Houston Texans: The position that Jordan Akins sees playing outside of TE

We know that Houston Texans tight end Jordan Akins has plenty of versatility but what position does he expect to play more this season? Let’s look into it.

Houston Texans fans — the first week of training camp has concluded and before we know it, they will be wrapping things up and preparing for the season. There are a lot of unknowns in terms of the production that the team will get from the offensive line as well as the secondary unit which both have a lot of questions left be answered on how impactful they will be.

But one thing’s for sure, the Houston Texans tight ends will be a group to be reckoned with this season as they currently have five tight ends signed to the roster currently.

Let’s go through them, shall we? Darren Fells, Jordan Thomas, 2019 third-round pick Kahale Warring, Jerell Adams and Jordan Akins.

Let’s talk about the latter of that series.

Akins has been working on various areas of his game this past season and even though he’s categorically a tight end, he’s going to be done so much more for this team in 2019.

I was excited when he was drafted in the third round of the 2018 NFL Draft but I wasn’t sure if his skillset was necessarily a great fit for the Houston Texans. He’s far from being an elite blocker but he’s incredibly fast and athletic — he was a two-sport athlete playing baseball as well — making his availability appealing to the Houston Texans‘ brass.

Now it remains to be seen if the Houston Texans will continue with the “stronger, longer, faster” mantra since Brian Gaine’s ouster after less than 18 months on the job but that’s something to monitor when the team hires his replacement to which for all intent and purposes, it’d likely be New England Patriots’ GM Nick Caserio.

Akins still fits that mold but he was asked by the Houston Chronicle’s Aaron Wilson in regard to what position does he see himself playing the most outside of tight end in 2019. He gave an interesting answer to that question.

Here’s what he had to say:

"“I would say slot receiver,” Akins said. “Special teams as well, up-back, punt return as well as fullback. Just moving us around, I think we can create more mismatches. All of our tight ends bring a different set of skills. You have speed, you have the thump and you have a little bit of both with (rookie) Kahale (Warring). I think coach (Bill O’Brien) is doing a great job of moving us around and creating mismatches as well as setting up the run blocks.”"

With his 6-foot-4, 243-pound athletic frame, this should be no problem as he does have the

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quickness the position needs as they line up at scrimmage. It also helps that he has a rather-healthy 68 percent catch percentage to go with this notion.

Teams won’t know what the Houston Texans are running because Akins could be lined up as a

tight end or he could be in the slot. By the time opposing teams figure things out, Akins may very well find himself in the red or end zone whichever comes first.

It’s good to hear these things coming from the Houston Texans because, quite frankly, I wasn’t quite sure what his role would be with the team.

It’s now becoming clearer…

Will this experiment crash and burn? Let’s see if this works first before passing judgment because I think it will.

Next. Texans: Team seems to be holding out for Nick Caserio. dark

It’ll be intriguing — that’s for sure — so let’s go Houston Texans!

Akins caught 17 balls for 225 yards — 13.2 yards per catch — off 25 targets through all 16 games — six starts — last season.

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