Walterfootball has been sour on O'Brien for a while. Not saying the other info is not true, but they seem to have a dislike for him.
Franchise tagging Clowney would be worse than letting him go, imo. That's just a sh*tstorm waiting to happen.
Projection: Six years, $135 million, $85 million GTD $135M Total value would be T-4th with Aaron Donald & Matthew Stafford $22.5M avg/year would be T-11th with Aaron Donald $85M guaranteed would be 2nd behind Matt Ryan($94M) and just ahead of Kirk Cousins($84M) Aaron Donald: 6 years, $135M; $22.5M/year; $50M guaranteed Khalil Mack: 6 years, $141M; $23.5M/year; $60M guaranteed Already said I'd pass on paying long-term so yeah, still pass.
Not that it makes that big of a difference, but Donald and Mack have $86M and $90M GTD respectively in their deals. That $50/$60 amount was the GTD at signing. Regardless I can't see the Texans doing this.
We’ve got Whitney, who was completely miss used this season - too much coverage and not enough pass rush attempts IMHO, I’d also imagine if they let Clowney go or trade him, they would add a pass rusher or 2 in FA or the draft. It will be difficult to tie that much money up in the DL on just 2 players.
Ross Tucker had a great point on Mercilus several weeks ago. He said that Crennel allows J.J. and Clowney to play with a lot of freedom, ie going after big plays vs always playing their assignments. He said he thought Mercilus could produce much better numbers if he played with the same freedom. So I guess the question is if they were to trade Clowney and if RAC used Whitney more as pass rusher, would you take that given Whitney would cost you 7.5mil vs somewhere around 20 for Clowney. To go one step further, if they used some of Clowney’s money to add an interior pass rusher would our pass rush be better overall than last season. Just stuff to think about
Trading Clowney is a Raiders/Mack move. Raiders did it because of money. Texans have plenty of money. Can, and should, waive Kevin Johnson for another $9M. That'll leave about $75M for the Texans if I'm not mistaken. Jjo is $4M and Lamar would be another $6M (assuming we would be going after someone like LeVeon Bell). So possibly $85M. Texans have options.
I disagree on the Mack move. Clowney has a significant injury history that cannot be discounted when looking at an expensive long term deal. Personally I worry about having that kind of money tied up in 2 players with extensive serious injury history (JJ and Clowney). I do like Clowney and his talent is obvious but the whole situation is worrisome. I heard a great question on the radio yesterday, would Bill Bellichek sign Clowney to a long term high dollar deal?
I don’t think they’ll let him go either but I was explaining the would could happen for money. Though, I believe he should be let go if we get some could cbs in the draft. Should be franchised
This may be my biggest frustration when watching Texans games. Even with as much as they've invested in the defensive line, it seems they fail to generate any sort of consistent pass rush at all, unless they're playing an awful team.
You don't want to be the sucker that holds on to Clowney for that kind of money and he will hold out if you franchise him so good luck with that.
