The Houston Texans offseason began just a little under a month ago following a disappointing Divisional Round loss on the road against the eventual AFC Champion New England Patriots, a defeat that has fallen on the shoulders of quarterback CJ Stroud, whose four interception 1st half submarined Houston's chances of advancing to the Conference Championship Game for the first time in franchise history.
Since their elimination, a parade of Texans players and coaches have come to the defense of CJ Stroud, routinely reiterating their belief in and commitment to the 24-year-old quarterback in both the short term and the long term despite two disastrous postseason games in a row and a disappointing two-season slump that has called into question whether or not the Texans would be wise to extend a contract offer to Stroud that would make him one of the highest paid players in the NFL.
Over the weekend, wide receiver Xavier Hutchinson became the latest Texans player to step up to the plate and offer a defense of Stroud even in the face of scrutiny. And with a monologue that comes off like aBlack Eyed Peas songthanks to it's use of the words 'lumps' and 'hump,' the the 25-year-old wideout expressed confidence that the Texans can not only overcome the unceremonious ending to the 2025 season, but take something from it as they move forward.
“You gotta take your lumps before you can get your wins," Xavier Hutchinson told Aaron Wilson of KPRC 2 Houston. "I believe in this organization. I believe in this team, the coaching staff. We will get over the hump one day. And I feel like it’ll be rather sooner rather than later.”
Each of the last three seasons, the Texans final lump has come in the Divisional Round of the Playoffs, a Groundhog Day sort of scenario for a franchise that is 0-7 in that very round. Against an inexperienced Patriots team that had undoubtedly benefited from a soft regular season schedule, this could be looked at as Houston's best chance to crack the final four since the franchise's inaugural season in 2002.
Houston's roster is going to get increasingly expensive, and therefore, much harder to keep together over the next few years, so the Texans are going to need to be operating on a 'sooner rather than later' timeline. So long as the Texans keep the majority of the league's best defense in tact, they should have a puncher's chance at a title every year, but as years of football history have taught us, there's an outsized chance that Houston's Super Bowl dreams will ultimately come down to if CJ Stroud gets right.
“It’s football, of course when you’re the quarterback, you’re gonna get singled out a lot of times,” Hutchinson said. “It’s rightfully or not rightfully fair. They love to build you up and then break you down. So, it’s not all on him. It’s on us, too. We’re gonna have Seven’s back. We’re gonna ride for him.
“C.J. is one of the best quarterbacks in the league. It wasn’t the best game for a lot of us, man, but that’s just how the ball goes sometimes. He knows what he can do. It’s all about us just playing ball and really just capitalizing on the opportunities that we got.”