Houston Texans: Deshaun Watson’s use of play action has positive results

The Houston Texans have been adding a bit more play action to Deshaun Watson’s workload and it has yielded positive results. What’s going on? Let’s look.

The Houston Texans have won eight straight games, which breaks the franchise record of seven games, a record notched back during the 2012 season.  Whatever way you slice it, the Houston Texans deserve to be in the conversation of the top teams in the AFC but there will critics out there talking about the team’s strength of schedule on how lucky they have been in some of those wins.

In at least five of the eight games in this streak, the Houston Texans have been quite lucky whether if it’s the placekicker not making a game-winning field goal in the clutch, the opposing team not getting in field position to help their kicker or just plain mismanagement by the opposing head coach.

Regardless, I’ll take the win and Monday night’s 34-17 win over the Tennessee Titans goes to show that this team can earn their wins when it counts the most.

But speaking of success — Deshaun Watson has a shiny new tool in the box in regard to how to trick defenses willing to take the bait.

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In Monday’s game, Watson was using a series of fakes to make things happen, similar to his mindset during that seven-game stretch last season when he was at his peak and the use of play-action pass has yielding positive results for Watson’s effectiveness of moving the chains.

This is something I proposed earlier in the season and it seems to be working.  The play-action pass works best when a team has a strong running game and with Lamar Miller notching his third game this season over the century with 12 carries and 162 yards, that aspect of the Houston Texans‘ offense is as strong as ever.  Lest we not forget his historic 97-yard run that changed the narrative of the team’s Monday night matchup.

According to Pro Football Focus (subscription required), Watson had netted 52 yards — 10.4 yards per attempt — and a 149.6 QB rating in eight dropbacks.  That’s versus 58 yards of non-play action — 8.3 yards per attempt — and a 118.9 rating through 26 dropbacks.

Bill O’Brien dialed up 23.5 percent of Watson’s dropbacks as play-action which is a stark increase since after the bye week.

Here’s a breakdown of the percentage of PA over the past few weeks:

Week 8 vs. MIA: 19.0%

Week 9 at DEN: 20.6%

Week 11 at WAS: 34.5%

Week 12 vs. TEN: 23.5%

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As you can see, it’s becoming a healthy part of Watson’s game day diet and I think it’s going to

continue to give the Houston Texans a leg-up among the remaining opponents in the schedule.

Matt Schaub was the king of the play-action pass back during his seven-season tenure with the Houston Texans but the difference is that Watson has the wheels to get the yards as well but it just provides another facet in this offense that teams will struggle to stop because of DW4’s talents.

Although it can’t be the centerpiece of the offensive strategy, I’m liking what I’m seeing so far and I hope that it continues as this team looks to dominate anything that stands in their way in this last month of the season.

Watson completed 19-of-24 of his passes for 210 yards — 8.8 yards per attempt — with two touchdowns, zero interceptions and a 130.9 QB rating against the Titans this past Monday.

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