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The Big Thing: What's wrong with C.J. Stroud this season?
The Texans were supposed to take over the NFL this season. That's what last season told us. They finished on a 7-3 run to win the AFC South and get into the playoffs. Then they ran over the Browns in their home playoff game. Stroud became the youngest quarterback to ever win a postseason game, and in that victory, the then-rookie promised us that every year would get better and better and better. It felt like Stroud would make at least the AFC Championship Game in Year 2 then maybe the Super Bowl then win the next 10 championships consecutively.
Stroud was an NFL-ready rookie who could throw punches with the best in the AFC, the next in line to challenge
Patrick Mahomes and start setting records. When the Texans started loading up on talent this past offseason -- trading for
Stefon Diggs, signing
Joe Mixon and
Danielle Hunter -- the hype train got predictably and understandably out of control.
The 7-5 Texans are far from a disappointment, and Stroud is far from bad. But they're 2-4 over their past six games after Sunday's embarrassing
32-27 home loss to the Titans, and Stroud is 25th in QBR at 51.3. Stroud threw two picks and ended the Tennessee game by taking a sack/going out of bounds for a safety. It feels like the team that was supposed to make the leap has instead taken a few stumbling steps backward.
Despite the recent rocky weeks, I'm nowhere near the panic button on Stroud. He has completed 63.1% of his throws for 2,875 yards and 14 touchdowns with nine picks. There are three key reasons that last season's sensation feels like this season's disappointment, and most of them are outside of Stroud's control. There's plenty he can do better as a young passer, and he will. But when I watch the Texans' offense, this is what I see:
A change in opponents' defensive approach
In 2023, Stroud was at the helm of a Texans offense run by first-time coordinator Bobby Slowik. We didn't know what was going to happen, and the rest of the league didn't, either. The Texans ran a lot of the Shanahan-tree hits. They got under center, ran the football a bunch and looked for deep play-action shots behind the run. As such, Stroud saw a lot of Cover 3 -- on 34.8% of his dropbacks, to be exact. The Shanahan offense wants you in Cover 3; it was built to beat that defense. Once Stroud emerged as an aggressive and accurate middle-of-the-field passer, the Texans started to shred opponents with all of the classics we know from the 49ers' offense, including deep crossing patterns and in-breaking routes behind bamboozled linebackers.
In 2024, defenses said no more. They are playing Cover 3 on 26.6% of Stroud's dropbacks, robbing him of the single-high looks he ripped up last season. In their place, opposing defenses have dialed up the two-high; they're playing Cover 2 on twice as many dropbacks this season (20% of the time) as they did last season. Similarly, Stroud saw base defense on 27.9% of his dropbacks in 2023, and now he sees it on only 21.6% of them.
This is not a structural response to a change in the Texans' passing attack. Houston is running play-action at the same rate as it did last season and dropping back from the shotgun just about as much as it did a season ago. The Texans, with the addition of Mixon in the backfield, are even better running the football than they were last season, but that probably has something to do with the lighter box counts, as well.
Last season, defenses were largely playing Stroud like a rookie quarterback. This season, they're playing him more like an elite quarterback -- and Stroud is still learning how to deal with that. The big plays are still there despite the two-high deployment (17.5% of his passes were explosive in 2023, and 15.8% are this season), but the down-to-down success rate has taken a hit, dropping from 47.6% to 42.5%. That's the difference between 10th last season and 26th today.
Does this mean that Stroud's 2023 season was a mirage? Was he a schemed-up QB with puffed-up numbers? Absolutely not. The dude shredded then, and he shreds now. Stroud still has all the arm talent, the ability to throw on move, the tight-window accuracy and the downfield ball placement that he had in 2023. To illustrate: His touchdown throw to
Nico Collins against the end line between three defenders was a
sight to see.
It's just harder than it was last season because Stroud is now getting star treatment. This is something he'll have to grow through, just as Mahomes,
Josh Allen,
Lamar Jackson and
Joe Burrow all did when defenses started catering to their particular games. And Stroud will be all the better for it once he does.
Bad interceptions (and bad interception luck)
Stroud has thrown some gnarly interceptions this season. The one in the end zone
against the Lions that galvanized the Detroit comeback was rough, and he sailed a bad one
against the Cowboys early in that game, as well. His second pick against the Titans was
another rough one; it seemed like he completely disregarded the underneath defender and got punished accordingly.
If it appears like these interceptions have come out of nowhere, well, they have and they haven't. Stroud threw only five interceptions last season. His interception rate of 1.0% was one of the best in the game and absurdly low for a rookie passer who started the entire season. This season, he has thrown nine for an INT rate of 2.3%.
Nobody likes when the interception rate doubles, but it's just about average for the league this season, so it's not like Stroud is handing the ball away at an egregious clip. Nor is Stroud putting the ball in harm's way at an egregious clip. His turnover-worthy play rate is 2.8%, which is exactly what it was last season. It's easy to forget in all the rookie hype but he got away with a lot of window-testing last season. This season, he's just regressing back to the mean.
Take as an example his first interception against the Titans. On
this play, Stroud and wide receiver
John Metchie III have a disagreement on where Metchie's route should break. Stroud tries to pull him downfield, whereas Metchie stays rooted to the spot.
This is a mundane miscommunication; it does not mean Stroud is hitting some sort of enormous sophomore wall that he will never overcome. This sort of play happens all the time but usually falls incomplete. The Texans caught a bad roll of the dice, and it ended in a pick.
I'm not going to get too worked up over interception rate, especially when it's mostly just a meteoric 2023 season crashing back down to earth. Stroud is an aggressive pocket passer who gives his receivers chances to make big plays. Many of his best throws wouldn't be attempted by a quarterback fearful of throwing a pick. You have to die by the sword every so often when you live by it.