The Houston Texans are one of the 2020's bigger disappointments. (Well, NFL-related disappointments.) They've already canned their head coach/decision-maker Bill O'Brien, but it's too late to turn their season around. Now the question is whether or not a fire sale is coming before next week's trade deadline.
According to the Houston Chronicle's Aaron Wilson, teams are inquiring about wide receivers Will Fuller and Randall Cobb. Cobb, certainly, would probably come cheaply, and might not change things too much for Houston (Deshaun Watson would manage). But Fuller would be a significant loss.
Fuller has quite famously battled injuries throughout his career, but he's healthy now, and he's caught touchdowns in five straight games. He's been one of the league's better receivers in terms of scoring over the previous three years, as well.
Over the last three seasons, Fuller has scored 14 touchdowns in 28 games. Among wideouts who started at least half the games (24) over the past three years, that's better than all but 12 of them. One of the guys ahead of Fuller is then-teammate DeAndre Hopkins. So Fuller managed that performance even while being the 2nd-best option for touchdowns on his own team.
| WIDE RECEIVERS PER GAME NUMBERS, 2017-2019 | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Player | St | No | Yds | Run | TD |
| Antonio Brown | 30 | 7.0 | 96.2 | .2 | .84 |
| Davante Adams | 41 | 6.5 | 79.7 | .0 | .70 |
| DeAndre Hopkins | 46 | 6.8 | 89.5 | .2 | .70 |
| Tyreek Hill | 43 | 5.1 | 81.9 | 5.4 | .67 |
| Marvin Jones | 38 | 4.2 | 62.8 | .0 | .61 |
| Calvin Ridley | 29 | 4.4 | 58.2 | 2.1 | .60 |
| Chris Godwin | 31 | 4.9 | 75.3 | .3 | .57 |
| A.J. Green | 25 | 4.8 | 70.9 | .0 | .56 |
| Alshon Jeffery | 38 | 4.3 | 55.6 | .1 | .55 |
| Cooper Kupp | 39 | 5.0 | 66.6 | .7 | .54 |
| Stefon Diggs | 44 | 5.2 | 68.2 | 3.1 | .53 |
| Mike Evans | 44 | 5.1 | 83.7 | .0 | .52 |
| Will Fuller | 28 | 3.9 | 57.0 | .3 | .50 |
| Amari Cooper | 45 | 4.5 | 63.9 | .7 | .49 |
| Adam Thielen | 42 | 5.6 | 73.0 | 1.1 | .48 |
| Michael Thomas | 48 | 7.9 | 91.1 | -.2 | .48 |
| Julian Edelman | 28 | 6.2 | 70.3 | 5.6 | .46 |
| Doug Baldwin | 29 | 4.3 | 55.5 | -.3 | .46 |
| Kenny Golladay | 42 | 3.9 | 65.0 | .4 | .45 |
| Tyler Lockett | 48 | 3.8 | 53.7 | 2.5 | .44 |
| JuJu Smith-Schuster | 42 | 5.0 | 68.9 | .3 | .44 |
| Mike Williams | 31 | 3.0 | 53.7 | 1.0 | .43 |
| Odell Beckham | 32 | 5.5 | 74.7 | 2.8 | .43 |
| Jarvis Landry | 48 | 5.8 | 65.4 | 2.0 | .42 |
| Devin Funchess | 27 | 4.0 | 51.4 | .0 | .41 |
| Keenan Allen | 48 | 6.3 | 78.9 | 2.1 | .40 |
| Tyler Boyd | 30 | 5.5 | 69.1 | .9 | .40 |
| Robby Anderson | 46 | 3.6 | 53.7 | .1 | .40 |
| Kenny Stills | 44 | 3.1 | 44.6 | .0 | .39 |
| Nelson Agholor | 43 | 3.8 | 43.4 | 1.2 | .38 |
| Michael Crabtree | 31 | 3.7 | 39.9 | .0 | .38 |
| T.Y. Hilton | 40 | 4.5 | 68.4 | .0 | .38 |
| Golden Tate | 42 | 5.1 | 58.9 | 1.7 | .37 |
| Sammy Watkins | 39 | 3.4 | 45.8 | 1.6 | .37 |
| Allen Robinson | 30 | 5.1 | 63.9 | .4 | .37 |
| Julio Jones | 47 | 6.4 | 96.1 | .5 | .36 |
| John Brown | 41 | 3.3 | 50.6 | .5 | .36 |
| Larry Fitzgerald | 48 | 5.3 | 56.1 | .3 | .35 |
| Robert Woods | 43 | 5.4 | 72.9 | 6.6 | .35 |
| DeSean Jackson | 29 | 3.4 | 55.2 | 2.3 | .34 |
| Brandin Cooks | 46 | 4.1 | 62.4 | 3.5 | .33 |
| Michael Gallup | 25 | 3.7 | 61.3 | .0 | .33 |
| Tyrell Williams | 46 | 2.7 | 44.2 | .3 | .33 |
| Emmanuel Sanders | 41 | 4.5 | 55.9 | 1.6 | .33 |
| Courtland Sutton | 32 | 3.6 | 56.8 | .5 | .31 |
| Jordy Nelson | 30 | 3.9 | 40.7 | -.1 | .31 |
| Paul Richardson | 33 | 2.8 | 36.7 | .3 | .30 |
| Cole Beasley | 46 | 3.7 | 38.3 | .0 | .30 |
| Chris Hogan | 27 | 2.7 | 37.1 | .6 | .30 |
| Curtis Samuel | 31 | 2.9 | 34.1 | 7.6 | .29 |
| Anthony Miller | 31 | 2.7 | 34.8 | .9 | .29 |
| Dede Westbrook | 37 | 4.2 | 45.4 | 3.4 | .29 |
| DeVante Parker | 39 | 3.9 | 55.9 | .0 | .28 |
| Mohamed Sanu | 45 | 4.2 | 45.5 | 1.5 | .28 |
| Jaron Brown | 25 | 1.8 | 28.6 | .0 | .28 |
| Chris Conley | 37 | 2.4 | 34.7 | .0 | .28 |
| Jamison Crowder | 40 | 4.3 | 50.3 | 1.7 | .28 |
| Demaryius Thomas | 42 | 4.2 | 49.0 | .0 | .26 |
| Sterling Shepard | 37 | 4.9 | 58.9 | 2.9 | .26 |
| Josh Doctson | 27 | 2.8 | 35.4 | -.5 | .26 |
| Christian Kirk | 25 | 4.4 | 52.0 | 5.1 | .25 |
Personally I hope there's nothing to the rumors. Houston is badly in need of draft picks, of course, with O'Brien having shipped out a ton of them in bad trades the past couple of years. They do need to try to bring some in.
But dealing Fuller just creates yet another hole to fill with a draft pick. Far better to hang onto their No. 1 wideout.
--Andy Richardson