Houston, you have a quarterback problem.
C.J. Stroud will enter an offseason full of questions following a dreadful performance during the Texans’ 28-16 loss to the Patriots in the AFC Divisional Playoffs.
He threw a career-high four interceptions and finished 20-of-47 with 212 yards, with one touchdown and a passer rating of 28.
“I look back and I just feel like I let people down, and I’m not happy with that,” Stroud said after Sunday’s game. “It hurts, and I’m not naïve to it. I didn’t play my best this year, but I’m going to respond.
“I’m going to keep my chest up, my chin up high, and I’m going to just keep battling forward. If God be for me, who can be against me. I’m just going to rely on that. I think even today, just our team doing great, our defense getting stops, and just being careless with the football, I’ve got to get that fixed, and it’s something that I know I can, so I’m going to get that done.”
The Texans squandered a championship-worthy defense in 2025. They finished first in yards (277.2) and second to the Seahawks in points allowed during the regular season (17.2).
All Houston needed Stroud to do was play smart football. But that didn’t happen in either one of their postseason games this year.
The Texans defeated the Steelers 30-6 in the AFC Wild Card round despite Stroud’s horrendous performance. He completed 21-of-32 passes for 250 yards and one touchdown. However, Stroud committed three turnovers, including a red zone interception.
Stroud is the first player in NFL playoff history with five-plus interceptions and five-plus fumbles in a postseason. Yikes.
Sunday’s loss to the Patriots wasn’t entirely on Stroud. Houston’s defense allowed three touchdowns, which is the most the starting unit has allowed since their Week 16 victory against the Raiders. Houston sat many of its starters in the season finale, a 38-30 win against the Colts.
Texans coach DeMeco Ryans says he never considered benching Stroud for backup Davis Mills.
“C.J. is our guy,” he said. “I believed that he could come back out in the second half and flip it. I believed that he could play better, and he did that in the second half. He did play better.
“We had some positive drives there in the second half. I believed that he would do that, and he did that. As I always tell our guys at halftime, it really doesn’t matter what happened in the first half. You have to flush it, remove it, and you just have to go out and finish the right way. We’ve been there before. We’ve been in situations much more dire than this, and we were able to bounce back.”
Stroud’s poor playoff performances complicate his future. He is eligible for a contract extension this offseason after finishing his three-year tenure in the NFL. Houston will also have to decide whether to exercise Stroud’s fifth-year option.
It would be a shocker if the Texans don’t pick up Stroud’s option for 2027. That would give them control over the signal caller for the next two years. Houston can then make a final decision on whether Stroud can be the quarterback who could potentially lead them to a championship.
During his rookie season in 2023, Stroud looked like the next elite quarterback in the league. He threw for 4,108 yards with 23 touchdowns and five interceptions after leading Houston to an AFC South division title. Following the Texans’ loss to the Ravens in the divisional round that year, Stroud’s play has plummeted.
In 2024, Stroud passed for 3,727 yards and 20 touchdowns, but he finished third in the league in interceptions (12) and had a QBR of 46.4, which was 24th in the NFL. He helped lead the Texans to the playoffs for the third straight year in 2025 and finished 11th in QBR (61.8). But his postseason performance this year is difficult to ignore.
Houston could give Stroud a contract extension, hoping he will eventually return to being an elite quarterback. Many will say the Texans have no choice but to give Stroud an extension, but they should be cautious of what is happening with the Dolphins and Tua Tagovailoa.
Miami was in a similar situation with Tagovailoa and rewarded him with a four-year, $212.4 million contract extension in July 2024, making him one of the NFL’s highest-paid quarterbacks. But after two seasons in which they missed the playoffs and he was benched, it appears the Dolphins will move on from Tagovailoa this offseason.
Cutting Tagovailoa before June 1 would create a massive $99.2 million dead cap hit for the Dolphins. They could also make him a post-June 1 designation, which splits it into $67.4M in 2026 and $31.8M in 2027, while trading Tagovailoa before June 1 results in $45.2M dead cap.
Just because the Texans can give Stroud a contract extension doesn’t mean they should. Houston can play out the string and, if need be, place the franchise tag on Stroud in 2028 if needed.
“Everybody is entitled to their own opinion,” Stroud said. “I know that I’m still getting better, and I’ve still got a lot of things to figure out. Year three for me. It will be year four next year, and I’m still learning every day.
“Had a new system this year and new guys and it’s something I’m still getting adjusted to. That’s no excuses, just I’ve got to learn from that. I don’t try to — I try my best to forget successes and failures. Regardless of what it is in that specific season, I’m going to learn from this, and I’m going to move on, I’ll be better, and I’m going to be back.”
The windows to win championships are small. With a talented defense like that, the Texans have to take advantage of their opponents when they can or risk wasting away one of the better defenses since the Seahawks’ Legion of Boom.
“Every year is different. I mean, this year, point blank, we just didn’t put points on the scoreboard. Our defense got stops all year, got turnovers, put us in great position.
“I didn’t put us in position to get us the wins by scoring points and seven, not three. That’s kind of how I look at it, and that’s what it is, so I take full responsibility. I’m the leader of the offense, and a lot of the things are on me to get it done to get us seven, and we just didn’t get that done this year, and I didn’t get that done. I take full responsibility, but I think as I look back, maybe that’s the thing we’ve got to get better offensively.”
