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Denny Medley-Imagn Images In 2023, second-overall pick C.J. Stroud enjoyed one of the most remarkable rookie quarterback seasons in pro football history.
The Ohio State alum mercifully ensured that nobody would ever helmet-scout any other Buckeyes signal-caller in a negative sense after he completed 354 of 553 passes (64.0%) for 4,557 yards (8.2 yards per attempt), 26 touchdowns, five interceptions, and a passer rating of 101.
7 – third-best in the league behind Brock Purdy and Dak Prescott among quarterbacks who took at least 50% of their teams’ snaps. Stroud was also one of the NFL’s most prolific deep passers, completing a league-high 38 passes of 20 or more air yards (tied with Jordan Love) on 65 attempts for 1,289 yards, nine touchdowns, no interceptions, and a league-best passer rating of 142.5.
Perhaps most importantly behind an average offensive line, Stroud was excellent when pressured, especially for a rookie. When disrupted, he completed 88 of 170 passes for 1,033 yards, three touchdowns, no interceptions, and a passer rating of 64.6, which was seventh-best in the NFL.
It seemed for all the world that the Houston Texans had found their slam-dunk, no-doubt franchise quarterback for the next decade or so, and that was that. Then, 2024 happened, and everything that was clear became uncertain. Stroud was affected by injuries to receivers Nico Collins and Tank Dell, but the main reason for his regression last season was an offensive line that couldn’t protect to any serious degree.
Last season, Stroud was the NFL’s most-pressured quarterback, seeing some sort of pocket schism on 274 of his dropbacks. And when pressured, he completed 87 of 186 passes for 1,177 yards, five touchdowns, three interceptions, and a passer rating of 69.7.
Outside of the interceptions, the numbers were similar, but you started to see the cumulative effects of all that pressure, as you would with most quarterbacks. Stroud started pressing, especially late in the season, because he thought he had to, and he had lost the inherent trust he should be able to have in his front five. Justifiably so.
The blame game had several players. Many observers were unhappy with offensive coordinator Bobby Slowik’s schemes, and how the protections didn’t help an undermanned line do their level best, whatever that was. Stroud was criticized at times for holding onto the ball too long and waiting for something to come open, and while there was validity to that at times, there was also the matter of the hog mollies in front of him losing all sense of protection.
The Texans’ offseason response was fairly severe. Slowik was given his walking papers, replaced by former Los Angeles Rams tight ends coach and passing game coordinator (and longtime New England Patriots assistant) Nick Caley. Houston also promoted assistant offensive line coach Cole Popovich (who found out in 2019 that he is distantly related to legendary NBA coach Gregg Popovich) to the main job, and also put Popovich in charge of the run game.
Caley and Popovich had worked together in New England on Bill Belichick’s staffs from 2016-2020, so the familiarity is already there. At his introductory press conference on Feb. 25, Caley got through exactly one softball question (What will it be like working with C.
J. Stroud?) before he was asked more pointedly how he planned to keep Stroud from getting killed in the pocket in 2025. “I think it all starts up front, obviously, and it’s really all,” Caley said.
”We all have to be in sync, and I think protections start with communication, trust and cohesiveness up front and really having clear rules in the protection system. We’re going to be going through that process. Obviously, I have a history with Cole dating back to my time in New England when he was our offensive line coach and I coached the tight ends, so I have a really good working relationship and level of trust with Cole.
He is a very good football coach, and I’m excited to go through this process with him.” Popovich was charged with replacing the legendary Dante Scarnecchia in New England, by the way, which is no small feat. The challenge he has now may be even more daunting, because nobody really knows what the Texans’ offensive line will look like this season.
They traded left tackle Laremy Tunsil to the Washington Commanders for draft pick compensation, they traded 2022 15th overall pick Kenyon Green to the Eagles for defensive back C.J. Gardner-Johnson, and they made a few acquisitions that didn’t really excite – tackles Cam Robinson and Trent Brown, and guards Ed Ingram and Laken Tomlinson.
These moves perplexed those in the know about offensive line play. the Texans jettisoned the guard that allowed the 3rd-highest one-on-one pressure rate among all guards (Kenyon Green) and have now acquired the guards that ranked 1st (Ed Ingram) and 4th (Laken Tomlinson). https://t.
co/hlTM0DNaXd— Nate Tice (@Nate_Tice) March 13, 2025“Yeah, there’s never one particular thing,” general manager Nick Caserio said at the scouting combine regarding the line’s personnel and improvement. “So, I think the big thing is, can you get the players to do the right thing, to understand their assignment? Do they play the right way with the right techniques? Do they play with the right fundamentals? Can they execute their assignment? Do they have an understanding of what’s going on? So, I don’t want to oversimplify it. Sometimes it’s like, they come up with some magic formula.
You protect from the inside out, can you protect the interior pocket? Can you identify the rushers that are the [biggest] threat? Do you have an answer or solution, what they’re doing on defense? So, we’ll do whatever we think makes the most sense. “Where we are today could be different in a week from now, could be different a few months from now. I don’t know how it looks.
Just because a guy is here doesn’t necessarily mean, that’s what it’s going to look like. You guys were here a couple years ago, where we basically traded for three offensive linemen, signed another player, guys that weren’t even here. We weren’t even talking about in training camp, we are playing Week 1 through 4.
So I mean, that’s just how it goes. So you are prepared for anything. So you’ve got to start with the foundation.
You’ve got to start somewhere with the group, and then just kind of figure it out as you go.” Generally speaking, “figuring it out as you go” isn’t the best way to put an offensive line together. Even if you have a Hall of Fame-level line coach like Scarnecchia or Jeff Stoutland (who will probably turn Kenyon Green into an All-Pro in about two weeks), there needs to be an overall plan, and all five guys need to know how to work together in a system that fits their strengths.
“Getting better protection for C.J. is definitely a main point of emphasis for us,” head coach DeMeco Ryans said at the combine.
“We know when C.J. is protected, he has a clean pocket, he’s a pretty good quarterback.
I constantly show guys clips in our meetings after a game of plays when we protect well and we should have a good pocket. I’ll show guys explosives, show outstanding throws that C.J.
is able to make in the middle of the field, along the sideline. He’s capable of making any throw on the football field, but it’s just a matter of protecting him and giving him that comfort when he’s in the pocket. When we do that, we can move the ball, we can make plays.
So that is a point of emphasis for us, of making sure he is protected better.” If it sounds to you like the Texans are throwing a bunch of whatever at the wall and hoping it sticks, you’re not alone. Adding several average to below-average blockers and betting that your new coaching staff can make the most of those guys is one strategy, we suppose.
And perhaps there will be considerable additions in the draft. But as for now, the C.J.
Stroud Protection Plan looks like one of those protection plans in which your device goes on the fritz, and you can’t get hold of anybody at the company to replace it. And if that’s the result in 2025, C.J.
Stroud could be the broken device in question..
