaker 1 (01:49:00):
When you saw that there was a giant article on
the Lakers on a front page of ESPN dot com,
you like, Ugh, Ramona's at it again, and then you
start reading and you realize, oh, she would never be
a part of this article. It's not flattering about Genie,
her bestie. There's lots of answers to that question. A
I've said this before on the show.

Speaker 2 (01:49:17):
While I do use ESPN for lots of stuff, I'm
being totally serted, I never ever ever see their homepage
because I go where I want to go Specifically, I
want to see their stand tracks or I want to
see a schedule. There's something very simple that I want
from them, just the way like college football. I'll always
go to there for the standings because I want to
see every single conference listed on one page. But I

(01:49:39):
almost never go esp period com mean in, I just
never do it now. I used to go to ESPN
Starzone like thirty five years ago on dial up, but
not anymore. And then b I did see who wrote
it and it wasn't her, and I absolutely expected it
to be here, and see she's I didn't read it.
She's the ed werder of Lakes coverage for sure, but

(01:50:03):
reading about it, you could have easily figured out there's
no way she wrote this because it's anti Genie Buss
and the Lakers and that's one of her friends. Yeah,
so what's the gist of this piece and what's been
the fallout from it? Since we gotta get some like
the Lakers? Yeah? Where's do we not have? That? Is it? Aly?
Cowboys and Yankees?

Speaker 4 (01:50:20):
Only?

Speaker 2 (01:50:21):
Come on?

Speaker 4 (01:50:22):
Now?

Speaker 2 (01:50:22):
This is the other third key shirt, right the jingle
and I'll make the make it for you your deep
southwest there on the West coast. Well yeah, but the
we are in the southwest giving the coverage. I don't
want it to say the same thing. I gotta got
a one different little tagline sports. If you want your
LA sports, you've come to the right place. That's good.

(01:50:43):
I like that, all right.

Speaker 1 (01:50:44):
So yeah, the gist of this article is not only
that the Lakers have been sold and how that all
came to be, but the infighting in the remaining members
of the family not named doctor Jerry Buss.

Speaker 2 (01:50:56):
Up to and including the mom who comes out of
left field to say, hey, uh, kind of disappointed.

Speaker 1 (01:51:03):
Me and Jerry had a discussion even when we were
getting a divorce, but he told me he wasn't gonna
have any more kids, and then he had two.

Speaker 2 (01:51:09):
I didn't like that. For those that enjoyed, and I
think everybody who watched it enjoyed it a winning time.
The rise of the Lakers dynasty, the dock that they
put together, where our good friend John c Riley was,
Jerry Buss and all these dog trails. Oh wait, no,
John c Riley's not late.

Speaker 1 (01:51:24):
I'm thinking of he's a step brother Philip Seymour Hoffman,
he's with us. But even in that for because it
was during the Magic Johnson introduced to the Lakers portion
of this Lakers dynasty, So it was many, many years ago,
you could clearly see what it ended up manifesting itself
over the thirty forty for years now that have passed.

Speaker 2 (01:51:43):
Who enjoyed the bus family kids? Yes, we're not going
to get along because of their paths into being part
of the Lakers. The daughter Genie was one of them.
All about the lake. There's a Jane, Well, she learned
about the Lakers from Carrie.

Speaker 1 (01:51:58):
Really, if there were there's a third daughter, which she
being called, I don't even know.

Speaker 2 (01:52:03):
Jenny.

Speaker 1 (01:52:04):
Well, we've got our daughters, you know them, Jeannie, Jane
and Jenny. It's real hard to keep him apart.

Speaker 2 (01:52:09):
Do you want to, well, who are who are the
who are the boy kids? What are their names? Joey, Jesse?
What is it? Just gotta be a Jonathan in there somewhere,
Johnny and Jimmy.

Speaker 1 (01:52:19):
Let me guess they were all named with a J
because Jerry wanted it that way.

Speaker 2 (01:52:25):
Anyway, you could see even then because she was super involved,
learned her way through the system, work learned her way.
I said she was the president by then, and so
was he not for them of her? This is his
husband and wife. Basically they weren't married. They were fornicating.

(01:52:45):
Were they common lawing it? I don't know. I think
you have to live together a long day together. Can
we leave that? They were definite? Not only what are
they together? They had been together? Yeah, But you could
see it then that this family was not going to
get along in running the Lakers. That's a large portion
of what this article is about and why they ultimately
sold the team.

Speaker 1 (01:53:04):
And how she basically like she murked everyone. She was
like a drug dealer man.

Speaker 2 (01:53:11):
So with what she had to respond with, was that
at all surprising? With what she chose among the many
things she could have said, we not happy with this,
or this is right, or not happy with that because
of the inclusion of bus family versus Lebron. That was
a statement she put out to try to say that's
not accurate.

Speaker 1 (01:53:30):
I really loved that she had to put a statement
out after she just completely destroyed him allegedly behind the scenes,
like she privately considered not re signing him or even
trading him, and that she would have traded him to
the Clippers is my favorite part. Could you imagine you

(01:53:50):
are like, yeah, you can have him, little brother, because
we're going to ensure that you get all of the
bad things about Lebron at the very tail end of
his career where you can't hurt us anymore.

Speaker 2 (01:53:59):
So, in response to the negative vibes and the things
you just mentioned between the bus family of the Lakers, Lebron,
et cetera, her statement was, it's really not right, given
all the great things Lebron has done for the Lakers,
that he has to be pulled into my family drama
to say that it wasn't appreciated. Well, it's just not
true and completely unfair to him. Well maybe you shouldn't
have had family drama. He's got plenty on his own. Yeah,

(01:54:20):
there's definits. Like we said, you know, Mark Walter, the
new owner, this is it's it wasn't sold because he
came to them. It was like, I wonder if they'll
sell it was sold because this wasn't going to work
any longer.

Speaker 1 (01:54:32):
Mark Walter also the owner of the Dodgers, who is
currently ruining major League Baseball.

Speaker 2 (01:54:38):
They're playing by the rules. The rules have allowed them
to be at the forefoot pointing out why things have
to change.

Speaker 1 (01:54:44):
Or will be thanking him because after on the other
side of the lockout, we're gonna have not only a cap,
but a floor. So everybody has to spend at least
a little, but you can't overspend to get everybody.

Speaker 2 (01:54:55):
The thing is that it might not prevent the Dodgers
from spending like crazy if they still want to just
pay the fines, the penalties, the taxes, whatever the cap
goes in, because it will not be a very strict
super here it is. That's it. It's hard gap, I
don't think or will it more put a bunch of
owners out of business and say, well, I got to

(01:55:16):
sell it to somebody that's got more money than me
because I already was barely making money. Now I'm a billionaire. Sure,
but I'm not making money on this franchise unless I sell.
And now you're making me spend more on my franchise.
It's not generating more. They think it's gonna force them
to operate their teams in a way that helps them
generate more money, which essentially said if you win more,
you're gonna make more, and we're gonna force you to

(01:55:38):
spend more so then you'll win more. I don't think
it's gonna work.

Speaker 1 (01:55:42):
I actually want to get into this a little bit
tomorrow at some point, because I mean, I know, we
joke of how long it was, and it was it
was way too long. I'm reading it this morning and
I'm like, come on, dude, get to the end. And
then you get to the end and you're like, Baxter,
that was a lot of nothing. But it is like
they're not in a good play. I don't know if
Walter owning them is going to get them back to prominence.

(01:56:04):
But one thing that was fascinating was was how Genie
was very aware that when Jerry owned the team, we
had this many championships and we missed the playoffs this
many times. You see these two fingers I'm holding up.
That's it in what thirty four years different? NBA is
fair to add to.

Speaker 2 (01:56:21):
Yeah, but since she's taken over and has had plenty
of star power hand delivered to her and her franchise,
they've done except for that one, you know, that fake championship.
The family issues that we're talking about with ownership, yeah,
super common in family owned sports teams. And how about
to happen here in Houston with the current owners, with

(01:56:43):
the Texans, with what's gone on with the McNair infighting, Carrie,
the lesser known McNair, has it created. I don't think
a change in how they've had to operate or something
overwhelming on an earthquake and an avalanche of dismay and turmoil.
The Broncos had unbelievable family turmoil. Arders that unbelievable family turmoil,
and ultimately they have to move on. They can't have

(01:57:05):
the team anymore. We'll transition into Rockets basketball because Rockets
launch Bad with me is next

Speaker 3 (01:57:14):
The eighteen on Sports Talk seven ninety