OFF THE TOP OF MY BALD HEAD
Barry Warner: One last look at the 2018 NFL Draft
May 1, 2018, 6:00 am
Justin Reid was a terrific pick for the Texans. Michael Hickey/Getty Images
The first draft of Texan GM Brian Gaine was done without first-or second round picks. Many teams had Stanford safety Justin Reid as a late first selection. With the first of his three third round picks, Gaine wasted no time in getting a starter. Reid has also played corner for coach David Shaw. With his impressive length and fluid hips, Reid will start when the season opener. Defensive coordinator Romeo Crennel has the Honey Badger and the second highest rated safety in the draft.
Like baseball, you must be strong up the middle. Past safeties were poor in coverage, with some taking the worst angle, constantly giving up both yards and touchdowns.
“The more you watch Justin Reid,” Stanford head coach David Shaw said, “you put him in the category with the top guys in this draft at his position. You see speed, you see athleticism, you see versatility, you see tackling in space, you see good coverage.
“What’s so good is this guy is a tireless worker. He loves the game of football. This guy’s going to wear out the (defensive backs) coach because he’s going to watch film on his own.”
As they announced the next pick, the Texans took Martinas Rankin from Mississippi State. He is a guard or center, not the desperately needed left tackle. The move gives them depth at guard for the next few seasons. This season he’ll be a backup right tackle, behind free agent Seantrel Henderson, who has been suspended a few times for smoking weed.
I would have taken Ian Thomas, a tight end from Indiana with the next pick, instead of Jordan Atkins from UCF. The former minor league baseball player excels after the catch, but is only an average blocker and will replace Stephen Anderson
The Texans got a steal in round four with Texas Tech speedster Keke Coutee, a slot receiver and return specialist.
Say goodbye to Braxton Miller from Ohio State, a failed experiment drafted three years ago. Unless he studied both tape and the playbook and learns pass routes he will get waived.
Sixth round pick Duke Ejiofor, defensive end from Wake Forest, would have gone higher. But he is recovering from labrum surgery and should be ready for camp. He’s a local kid, from Alief High School and will probably be a practice squad candidate.
With the second sixth round pick they drafted another Mississippi State player, tight end Mark Thomas. At 6-5, 250 he played outside receiver, but will need to put on weight as a blocker and move inside. Here is the report from one NFL GM texted to me after the pick: ‘Monster size, but can he become a legit blocker? Has very limited football IQ. Talented but would only bring in as a free agent.”
I really thought this was a dumb, wasted pick, when a kid from Wagner College, Greg Senatt was still there. He’s 6-8, 290 and only played two seasons after quitting the basketball team.
The last sixth round selection, Peter Kalanbi, is another Stanford product. The edge rusher is 6-3, 252 and has underperformed in college.
The seventh-round pick, Jermaine Kelly, a defensive bank from San Jose State, was the best player on a terrible team.
The Texans did sign three street free agents as potential left tackles.
Jaryd-Jones Smith, a 6-6, 320-pounder from Pitt, Anthony Coyle, 6-6-305 from Fordham and Karl Malone Jr from LSU, an underclassman. For those of you from the millennium generation, look up his dad Karl Malone, which will be most interesting.
Jets get their man
“Sucking for Sam” paid off for Jets fans, hoping USC quarterback Sam Darnold ends the fifty years of franchise history. Since the legendary Joe Namath led them to the Super Bowl upset over Don Shula’s Colts, the Jets have never had a top tier quarterback.
I had Darnold graded as the top QB, followed by Josh Rosen, Baker Mayfield, Josh Allen and the kid I think will be a star, Lamar Jackson.
Vince blows it
Former UT star Vince Young, a bust as a pro, announced the Titans first round pick. Instead of pronouncing the name Harold Landry, linebacker from Boston College VY called him Honor.
That must make all of his professors at Texas feel so proud.
Bad look
Perhaps the biggest moment on Thursday night was watching the Steelers’ Ryan Shazier walking across the stage with his fiancée to announce Pittsburgh’s first pick. Upon reflecting a few days later on the emotional scene, the cynic in me could not help but shake my head.
It’s mindboggling that just five months after Shazier hurt his spine making a routine tackle the NFL is using his horrific injury to sell the unifying power of football. Take into consideration how long the NFL and the Steelers refused to address whether he’d be able to walk again.
Many parents in our nation are at crossroads when it comes to allowing their sons to play football. Ryan Shazier is the strongest argument against football, and the NFL used him to sell the future of the sport. I don’t give a damn about the rule change on a rule on hitting with the crown of the helmet in the wake of the former Ohio State star’s injury. the linebacker went to make a normal tackle, and he left on a stretcher. There will be more injuries like Shazier’s.
Someone picked over the weekend will have their career cut short by head or neck or spinal injuries.
That in itself is one of the major hurdles the once pristine NFL must deal with.
By the numbers
In an effort to suck in gamblers, Las Vegas wasted no time in publishing their first bet on number of wins each franchise would have in 2018.
The wise guys had the Texans winning 9.
Put me down for the under.
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Everyone raved about the leadership of second-year quarterback C.J. Stroud this week as the Houston Texans prepared for their wild-card playoff game against the Los Angeles Chargers.
Everyone, that is, except the man himself.
“I don’t think I’m a great (leader),” Stroud said sheepishly. “I don’t know. That’s probably a bad thing to say about yourself, but I don’t think I’m all that when it comes to leading. I just try to be myself.”
But the 23-year-old Stroud simply being himself is exactly what makes him the undisputed leader of this team.
“C.J. is authentic, he’s real,” coach DeMeco Ryans said. “It’s not only here, it’s in the locker room around the guys and that’s what leadership is to me. As you evolve as a leader, you just be authentic to yourself. You don’t have to make up anything or make up a speech or make up something to say to guys. C.J. is being C.J.”
Sixth-year offensive lineman Tytus Howard said he knew early on that Stroud would be special.
“He has that aura about him that when he speaks, everybody listens,” he said.
Stroud has helped the Texans win the AFC South and reach the playoffs for a second straight season after they had combined for just 11 wins in the three years before he was drafted second overall.
He was named AP Offensive Rookie of the Year last season, when Houston beat the Browns in the first round before falling to the Ravens in the divisional round.
His stats haven’t been as good as they were in his fabulous rookie season when he threw just five interceptions. But he has put together another strong season in Year 2 despite missing top receiver Nico Collins for five games early and losing Stefon Diggs and Tank Dell to season-ending injuries in the second half of the season. He also started every game despite being sacked a whopping 52 times.
“He’s taken some crazy shots,” Howard said. “But even if he’s getting sacked and stuff like that, he just never lets that get to him. He just continues to fight through it, and it basically uplifts the entire offense.”
He also finds ways to encourage the team off the field and works to build chemistry through team get-togethers. He often invites the guys over to his house for dinner or to watch games. Recently, he rented out a movie theater for a private screening of “Gladiator II.”
“He’s like, ‘I want the guys to come in and bond together because this thing builds off the field and on the field,’” Howard said. “So, we need to be closer.”
Another thing that makes Stroud an effective leader is that his teammates know that he truly cares about them as people and not just players. That was evident in the loss to the Chiefs when Dell was seriously injured. Stroud openly wept as Dell was tended to on the field and remained distraught after he was carted off.
“It was good for people to see me in that light and knowing that there is still a human factor to me,” he said. "And I think that was good for people to see that we’re just normal people at the end of the day.”
Stroud said some of the leaders who molded him were his father, his coaches in high school and college, and more recently Ryans.
His coach said Stroud has been able to lead the team effectively early in his career because he knows there are others he can lean on if he needs help.
“Understanding that it’s not all on him as a leader, it’s all of our guys just buying in, doing what they have to do,” Ryans said. “But also, C.J. understanding a lot of guys are looking up to him on the team and he takes that role seriously. But it’s not a heavy weight for him because we have other leaders, as well, around him.”
Stroud considers himself stubborn and though some consider that a bad quality, he thinks it’s helped him be a better leader. He's had the trait as long as he can remember.
“That kind of carried into the sport,” he said. “Even as a kid, my mom used to always say how stubborn I was and just having a standard is how I hear it. It’s stubborn (but) I just have a standard on how I like things to be done and how I hold myself is a standard.”
And, to be clear, he doesn’t consider himself a bad leader, but he did enjoy hearing that others on the team consider him a great one.
“I just don’t look at myself in that light of just I’m all-world at that,” he said. “But I try my best to lead by example and it’s cool because I don’t ask guys and to hear what they have to say about that is kind of cool.”
Though he doesn’t consider himself a great leader, Stroud does have strong feelings about what constitutes one. And he’s hoping that he’ll be able to do that for his team Saturday to help the Texans to a victory, which would make him the sixth quarterback in NFL history to start and win a playoff game in both of his first two seasons.
“That would be making everybody around you better,” he said of great leaders. “Kind of like a point guard on the offense, the quarterback on the football team, the pitcher on a baseball team — just making everybody around you better.”