During the 2023 season, Bobby Slowik was becoming a name to watch in future coaching searches. The first-year offensive coordinator had the Houston Texans offense humming and helped C.J. Stroud earn the 2023 NFL Offensive Rookie of the Year Award.
This season, things have gone in the opposite direction for Slowik.
Houston's offense has shown flashes, including during their 23-point first half against the Detroit Lions on Sunday Night Football. They've also gone through long stretches of futility, which we saw in the second half of that same game.
This wasn't a one-time issue either as the Texans nearly gave one back to the Buffalo Bills after a dominant first-half and scored just three points in a loss to the Green Bay Packers. Slowik was asked about the team's issues, and he claims that while some adjustments get made, defenses aren't doing anything different in the second half compared to the first.
“There’s no one thing a defense is doing in the 2nd half that’s different than what they do in the 1st half”
— Dylan Delgatto (@DDelgattoNFL) November 11, 2024
Has he watched a single game this season? 😭
pic.twitter.com/z4P00OBorH
To be fair to Slowik, the idea of adjustments being made at halftime gets overblown. Teams don't have enough time to completely change a game plan during the break. Coaches spend all week putting their plan together, and can't scrap it in 15 minutes. What they can do, however, is figure out what worked as well as what didn't and make small tweaks.
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Slowik saying teams aren't doing this paints himself in a bad light. Clearly, there's something that opposing defenses are figuring out during the first 30 minutes, and when they get time in the locker room, they're zeroing in on that.
Houston, on the other hand, is failing to adjust once the defense does. It's a chess game and right now, Slowik seems to be playing checkers.