The 2023 NFL draft is less than a week away.
The draft in Kansas City represents one of the most optimistic moments in the past three years for the Houston Texans. With their twin first-round picks starting at No. 2 overall in a quarterback-heavy draft, the Texans can find their new franchise quarterback and use the remaining 11 picks to put the finishing touches on the roster.
General manager Nick Caserio visited with “Payne & Pendergast” on Sports Radio 610 [KILT-AM] April 20 and talked about the last week of draft prep.
Here is a look at how the final week before the draft will unfold for the Texans.
Finishing touches
“We’re really kind of putting the finishing touches on everything,” said Caserio. “So, finished up the 30-man visits [April 19]. We had a lot of traffic in the building between the 30-man visits and the local day going back to that first week in April. So, we’re just really kind of fine-tuning and tweaking, and I think what we’ll do here over the next week or so, we’ll just get some follow up information that we feel to solidify the profile of a prospect.”
Reading the room
“We’ll make some calls league wide to try to get a barometer as to where teams are, their propensity to move, where they may want to go,” Caserio said. “Trades are really player driven anyway, but really to kind of have an overall general idea. Look, nobody is going to give away anything at this point.”
Evaluating the medical
“We’ll finish up with the medical evaluation,” said Caserio. “We’ll meet with our doctors and kind of get that perspective. It doesn’t necessarily eliminate a player; it just gives some context as to where the player might be in terms of his recovery, in terms of his availability for the spring, whether or not he’ll be ready for training camp. So, those are the types of things here over the next five to seven days that we’ll focus on.”
Looking at player clusters
“Really it’s more just tweaks and modifications,” said Caserio. “I think we have clusters of players that we have together. So, we may go back through and go back to back to back to back to back, and say, ‘All right, are we comfortable with this group, one of three, one of two?’ Whatever it may be. Then when you get into the draft you have to rely on the information that you’ve accumulated and gathered and just be ready to, I would say, react, adjust and be flexible and adaptable and realize the reality is players are going to come off the board.
“Maybe players will come off sooner than you think. Maybe some will come off later. You just have to be prepared and utilize the information and resources that you have at your disposal to make good, sound decisions.”
