Will Fuller tasked with heavy load for Houston Texans’ future
By Matt Conner
Unless the Houston Texans import a major veteran wideout this offseason, they’re tasking Will Fuller with a very heavy load.
It feels a bit ridiculous to draw many conclusions on a team’s offseason approach on the day before free agency even officially begins. The NFL offseason is long and many signings still have yet to materialize, let alone a team’s draft plans. But the Houston Texans have already made one thing clear for its offense: Will Fuller has to step up.
On Monday, Bill O’Brien decided to make his laughable trades into an annual tradition by shipping off one of the NFL’s top three wide receivers in DeAndre Hopkins to the Arizona Cardinals in exchange for running back David Johnson. There’s little need to further the laugh track, er, commentary on the trade at this point. The best we can do is survey the crash site.
It’s important to note a couple points about this remade Texans offense.
- O’Brien is undoubtedly envisioning Johnson as a serious focal point of his envisioned attack, so some shouldering of the load now falls to the oft-injured back who’s averaged 3.6 yards/carry since 2016.
- The Texans are also likely to strike early in the draft for a wide receiver to help replace Nuk’s contributions on the field. In such a deep wide receiver class, the Texans have picks No. 40 and No. 57. If they’re lucky, the Texans might have choices like Tee Higgins or Denzel Mims for the former and Brandon Aiyuk or Michael Pittman, Jr. on the latter. Some rookie will also help ease the offensive burden.
- Deshaun Watson is one of the NFL’s best young quarterbacks, a player who makes everyone around him better. Even after trading Nuk, Watson will help make someone look better than they are here.
- Veteran wide receiver Kenny Stills and third-year wideout Keke Coutee are also here to help round out a capable receiving corps.
Despite all of these disclaimers, however, the absence of DeAndre Hopkins is a major burden for this offense to handle. Even with various degrees of the load handed off to the aforementioned imports and incumbents, the player tasked with the heaviest load of all is Will Fuller.
In some ways, Fuller should be up to this task. He’s a deep threat who ran the 40-yard dash in 4.32 seconds at the NFL Combine back in 2016, the same draft that the Houston Texans made him the 21st overall selection. Right then and there, branded with a first-round designation, Fuller was tasked with the potential burden of carrying an NFL offense.
To date, Fuller has never looked the part. Whether or not that’s his fault is difficult to say. On the one hand, Hopkins’ presence loomed so large on the Texans’ roster that Fuller never had to play this role. It wasn’t even possible. It’s asking if an actress can play a leading lady when she’s always staging scenes with Meryl Streep.
On the flip side, Fuller had a difficult time even holding down his part as a complementary deep threat. Upon entering the NFL, Fuller came with three primary concerns: 1.) a penchant for drops, 2.) a lack of strength, and 3.) a slight frame. It’s the latter two that have clouded his NFL career thus far, as Fuller has dealt with numerous injuries as a four-year pro.
Fourteen games is the most Fuller has played in a single year, his rookie campaign, with two missed games due to hamstring and a left knee injury. He missed six games in 2017 with a broken collarbone for one stretch and cracked ribs in another.
In 2018, Fuller suffered his worst injury to date with a torn ACL on Thursday Night Football against the Miami Dolphins that stopped his season at 7 games. In 2019, he was limited to 11 games due to a hamstring injury at midseason and a groin injury that kept him out of the season finale and part of the postseason.
When playing alongside Hopkins as a healthy downfield target, the Texans passing offense worked out as hoped. Few offenses were capable of matching the Texans’ ability to move the chains, even with their offensive line concerns, with Watson at the helm and targets like Hopkins and Fuller at his disposal. Now it’s hard to tell what the Texans will be able to do. Watson will keep defenses honest, but it’s hard to imagine Houston will be nearly as dangerous at this point.
Standing in the shade of DeAndre Hopkins, Will Fuller has had a hard time even staying healthy to provide a complementary skill set for the Texans offense. This makes it very difficult to believe he’s up for the herculean task of staying upright to withstand the rigors of 150 targets in a single season. The whole first-round stamp will say Fuller should be capable, but four years of playing time in the league says the Texans are asking too much of the Notre Dame product.