Battle Red Blog
The NFL season is a cruel mistress. My other love is baseball. There are 162 of those suckers, so no one in their right mind jumps to any conclusions after just two games. In a 17 game schedule, you are talking about nearly 15 percent of the total season. In baseball terms, that equals about 25 games. Suddenly, slumps take on new significance. Things that might seem like blips on the radar become trends. When you see them in both games then you have to take notice.
Unlike baseball, the NFL is a capped sport. Teams find it much harder to do course corrections midstream. Trades are also much less frequent. So, unfortunately you have to deal with what you have in house. This is particularly true as it pertains to the offensive line. We talked about the decisions that Nick Caserio made during the offseason. We can belabor the point yet again, but it is what it is at this point. You have a couple of second round backups and you could roll the dice on them. You also have Cam Robinson. That is pretty much the extent of what you have unless you want to roll the dice on Trent Brown being healthy.
The tight end room is pretty thin as well. You really only have two healthy ones. I would expect them to sign someone else to the practice squad at this point, but the odds of them playing meaningful plays is probably slim. Fortunately, it looks like Christian Kirk is finally ready to make his Texans debut against his old team. That leaves just one position group since the Texans aren’t making a change at quarterback.
Before we go too far into the ins and outs of that position and others, let’s take a look at the overall numbers through two games. We will look at a number of different numbers and you tell me what jumps out at you. I usually like to look at numbers like these before making any grand pronouncements.
At some point, there will be a referendum on the quarterback position. There has to be. You don’t pay a guy 60+ million per season without really looking at his performance. However, those kinds of decisions aren’t made after two games. We can surmise that the receiving situation will get better with Kirk back in the fold as well. So, that still leaves one group.
Both Caserio and DeMeco Ryans are well within their rights to play Joe Mixon’s health close to the vest. Reporters and commentators also have the right to keep asking what is going on. However, they must know what the likely outcome of that is. A world with Mixon, Nick Chubb, and Woody Marks as your tailbacks is...
