The Houston Texans made Ohio State quarterback C.J. Stroud the fulcrum of the offense when they selected him with the second overall pick in the 2023 NFL Draft. The Texans also took former San Francisco 49ers passing game coordinator Bobby Slowik to make him their offensive coordinator, so you can expect to see a lot of Kyle Shanahan-style concepts in this offense — boot action out of the pocket, a lot of pre-snap motion, and 21 personnel (two running backs, one tight end, two receivers). Shanahan really didn’t have a guy in Brock Purdy who could roll out credibly in 2022, but there was a reason the 49ers traded as much as they did to get Trey Lance.
Stroud, with his ball placement, ability to read the field, and underrated sense of how to attack defenses while on the move, seems like a natural fit. Two of the top five quarterbacks in EPA in the NFL last season with the benefit of pre-snap motion were Purdy and Jimmy Garoppolo, so that’s obviously a San Francisco staple.
Per Sports Info Solutions, Stroud in 2022 completed 98 of 137 passes for 1,233 yards, 632 air yards, 17 touchdowns, one interception, and a passer rating of 135.7 — that passer rating led all FBS quarterbacks.
New Texans OC Bobby Slowik comes from a Kyle Shanahan system that uses motion to maximize things for quarterbacks.
C.J. Stroud with motion last season: 98 of 137 for 1,233 yards, 632 air yards, 17 touchdowns, one interception, and a passer rating of 135.7. 🙂 pic.twitter.com/cj1WaIxpX1
— Doug Farrar ✍ (@NFL_DougFarrar) May 16, 2023
In this week’s episode of “The Xs and Os with Greg Cosell and Doug Farrar,” Greg (of NFL Films and ESPN’s NFL Matchup) and Doug (of Touchdown Wire) get into all the ways in which Stroud is already primed to succeed wildly over time in that Shanahan-style passing game.
