Uncertainty at quarterback led to Texans signing Tyrod Taylor

When Tyrod Taylor signed with the Houston Texans in March, his arrival came with the notion that he was the team’s contingency plan at quarterback. Deshaun Watson, Houston’s starting quarterback since September 2017, requested a trade and had no interest in playing for the Texans again.

But according to first-year general manager Nick Caserio, Taylor’s signing was more about his experience and fit in Houston than finding a potential replacement for Watson.

“What we try to do at all positions with the entire team is to identify players that we thought we liked that may have had some experience with our staff and that were looking for an opportunity to compete, to be in a good situation and that wanted to be in Houston,” Caserio said during a press conference via Zoom. “He [Taylor] certainly fell into that category like a lot of other players…We just try to do what we thought was best for the organization and for the team. So that’s why we signed the players that we did.”

Caserio additionally acknowledged that the lack of quarterbacks on the roster also led to the signing of Taylor. At the time, Watson was the only quarterback under contract — with AJ McCarron entering free agency and Josh McCown’s retirement.

Since Taylor’s acquisition, the Texans have also added Ryan Finley with a trade from the Cincinnati Bengals.

“That was a position where quite frankly we didn’t have very many numbers,” he said. “When you have one player at any one position on the team, you need more than one person. So I think that’s kind of how we approached it and just kind of went through our process and evaluated it accordingly.”

After spending the last two seasons with the Los Angeles Chargers, Taylor is reuniting with his former quarterback coach David Culley — the Texans’ first-year coach.

Taylor played under Culley during his final season as the starting quarterback with the Buffalo Bills in 2017. While leading the Bills to a 9-7 record and their first postseason appearance since 1999, Taylor threw for 2,799 yards and 14 touchdowns that season.