Zach Cunningham absolutely deserved to get paid why he got paid. McKinney and Whitney on the other hand.
Out of curiosity how much of the lack of pressure without him can be attributed to them going into a more base coverage with less emphasis on pressuring which contributed to him being taken off the field. Also how many of the plays of him going off the field as a result of injury. Percentage also doesn't tell me how many total plays were run with and without him. Data without analysis is crap
While that can explain some of it, it's not like he was brought in specifically for pass rush downs, while he gives one hell of a boost to the pass rush, he's absolutely elite against the run. Also, we're not talking about a one year outlier, he's made a career out of being an absolutely disruptive force when on the field. Very few teams even attempt to only send one guy at him and he's always the primary focus of the O line whenever he's on the field. He's a TFL machine....his 3 final seasons in Houston he had 53 TFL's, last season without him no one on the team had more than 9. Even with only 600 snaps, Clowney would have ranked 2nd on the Texans last year in TFL's despite most defenders at the top having 900+ snaps. He's just THAT much better than any player on the Texans. Losing Clowney was a major hit to the defense, and they could have had him back, but they decided not to make him a serious offer....and no offer whatsoever till they saw he was going to the Titans.
Clowney is a very good but not great player. Certainly not worth the money he was asking for, as the market bore out. How much of that 15 million the Titans gave him is in unlikely to be earned incentives? How much is guaranteed? 8-9 million?
I'm not going to get bogged down with the "very good/great" labels, the point is that he's considerably better than any player currently on the Texans defense and IMO that's what matters given the sad state of the defense.
Debatable If true, this says plenty about the state of the Texans defense. Clowney was very avg last year.
The only player even in contention for that "debate" would be JJ Watt, and IMO he's lost a step but we'll see. As to Clowney being "league average" last year.....no, just no. Last season was scored an 87 by PFF, Mercilus was a 65. Cunningham was a 69, Martin was a 56. Now DJ Reader was an 86....but he's gone now. There's just no talent on defense anymore.
Can he make plays like this? Yes Can he make plays like this consistently? Nope He was nearly invisible many games last year. Certainly not worth 17 million per season.
You say he was nearly invisible and yet he'd have been 2nd on the Texans in TFL's despite playing 300+ fewer snaps.... so maybe he was better than you remember.
@Bobbythegreat -- nice breakdown on JD!! I couldnt agree more, too many people get bogged down with SACKS as the end all stat for a defensive player, but in reality guys like JD impact the game SO MUCH MORE than just one trick ponies who can get to the passer like Jacob Martin. Like you said his run defense is elite - so much so that teams barely run at him, and when they do he has been double/triple teamed more than any other defender in the NFL over the last few years. DL Teammates of JD Clowney tend to have career years with himon the team. I understand blue blood fans trying to not accept that the current management structure cant seem to identify or retain the actual talent on the team and thus trashing all the ex players, but some of the moves that have been made by OBrien and Co. have been quite negligent with emotions overriding logical decision making and true team building. and here is the leaderboard for the 'pass rush win rate' by NFL defenders:
Still not worth 17 million he wanted and the market bore that out. Especially with that knee. Year to year is the smart way to go with Clowney if you want to protect your cap and keep Clowney playing hard and not taking games off. Especially with that knee.
Hate to break it to you but that was knock on the Texans. The situation you laid out is exactly what the franchise tag is for. But instead of exercising it, King Bill got butthurt that he didn’t show up for camp and did whatever he could do trade him. And to be clear, I like Martin and Conley. But if I have a choice between them and Clowney for essentially what was a 2 year/$35M deal, I’m taking the latter for sure.
thats a tough one. thats the year Deshaun came on board and you found Zach in the 2nd round. Now the 3rd rounder that year busted out (as most 3rd rounders do sadly under OBrien) so if you could have gotten creative with some picks MAYBE you could have moved back up into the late 1st. Imagine that having one ALL PRO/DPOY brother hand off the defensive legacy to another - wow!
This would've required forward thinking. Something the Texans org has never had. BTW, if the Texans had picked Dion Dawkins like some wanted then the Texans would have all of their draft picks. Cunningham is an avg to slightly above avg player and the Texans would've been much better drafting Dawkins or trading up for TJ. JJ tried to tell everybody before that draft. Of course the Texans continue to carry on the radition of blowing 3rd rd picks.
