J.J. McCarthy Is Projected To Get Walloped By the Texans

I'm a little pissed off that John Harbaugh didn't listen to me. We're talking about Giants Texans this weekend, which is oddly one of the great, like one of the premier matchups of this weekend, which you can say, you know, it says a lot, but it's Houston heating up. It's the Giants trying to stay on top of this just disgusting NFC East. And John Harbaugh ends up pivoting to JJ McCarthy, the consummate Michigan man. So take whatever Albert says with a grain of salt. yeah cj stroud revenge game from 2022 oh right yeah yeah and marvin harrison right go get him siege let's start with the jj mccarthy of it all though um you know we we we kind of deep dove on this on the show on uh on uh monday and it's an interesting move it's probably the biggest move that harbaugh has made as head coach so far outside of green lighting the dexter warren straight yeah right um and this one i think you you know you've always been good at kind of bringing this perspective where this is probably you know this is probably gassing up the locker room a little bit more because it may be hard to get the guys going against houston with jamis in the lineup and just kind of understanding what jamis has been yeah i just think it's premature Sure. And I'll stand on the Hill saying that like JJ McCarthy doing what he did against the saints, like Kellen Moore was pulling starters at that point. It was effectively like a permanent two minute drill. Sometimes it's easier to get those deep completions in there. And I get it. I've heard the explanations. It all makes sense. JJ is closer in complexion to Jackson darts. So you can run a version of the offense that they installed during training camp. Fine. Totally get it. But jamis if you look at if you look at jamis and you listen to Jamis and you look in Jamis's past his level of don't give a you know what is beyond a 10 if this guy has a ---- game against the Houston Texans it will not matter one iota to him in the future like that guy is beyond consequence personally if JJ McCarthy gets walloped by this defense and this is a 10 point spread going into Sunday so i think Vegas thinks he's getting walloped i think he's getting walloped what happens to that kid and then you can't bench him again i know you got to ride with them you know and so i think that's where you're getting yourself stuck a little bit in my mind JJ is sort of the quintessential like once you go with him you have to roll with them um and i just you know i i i'm with everyone on like he is a fit for what Matt Nagy was building for Jackson Dart like you mentioned i think that's true um in a lot of ways like there are stylistic similarities between him and Jackson Dart um and you know when i ask people like to compare the two JJ may have a stronger arm i think Dart has maybe a little more arm talent and his ability to change speeds the question with JJ is like the sturdy build that Jackson Dart has to run RPOs and be right legs to get around like like JJ's already been hurt a bunch and doesn't have the same build the Jackson Dart does but i can see where you can make it work like my question is how much of the offense can he possibly have right now after only having been there for a couple of weeks and what's that going to look like against Houston and i think i'd be i'm gonna be curious if you agree with this i think if Houston's going to take off we'll see it this week i think if if that went over the Jaguars was their foot in the ground moment right like where they're turning it and now all of a sudden you're going to see what they really can be to me like this is this is it this is the week and it's and it's going to be foot on the gas and they wind up when they winning this going away and they go into their bye with a great shot to reset you know and so i i sort of look at it that way they've got a wounded giants team at home for the Texans this should be the one you know what i mean like where it's like oh they are the team that they were last year you know a couple things i i think one CJ Stroud has been playing phenomenally well lights out and and you know you go zero and four and i think that that goes a little bit unnoticed but here's what's happening in real time last year the struggle i think in part was like the Texans did something that teams don't really do anymore. And that is take, you know, he was in kind of a pre-baked kind of Miller Lite version of the Kyle Shanahan offense. And it was working for him. Right. But they wanted to pivot. Stroud wanted more control. And so they bring in kind of a hybrid version of what McVay does for Stafford and what the Patriots had historically done for Tom Brady. Right. That makes you a little bit more of a pre-snap quarterback. That gives you a lot of flexibility at the line, but that also demands of you that you understand coverages at a doctorate level, that you understand protections at a doctorate level, and that you can operate all this at basically the speed of light. We saw the struggles with that a little bit last year, but what we've seen this year are myriad examples of the correct identification of when a route needs to be adjusted, when you're seeing someone coming hot and you have your read on a blitz. And so Stroud now, this is the benefit of it. This is the payoff. You go through a little bit of a struggle. And I think this is probably where i failed as an analyst last year and i think a lot of people failed in saying oh stroud's just being crappy stroud's just being crappy and nick casario's out there like what the f are you talking about i'm not gonna you know i'm not gonna trade this guy now he didn't sign him also so i think he may have had some of those doubts too but i think that everyone was waiting for that moment where the rubber met the road and now credit to stroud because he is now gonna get himself 70 million bucks a year because you know what i mean like it was a nice little it was a nice little gamble if he keeps playing this way uh playing this way defensively this is still a top six unit in drop back success rate opposing quarterback drop back success rate and they're 11th against the run in the nfl in terms of epa per play and i think that what we have to what we have to consider and the texans have been saying this and i get it i'm texans defender in chief this year I'm the guy whose name is under the byline on the cover preview issue. And everyone's saying, I'm the jinx. I'm the jinx. And I got to defend my pick here, my Super Bowl pick. But they were also one of the unluckiest teams in the NFL through the first five weeks of the season. Like, guys are making insane catches, 50-50 balls. There were drops. There were weird fumbles that they weren't recovering. There was a ton of stuff. Weird, oddly timed penalties, everything, right? and so i think that the texans are now just getting to the other side of this and the credit to them should be the fact that like nobody's gonna nobody's betting with any degree of confidence that they won't make the playoffs now who is well i mean and here's the other thing is they can win this one they have their bye then at chargers at browns colts on thursday night that could be six and four and now you're going you're you're you're having baltimore come in coming off of your mini bye your six and four thanksgiving weekend i i mean connor you look at the rest of their schedule it's freaking manageable you know what i mean like it's really manageable and like i i just i don't know i i like i think if cj can keep up this pace they have too much talent on defense and i i think like you start to see okay marvin harrison's going to be able to make an impact and jaylen noel looks like i mean like a real star and we'll see what they get with tank dell coming back but you know the one question i still have and this is where the giants will be able to to to really test them is the offensive line and the giants should be able to really test the texans and how far they've come along in that area um but i just about everywhere else it looks like they're okay not okay they're good just about everywhere else if you get something from Dell and Marvin Harrison's 70% of the Marvin Harrison we believed we were getting in the draft this all of a sudden becomes like the second deepest wide receiver room in the NFL right and that was after losing a guy they thought was going to become a star Jade Higgins right i mean next year i don't want to get ahead of ourselves but imagine what like if Harrison becomes this you imagine Collins Harrison Higgins it's like a basketball team out there you know what i mean that you're dealing with it's crazy like if you remember the old school Chargers offenses when they had Vincent Jackson and Malcolm Floyd and all of those guys oh yeah yeah like it's they have a it's it's a really really interesting situation going forward for the Texans