CJ Stroud and the Houston Texans Early Down 1st and 2nd Down Offense

CJ Stroud is on fire. He is playing at a high level and doing it in different ways.

He recently had one of the best games by an NFL rookie quarterback. He completed 30 of 42 passing attempts for 470 yards and five touchdowns against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers on Sunday, breaking the record for passing yards with 472 and the single-game passing touchdowns by a rookie with 5.

One of the reasons is Bobby Slowik, the Texans offensive coordinator, has a very aggressive approach. They throw the ball on early downs and challenge defenses downfield.

On first down vs the Bucs, they threw the ball 18 times and he was 15/17 for 299 yards. He also had one called back for 16 yards on a holding call. The Texans use play action both under center and in the gun and often go max protection and throw the ball down field. Five of those were explosive plays of 20 yards or more. They excel in yards per play, averaging 7.5 per pass play which is 3rd in the NFL. They are also 4th in the league with 264 yards per game.

Slowik, breaks it down for Stroud and puts him in very advantageous positions to succeed. Let’s take a look at that and how he excels on early downs.

1st down

On early downs you will see a ton of play action and 7-8 man protections. This is highly effective as they often chip or double the other teams elite rusher.

They will often run boot and not allow penetration from the other teams best player.

Below they come out in 12 with 3x1 to to the boundary. They fake jet and run boot back to the tight end side. They block the DE and then release the TE to the flat. This takes away penetration from the DE and allows the nice gain on the outside.

Here’s another example from Slowik on 1st down.

#1 tells Stroud the defense

#2 creates a favorable 1x1 matchup to the man side.

WR Brown vs DB Mc Collum

#3 creates space for the wr to work to the middle of the field

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