EVERY-THING SPORTS
How Texans' CJ Stroud finds himself in elite company after dazzling comeback victory
Nov 6, 2023, 3:35 pm
CJ Stroud has been beyond impressive. Photo by Wesley Hitt/Getty Images.
Here are all the ways Houston Texans QB CJ Stroud is breaking the mold
Him.
The Man.
QB1.
The Face of the Franchise.
Coleridge Bernard Stroud IV.
C.J.
Whatever you want to call him, make sure you say it with the utmost respect. Stroud had the performance of a lifetime in the Texans' 39-37 win over the Tampa Bay Bucs. He led his team to an improbable comeback win. Improbable you ask? They were on their third or fourth different starting center. The whole team has been decimated with injuries. Quarterback is the only position group that hasn't had a guy miss a game this season from injury. The injuries kept coming in-game as Jimmie Ward, M.J. Stewart, Ka'imi Fairbairn (more on this shortly), John Metchie III, and Hassan Ridegway were all ruled out of the game with injuries. All of that, plus being down 37-33 with 46 seconds left and two timeouts. Nothing a rookie record of 470 yards passing and five touchdowns with no picks couldn't cure.
None of it phased him. One of the injuries has been to Robert Woods. A bit of an afterthought of a wide receiver signing because he was coming off an okay season with the Titans. A receiver over 30 years old two years removed from an ACL injury isn't exactly WR1 material for a rookie QB. Woods became a safety blanket for Stroud. The other receivers were all unproven with little experience. Dalton Schultz (211) was the only one of them that had more than 100 career receptions entering this season. Combine that with a first time offensive coordinator, rookie head coach, and a franchise trying to turn their team around, you wonder how is this kid seeing this much success so early on?
Faith. He opened his post game presser by thanking his Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. When asked how he stays so calm, he reiterated his faith by saying, “God gives me a peace to remain calm despite all what's going on around me.” He spoke about how he's a family man and struggles with balancing everything sometimes. That led to him speaking out on criminal justice reform. He brought up his dad's situation, as well as prison conditions in Mississippi. Saying he wants to use his platform for criminal justice reform was a delight, but the fact that he knows about it and does the research was impressive. “Some of the conditions with rats and roaches and stuff… I mean, I know they're criminals, but they're humans too.”
Whenever I hear about a player's leadership skills, I often pay attention to what others say about them. Unprompted praise from a vet on a rookie's leadership skills isn't something that should be ignored. When Laremy Tunsil says he's impressed by Stroud's leadership skills and other vets speak very highly of him, it lets me know the hype is no longer hype. The hype has given way to the real deal. Stroud is everything they say he is and then some. Stories like this go back to his time at Ohio State. He once told his NIL agent he didn't want any more deals so he could focus on being a good teammate and leader. He even bought his teammates gifts to share his newfound wealth. So I wasn't really surprised when I heard he regularly hosts teammates for dinner during the week.
Setting rookie passing records while leading your team to a comeback win on the final drive is one way to announce your arrival to the upper echelon of QBs in this league. No longer is he thought of as a good young QB, or good for a rookie. He's good. Period. Use whatever measuring stick you want, this kid stacks up with the best in this league. Name 10 QBs in this league playing better football this year. I doubt you can. As good as he is now, wait until they put more talent around him. If he stays healthy, he's going to be in that top QB conversation for a long time. Stroud has given Houston something it can be proud of.
They’ll be watching in Canada, not just because of Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, though the NBA’s scoring champion and MVP favorite who plays for Oklahoma City surely helps lure in fans who are north of the border.
They’ll be watching from Serbia and Greece, the homelands of Denver star Nikola Jokic and Milwaukee star Giannis Antetokounmpo. Alperen Sengun will have them watching Houston games in the middle of the night in Turkey, too. Slovenian fans will be watching Luka Doncic and the Lakers play their playoff opener at 2:30 a.m. Sunday, 5:30 p.m. Saturday in Los Angeles. Fans in Cameroon will be tuned in to see Pascal Siakam and the Indiana Pacers. Defending champion Boston features, among others, Kristaps Porzingis of Latvia and Al Horford of the Dominican Republic.
Once again, the NBA playoffs are setting up to be a showcase for international stars.
In a season where the five statistical champions were from five different countries, an NBA first — Gilgeous-Alexander is Canadian, rebounding champion Domantas Sabonis of Sacramento is from Lithuania, blocked shots champion Victor Wembanyama of San Antonio is from France, steals champion Dyson Daniels of Atlanta is from Australia, and assists champion Trae Young of the Hawks is from the U.S. — the postseason will have plenty of international feel as well. Gilgeous-Alexander is in, while Sabonis and Daniels (along with Young, obviously) could join him if their teams get through the play-in tournament.
“We have a tremendous number of international players in this league,” NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said earlier this season. “It’s roughly 30% of our players representing, at least on opening day, 43 different countries, so there’s much more of a global sense around our teams.”
By the end of the season, it wound up being 44 different countries — at least in terms of countries where players who scored in the NBA this season were born. For the first time in NBA history, players from one country other than the U.S. combined to score more than 15,000 points; Canadian players scored 15,588 this season, led by Gilgeous-Alexander, the first scoring champion from that country.
Gilgeous-Alexander is favored to be MVP this season. It'll be either him or Jokic, which means it'll be a seventh consecutive year with an international MVP for the NBA. Antetokounmpo won twice, then Jokic won three of the next four, with Cameroon-born Joel Embiid of the Philadelphia 76ers winning two seasons ago.
“Shai is in the category of you do not stop him,” Toronto coach Darko Rajakovic said after a game between the Raptors and Thunder this season.
In other words, he's like a lot of other international guys now. Nobody truly stops Jokic, Antetokounmpo and Doncic either.
And this season brought another international first: Doncic finished atop the NBA's most popular jersey list, meaning NBAStore.com sold more of his jerseys than they did anyone else's. Sure, that was bolstered by Doncic changing jerseys midseason when he was traded by Dallas to the Los Angeles Lakers, but it still is significant.
The Slovenian star is the first international player to finish atop the most popular jerseys list — and the first player other than Stephen Curry or LeBron James to hold that spot in more than a decade, since soon-to-be-enshrined Basketball Hall of Famer Carmelo Anthony did it when he was with New York in 2012-13.
“We’re so small, we have 2 million people. But really, our sport is amazing,” fellow Slovene Ajsa Sivka said when she was drafted by the WNBA's Chicago Sky on Monday night and asked about Doncic and other top Slovenian athletes. “No matter what sport, we have at least someone that’s great in it. I’m just really proud to be Slovenian.”
All this comes at a time where the NBA is more serious than perhaps ever before about growing its international footprint. Last month, FIBA — the sport's international governing body — and the NBA announced a plan to partner on a new European basketball league that has been taking shape for many years. The initial target calls for a 16-team league and it potentially could involve many of the biggest franchise names in Europe, such as Real Madrid, Paris Saint-Germain and Manchester City.
It was a season where four players topped 2,000 points in the NBA and three of them were international with Gilgeous-Alexander, Jokic and Antetokounmpo. Globally, time spent watching NBA League Pass was up 6% over last season. More people watched NBA games in France this season than ever before, even with Wembanyama missing the final two months. NBA-related social media views in Canada this season set records, and league metrics show more fans than ever were watching in the Asia-Pacific region — already a basketball hotbed — as well.
FIBA secretary general Andreas Zagklis said the numbers — which are clearly being fueled by the continued international growth — suggest the game is very strong right now.
“Looking around the world, and of course here in North America," Zagklis said, "the NBA is most popular and more commercially successful than ever.”