Teams going thin at backup quarterback with their starter firmly in mind is not uncommon in the NFL.
Until the drafting of Jordan Love, the Green Bay Packers had the likes of Brett Hundley, Matt Flynn, Seneca Wallace, and Scott Tolzein take snaps in place of Aaron Rodgers. The Indianapolis Colts famously had Jim Sorgi and Curtis Painter backing up Peyton Manning because their season was lost anyway if their starting quarterback went down.
The Houston Texans are going thin at quarterback in 2022 all the while second-year Davis Mills is still an unproven commodity.
According to Cody Benjamin from CBS Sports, the Texans didn’t have anyone to place in the two top backup quarterback categories of promising youngsters or proven veterans. What is fascinating is that Tyrod Taylor, who was the Texans’ starter last year and was beat out by Mills in the final five games, made the list as the No. 10 quarterback.
New York is overpaying considering he’s struggled to even stay healthy coming off the bench in recent years, and he’s not particularly accurate despite a tendency for short-area passing. Still, he’s been a serviceable starter before, and he can move.
Even though Taylor may not be competing for the starting job in Houston, his absence demonstrates how thin the Texans are going at quarterback.
Kyle Allen didn’t make the list, but the former Houston Cougar would be the Texans’ only hope if anything happened to Mills. Allen has a 7-10 record as a starter and his best year was with the Carolina Panthers in 2019 when he went 5-7 in place of an injured Cam Newton. He followed Ron Rivera to Washington and went 1-3 in 2020, but failed to start a game last season.
Although not in the same league as Manning, the Texans’ philosophy still seems to be the same as the anecdote about then-offensive coordinator Tom Moore, who was asked why the team didn’t give more first-team reps to Sorgi. Houston may be willing to accept they will be in the same boat if anything happens to Mills, which could be why they haven’t shored up the position behind their former 2021 third-rounder from Stanford.
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