After the Houston Texans’ 16-10 loss to the Carolina Panthers in Week 4, quarterback Deshaun Watson went viral as he broke down their defense in his postgame presser.
In Week 5, following the Texans’ 53-32 win over the Atlanta Falcons, in which Watson threw five touchdown passes as part of a 158.3 passer rating performance, Watson took time once more to explain the opposing defense.
“They play a lot of man, different variations of man,” Watson said. “They play a lot of diamond front, which, diamond front is five across, the center is head up, the two guards are covered up, got the two wide [defensive] ends with Vic Beasley and (Takk) McKinley, and then you have the linebacker, Deion (Jones).
“Sometimes they play man, sometimes they drop out and play Tampa. They do a little bit of zone. They try to do it in — their pressure in empty was to bring the star, press him and cap the safety. I just threw hot both times.
“One time, [receiver] Hop (DeAndre Hopkins) was there and he didn’t recognize that I told him to break out hot, and he kept running his seam route, so I just took it up the middle. Then, different blitz zone packages. They play a cover-six, zoned it off, and then they played diamond two and popped out.
“So, they did a lot of different things. Low in the redzone they played — we call it a zero rat where there’s no safety in the middle and that rat defender, which is [safety] 37 (Ricardo Allen), doubled Hop. It leaves everyone else one-on-one, so that’s why [tight end] (Darren) Fells and Will (Fuller V) were able to connect and win, because it was just one-on-one match-ups.
“They did a little other stuff. The zone read package, they made sure they contained me and not letting me pull it. We locked in on each and every play and tried to make sure we knew exactly what they were doing.”
Watson managed to complete 28-of-33 for 426 yards. It was also the first time of the season and the second time in Watson’s 28 career games with the Texans that he did not take a sack.
Houston improves to 3-2 on the season, a much-needed win as the Texans look to stay atop a competitive AFC South that had all four teams with 2-2 records entering Week 5.
