Texans Interested in QB Brock Osweiler [UPDATE: Reached Agreement]
 

The Texans have cleared more than $40 million in cap room. They have built themselves a warchest to pursue just about anyone they want that hits the open market. There is a QB-sized hole in their salary cap.

Bill O'Brien was on ESPN the morning after the Super Bowl (Mike & Mike?) and emphatically hoped that Peyton Manning would not retire. With Manning still not announcing his intentions, O'Brien may be getting his wish.

Either Manning hits the open market and becomes a tutor to a likely first round draft pick, or Osweiler, no longer under the control of the Broncos following their tagging of Von Miller, hits free agency available to the highest bidder.

Man, I hope not. I didn't see anything out of Osweiler that merits a big contract. The only way I'd do it is if we can sign him to a deal that has an early and cheap escape clause if he doesn't work out. I'd rather target someone like Lamar Miller to solve the RB issue, possibly sign an OL or WR (maybe Rishard Mathews) and then sell the farm if need be to move up for a QB.

PFF listed Osweiler as one of their potential "Free Agents about to be Overpaid":

https://www.profootballfocus.com/blo...-get-overpaid/

http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com...s-agent-today/

Texans are planning to lure Osweiler away while the Broncos are having their farewell ceremony for Peyton Manning. Denver made a 3-yr, $45 million bid to Ossie but it is not known how much of that is incentives and how much of it is guaranteed.

Or maybe Ossie is just tired of being upstaged by HOF quarterbacks every time he grabs his helmet.

If he comes to Houston I guarantee he will not have that problem.

I would hate for the Texans to spend a ton of money on that guy.

Pursuing Osweiler gives us a little indication that the team is not buying Tom Savage as a possible starter. Otherwise you make Savage battle a rookie QB in camp to start Week 1.

O'Brien refuses to let a rookie QB start if he can avoid it. If you forget the pains of the lack of production at the position over the past two years of journeymen, then I can see the argument that he already has a championship-caliber defense and just needs a game manager to keep the team at a playoff level.

Osweiler being under center when the Broncos beat the Patriots in the regular season is about to make him a lot of money from some team. That said, $15M/yr is below average still for a starting QB in the league.

You guys need to remember, we're in lying season. No one but the team and the player knows the truth behind any of these "reports."

If he shows up at a Houston airport, then I'll believe there is interest. Till then, I'm going to assume the agents are trying to create a market.

Not mine but I just had to share this:

The Saga of Brock Osweiler: A High-School Romance:


You take your girl to the big dance. You're not really sure about her. She's asked you before whether you're ready to "get serious and plan our future together" but you always put her off. Not really ready to commit. She's a nice enough girl, but you've got some questions about her. She might have a few short-comings. Do I really want to commit to her long-term? Am I ready for that? And is she really long-term relationship material?

But, then you get to the dance and you look around and GOd damn! There's some ugly looking girls standing against the wall! One of them's got a hair lip, one's got a raging personality defect and just punched a guy in the face who asked her to dance, and the rest are in various stages of short and lumpy.

And you think: "Damn! I better keep the girl I'm with! She might not turn out to be great, but compared with what's out there she's looking pretty good right now!"

But, there's a bunch of horny single guys at the dance, all eyeing your date. And then this rich guy from Texas and another one from L.A. and another one from Cleveland come over and start sweet talking your girl and you realize that, forget about finding a better option, you're going to have a fight on your hands just to keep the girl you've already got!

And you turn to her and say "you and me baby! I think you're awesome! Let's go steady!"

But she says: "not so fast! I asked you three months ago and you never gave me an answer. You made me wait all the way to the big dance, and now I'm going to explore my options! Rick Smith here from Houston says he's going to take me on an all expense trip to the Cayman Islands and buy me a car! I just might go with him!"

And what do you say? "I was planning to tell you tonight! You and I are going to the Caymans! All expenses paid. What do you say?"

And she says: "Well, what about the car? Is it a nice car? Cause Rick here promised me a Mercedes coupe!"

Moral of the story? If you aren't willing to lock her up early. If you wait until the big dance, it isn't about how great your girl is any more. The real question is going to be: "what are the alternatives?" Are they really any better? Or are you just going to wind up taking one of the hair-lip girls on that all expenses paid trip to the Caymans?

Texans have reached an agreement with Osweiler.

Time to see the terms next...

If I try hard enough I can find a way to defend this. He's not a rookie and at the very least you know he can play some. A couple of the rookies coming out this year will probably be very good in a few years and a couple will flame out entirely. The Texans minimize the risk of a total flameout in exchange for giving the guy veteran money. I might not have done things this way but as I said I can find a way to defend it.

Also, it gives the team the freedom to go BPA at every point in the draft. And since it looks like they're going to come away with Miller, too, they have tons of options.

The Texans have a championship defense NOW. So I think Osweiler is totally defendable as a signing vs. put all your eggs in what might be the 3rd or 4th QB drafted if the Texans sit at #22 overall.

This is a move that recognizes the Texans are not willing to waste any more of J.J. Watt's career with the Hoyer's, Fitzy Cent's, and Mallett's of the league.

Those are also my thoughts because of courses there's unknowns and uncertainty with Osweiler but not nearly as much as with the best QB we could have got in this years Draft.
They just announced that Brooks signed for 40m over 5 years with Philly.
No doubt that the OLine is now the top priority in the Draft.

Denver media reporting Osweiler deal is 4-yr, $72 million with $37 million guaranteed. Broncos would not go higher then $16mil/yr with $30 million guaranteed.

I stand corrected. Guess they really were interested....

The clock is now ticking on B'OB.

One comment:

"Manning shadow, Elway town, he's going to get his chance to be the man in HOU."

Well. We now have a coach and a QB with the initials "BO". I would not stoop to make a bush league joke here...... nope, not a sniff...

Goodness, this changes a lot of things.... Texans must've been planning it for a while what with the loss of the two linemen. Curious to see if the Denver/Houston connection remains amiable from now on....

One good thing.... Hoyer's gone.

I don't like who we picked or what we paid him. I do like that BOB has finally picked his QB and we have a chance to do something other than spin our wheels. Hopefully he is not Matt Flynn. I really want to be wrong.

Appears to be structured like a 2 year deal.

From Aaron Wilson :
Brock Osweiler: $72M, $37M gtd, $12M signing bonus, salaries $4M, $16M, $18M, $13M
Brock Osweiler has $5 million roster bonus on March 16, $4M base salary in 2016 fully guaranteed along with $16M 2017 base
LaConfora:
Brock Osweiler's deal with Texans includes all the guar $ in 1st 2yrs. $21M in '16 ($17M in bonus and $4M salary) and a $16M guar base in 17

https://twitter.com/AaronWilson_NFL/...49976726568960

All of the guaranteed money is in the first two years, so the Texans can pull the ripcord after 2017 if necessary.

We paid approximately a 20 % premium over what the Broncos "could" pay him and they might have been willing to go higher had they had the cap to
do it. I got NP with that and now we have all of our Draft picks in place instead of using them on a bigger unknown QB in the Draft - it's what's known as having your cake and eating it too.
And due to unusually large cojones Rick Smith may have difficulty getting thru his office door this morning after the deal he pulled over John Elway, but as mentioned Smith had the ammo(cap) to do the deal. But it's a big deal snatching this young NFL vet QB away from Elway and the defending SB champs.

We didn't snatch him away. He was Denver's if they wanted him. They chose not to offer him market value. We got him by paying more, not by sweet talking him away. And consider that Denver allowed him to walk without another QB on the roster.

Either way we are paying big time proven QB money for a guy who has less starting time than last year's rookies. Paying a guy with almost no experience or track record like a guy who has experience and track record is not called having your cake and eating it too.

QB A - 62%, 246 ypg, 1.3 TDpg, .8 INTpg, 86.4 rating
QB B - 61%, 246 ypg, 1.7 TDpg, .6 INTpg, 91.4 rating

Can you guess which of those QBs is Brian Hoyer and which of those QBs is getting paid $18 million per year?

Oh they wanted him though likly their pockets weren't deep enough to retain him, to afford him. Do I wish we could have gotten him for less ? Sure I wish we could trade a couple mid-round picks to GB for Aaron Rogers. I wish I could have bought my house for less, but I love it here and it's home now. Sometimes one just has to stick their head into it and do it. Kudos to the Texans for making this really big move here.
ne;This is a lot better than coughing up several Draft picks (maybe including multiple 1st rounders) for a college QB with not a single snap of training camp experience.

A college QB would have cost more draft picks but far less money. Either way we allocated huge resources and I hope Brock is great. And no matter what, I am happy we picked a QB and are moving forward for better or worse.

Osweiler gave fans just enough (Patriots, Steelers 1st half) to see greatness and just enough (Chargers, Steelers 2nd half) to be fearful. He's not a graceful runner but he can get the job done and he has the strong arm to zing the ball where it needs to go but he seemed to be easily confused on blitzes which may/may not be cured with more playing time instead of sitting on the bench.

Personally, I think the Texans overpaid but, given their situation, it's as good an option as anything else. Think of it this way: Texans traded Hoyer, Foster, Jones and Brooks for Osweiler, Miller, Allen and Bergstrom. Did we improve? Depends how you look at it.

Texans certainly made some bold moves yesterday. Hope they work out in next two years.

Seems 18 mil is only 14th highest qb salary in 2016, so with two year out option not bad.

Os is 25, so hoping we get the upside to show. Hope our rebuilt Oline performs well, if so, we should be okay.

I have no idea how the cap wizards do this but the contract for Osweiler is front-loaded yet will only count $12 million against this year's cap, according to sources. Apparently, much of this year's money is a big bonus that doesn't fully count against the cap.

Interesting read on the move: http://bleacherreport.com/articles/2...it-first-seems

Bonus money is spread over the term of the deal. So while the players guarantees are all in the 1st 2 years, there would still be some cap ramifications if they cut bait in year 3.

I am not too hung up on the money. They had it. They spent it. Let the accountants worry about how to make it work. I can only think of a couple of times they have truly been in cap troubles, so apparently they know how to manipulate it. Also, with the cap ever increasing, I really don't see it as a huge burden either way.

Maybe? Rumors exist that Osweiler wasn't as interested in a return given his dislike of Kubiak's offense and how he felt he was treated last season. And the Broncos offered him ~$16M per yr reportedly, but yeah, they didn't want him. :confused:

I honestly think Elway botched this. He had a hard time giving that kind of money to a player with a half season's worth of starts. And he likely underestimated the market, which is somewhat understandable before seeing what guys like Cousins and Bradford are being paid this year. Elway is about to find out how hard life is being a QB-needy team like the Texans have been the past three seasons.

It's all about the QB. Pick Hoyer and any three other players and you've made the wrong choice, period. Hoyer wasn't a factor for 2016 anyway... the team would have invested at minimum their first round pick in a new QB. So the team really trades a rookie QB, an injured Foster, and newly minted Jones and Brooks for a 1st round pick, Osweiler, a young and healthy Miller, Allen and Bergstrom.

And keep in mind this is about 2016... meaning 2012 Arian Foster is now a 30-yr old running back entering training camp on a bad Achilles heel. Jones and Brooks are decent starters, but they're being paid more than Allen and Bergstrom for questionable, if any, improvement over the former. So I don't think this depends on how you look at it at all.

Regardless of cost, I'm happy and am willing to give Osweiler a chance. And hey, he was smart enough not to pick jersey #8. That's a good start right there, IMO. :)

Welp. Shows what I know. We'd already seen that he was so historically bad as a Texan that they sold the farm to get Cleveland to take him out of the building. And apparently he is so terrible that the team with arguably the worst quarterback situation in the history of the modern NFL over the last 25 years can't use him.

Let that sink in for a minute. McNeck and Ricky pooled their collective intellectual prowess and gave $37 million dollars to a guy that not only can't win the Browns starting job, he can't even make the fking team. Unreal.

He must have a terrible attitude. If he was a tiny bit professional he'd be the backup.

He kinda reminds me of Eddie Haskell from the old Leave it to Beaver show.

He should never have to work a day for the rest of his life if he invests his money wisely.....

I'm sure you've read everything I've read on him. What I've concluded is that his confidence is shot (I initially mistyped that with an i which basically amounts to the same thing) and that once he decided that he couldn't read defenses he was just about done.

It makes me wonder. I had lots of problems with Kubiak, but as Pickett's signature attests, I obviously think had a way with quarterbacks. BOB, the supposed quarterback guru, well, let's just say the jury's still out on that one. I'm pretty sure if you put me in a room with Brady for half an hour I'd walk out of there a mfing quarterback guru, too.

From what I've gathered Brock was soft and he lost his confidence. I suppose that can happen to a guy. But, I don't know, that sort of sounds like a 6th round flyer more than a $40 million dollar man.

Anyhoo, the Texans are all set now with a guy who can't stay healthy and a guy who can't hit a target. I will say that from what I've seen Watson's arm strength does not seem to be an issue. He has plenty of arm strength to throw it right the fk over any receiver who happens to be running around in the defensive secondary. So we can dispose of that particular issue.

You gentlemen will have to excuse me. I'm about to
climb into my helicopter and embark on a journey to my
valley finca for a quick cheese tasting. I have some fresh pressed olive
oil and some young white to evaluate, also. I'm sure you
understand, you're all men of the world, especially nunu.

I saw an article yesterday that half of the NFL's starting QBs will be over 30.
And even crazier, 11 of the top 15 passers from 2011 will be starting opening day. That's why Stafford, Carr, and Luck are so rich. There are no young guys who can play QB right now.

So it's scary to draft a young guy when it might mean you are tying your franchise to 3 years of awful QB play that you can't give up on because you spent a 1st round pick (Blake Bortles). So instead of taking the plunge at QB in the draft, we tried a shortcut and threw piles of money at a guy who couldn't play on his previous team but won some games due to an awesome defense. Of course we only tried that after 2 years of pretend QBs.

So we are now 4 years away from Kubiak and Schaub, and we are just now dipping our toes in with a brand new rookie QB. The good news is that by 2020 we should know if we need another QB or not.

Brock actually looked like a guy who could play in Denver. Small sample size, sure. But he looked like an NFL quarterback. Buford'll tell you.

I guess what I'm saying is that Kubiak has my eternal respect because he licks his palms and magically turns a guy who can't play for the worst team in the history of the sport into a reasonable facsimile of an NFL player.

I like Matthew Stafford fine. I think he's pretty good. But that contract? Man. It's crazy what you have to pay for pretty good.

You scared me. I saw the headline and thought "Ozzie is back???"

particularly coupled with the news that they'd cut Weeden.

Oh, well. I'm busy watching the Twerps demolish the Longhorns. The Curse of the Longhorn Network continues...

I'd forgotten all about that game. My younger self would be disgusted at what I've become. Of course, if I could have a couple of words with my younger self...

Once I started my retirement countdown and began focusing on a new location, I've found myself caring less about things that used to occupy my unswerving loyalty. Realizing I don't need all these clothes in my closet where I'm going, I bagged four hefty bags full of shirts and pants on Wednesday to send to hurricane victims. A lot of folks had to leave with just the shirt on their backs. If I can give several victims a few extra shirts to wear, it's well worth it and very little sacrifice.

Anyway, Osweiler is back with the Broncos! Small world, eh? I guess living in Peyton Manning's shadow doesn't look so bad now.

I hope they like oversized Broncos sweatshirts, Promise Keepers 1997 tees and velcro Reeboks.

Just kidding, nice work. There was amazingly little loss of life for a storm of this size but it is impossible for me to comprehend the number of families that lost everything.

By the way, I'm not done talking about what we were discussing earlier. I still owe you some thoughts.

None of those but the lucky will get some Astros polos and tees in now retro colors plus an LSU t-shirt I got from a now-defunct store in Baton Rouge and an Edmonton Oilers tee shirt from my Wayne Gretzky days.

I held onto my Phi Slama Jama t-shirt that Coach Lewis signed for me. I also kept two Larry Dierker-style Hawaiian shirts with Astros logos on them. I decided these still might have monetary value some day.