C.J. Stroud is highly driven by competition. The Houston Texans quarterback is willing to compete in anything, anywhere — whether it’s on or off the field.
“If you’re competing against him, you got to bring your s—,” tight end Dalton Schultz told ESPN. “Because it doesn’t matter what it is — f—ing cards, dominoes, football, jogging off the field — my guy wants to win.”
After making a huge impact in his rookie season, Stroud’s drop in performance during his second season has been one of the biggest surprises of 2024. He has had to constantly fight to maintain what he calls a “competitive edge.”
Despite the struggles, Stroud still led the Texans to the playoffs as AFC South champions for the second consecutive year, and he’s determined to get back to his best for the postseason.
The Texans had high hopes for a Super Bowl after a strong 2023, which marked the debut seasons of Stroud and coach DeMeco Ryans. However, 2024 has been a mix of highs and lows, with a particularly tough 31-2 loss to the Baltimore Ravens on Christmas Day in Week 17.
“The difference that I’ve had this year is I haven’t had as much fun,” Stroud said before Week 18. “That’s something I want for the team again. … But it’s a fight. You got to go get it. It’s been a year of sowing seeds for me. So just learning more about me as a man and as a football player as well.”
Heading into the final game with the No. 4 seed locked up, Stroud played only the opening drive in the Texans’ 23-14 win. Now, the Texans (10-7) will face the Los Angeles Chargers (11-6) in the wild-card round on Saturday (4:30 p.m. ET, CBS), with Stroud being one of the main reasons the team believes in their chances.
When players and coaches talk about Stroud and his intense personality, they mention his game-winning drives, practice efforts, locker room competitions, and more. It’s something he hopes to use as the Texans move into the playoffs.
“I’m still fighting for my peak competitive edge because I haven’t really gotten to it as much as I would like,” Stroud told ESPN. “This year, I had it at the beginning of the season. I feel like I fight every day to get that edge back. … It starts and stops with me. It’s not always easy. It’s heavy. I’ve been trying my best to keep that fire.”
After throwing for 4,108 yards (eighth in the NFL) with 23 touchdowns (13th) as a rookie, Stroud’s performance in his second season dropped to 3,727 passing yards (15th) and 20 touchdowns (tied for 15th).
This decline isn’t solely his fault. He has faced pressure on 38.9% of his dropbacks (third most) and been sacked 52 times (second most), while the Texans’ offensive line ranked 22nd in pass block win rate (58%). The line has struggled with defensive twists and stunts from opposing teams, leading to 52 unblocked pressures, the second-most in the league, according to Next Gen Stats.
Wide receiver Nico Collins was leading the league in receiving yards before going on injured reserve with a hamstring injury after Week 5, missing five games. Then, season-ending injuries to receivers Stefon Diggs (torn ACL in Week 8) and Tank Dell (left knee injury in Week 16) further hurt the team. Stroud’s top three receivers played in only three full games together.
Collins believes Stroud still did well despite these challenges.
“That’s something about this league — injuries are going to happen, hiccups are going to happen in season,” Collins said. “I feel like, as you go, you’ve got to adapt. I feel he did a great job with that.”
After a divisional round loss to the Ravens last season, Stroud believed the Texans had a “target” on their back after an expensive offseason, where they added running back Joe Mixon, defensive end Danielle Hunter, and Diggs.
The expectations for Houston were high, but Stroud’s own expectations were even higher. If the offense wasn’t practicing well, his frustration was obvious — like when he yelled at the offense for a sloppy day of training camp in the August rain.
But he was also hard on himself when he didn’t meet his standards. During the last team drill of Day 3 of camp, Stroud ran a bootleg to the right but faced pressure. He threw an incomplete pass and yelled “F—!” as he walked off the field.
A few minutes later, Stroud walked over to the quarterback group standing behind the third-string players before taking a knee, with his helmet pressed into the ground. Quarterbacks coach Jerrod Johnson raised his hand, and Stroud thought the starters were back up.
He grabbed his helmet and started to sprint, but Johnson was just signaling that practice was almost over. Stroud slammed his towel into the ground, upset he couldn’t correct the mistakes immediately. To release his frustration, he stayed and ran sprints.
“He always wants to win,” Ryans told ESPN. “Whether we’re doing competition periods in practice, just good on good, offense versus defense, or when we have our situational practices, he is fired up. I love that about him.”
Sometimes, practice battles end with a game of basketball. On Thursdays, the Texans hold third-down competition periods where the starting offense and defense compete for a set number of reps. If it ends in a tie, the tiebreaker happens in the team meeting, where each side picks a player to shoot on a mini basketball hoop.
“[Stroud] is normally … being picked,” wide receiver Xavier Hutchinson told ESPN. “He’d be beating himself up if he missed a shot, like he’s an NBA player.”
For offensive lineman Tytus Howard, Stroud’s strong desire to compete was especially clear in the Texans’ Week 5 win against the Buffalo Bills. They were playing against Diggs’ former team but were missing Mixon (ankle) and Howard (hamstring), and they lost Collins in the first quarter after he hurt his hamstring on a 67-yard touchdown.
Throughout the week, Stroud kept sending a clear message.
“He just let guys know, ‘Hey, we got guys going down. We are still the better team than this team. We’re going to make s— happen,'” Howard told ESPN. “We went on to play a phenomenal football game. It was probably our most complete game of the year.”
Stroud finished 28-for-38 with 331 yards, one touchdown, and one interception. He helped set up the game-winning 58-yard field goal by Ka’imi Fairbairn with a 5-yard pass to running back Dare Ogunbowale to bring the ball to the Bills’ 41-yard line with just two seconds left.
Houston started 6-2 and traveled to play the New York Jets in Week 9, with Stroud ranked sixth in passing yards (1,948) and tied for 10th in touchdown passes (11). However, without Diggs or Collins, Stroud completed a career-low 36% of his passes for 191 yards and was sacked a career-high eight times in a 21-13 loss.
The following week, the Houston Chronicle reported that Stroud called a team meeting to discuss what might be going wrong. After that meeting, the team went 1-1. However, in Week 12 against the Tennessee Titans, who ended up with three wins and the No. 1 draft pick for 2025, Stroud threw an interception with 41 seconds left in the first half, which led to a Titans field goal.
The Texans lost 32-27 as Stroud threw two touchdowns but also two interceptions, doubling his total from 2023 (four).
In the locker room after the game, Stroud’s frustration was clear, and some teammates tried to comfort him. He felt like he was letting the team down and knew he could perform better than his mistakes.
“It’s no secret I haven’t been playing well, for my standard,” he said. “I’ve got to be better.”
Despite the challenges, Stroud kept pushing to find ways to keep his competitive edge. At the end of a team meeting the Monday before Week 17, Stroud stood up and gave a motivational speech. It was about preparing for playoff football as the Texans were sitting at 9-6, with a chance to face one of the best teams in the AFC on the national stage.
Even though the Texans lost to the Ravens, the goal was to get his teammates ready for what was to come, despite injuries. Houston is a three-point underdog against the Chargers, according to ESPN BET, and some people have little faith they will win, but Stroud likes that.
“Noise is always going to be there,” Stroud said. “It’s part of sports, always evident in this sport. And they said the same thing about us last year [for the playoff opener against] the Browns — and I’m not saying it’s last year — but we went out there and did what we had to do to win.”
“I kind of like being the underdog. I’ve been the underdog a lot of my life in my career. So, it’s actually comfortable for me.”
Ryans believes the team needs to play “complementary football” to be at its best, but he also understands what he needs from his quarterback to help lift the team as they aim to win the franchise’s first Super Bowl.
“You see it when [Stroud’s] on and playing well,” Ryans told ESPN. “You see that competitive fire, it’s about others playing well around him as well. When we play well around him, and we set him up for success, and we do that on a continued basis, everybody’s successful.”
