Every list of difficult offseason questions for the Kansas City Chiefs begins with what they should do with Justin Houston.
Ever since Houston received a massive contract following his outstanding 2014 season, he has been under more intense scrutiny than any player in Kansas City besides the quarterback. After a brutal knee injury in 2015 affected him well into 2016, fans began to question the wisdom of Houston’s deal. He was healthy in 2017 and played at a high level, but the questions did not go away.
Now the Chiefs face a dilemma in 2019 with Houston set to cost $21.1 million against the cap. Kansas City could save $14 million by cutting the pass rusher. As such, there are quite a few calls for the Chiefs to do just that, adding with the argument the fact that Houston missed multiple games with a hamstring injury last season.
Any decision about Houston should start with a simple question: How good a player is he now? To determine this, box-score analysis is close to useless. Instead, it’s necessary to examine every snap and look at what Houston did, charting wins/losses and neutral plays as well as stuffs, effective double-teams, chips drawn and pressures/hits/sacks. For a more detailed explanation on those terms, click here. Because we’ve reviewed Houston’s film previously in this manner, we can compare his 2018 numbers to his 2017 numbers and determine whether he’s trending downward. We can also compare him to fellow pass rusher Dee Ford, another important contract decision the Chiefs must make this offseason.
Notes: “Chips” were a new addition this year, as it seemed relevant to count how often teams used a running back or tight end to help with Houston. Additionally, it’s worth mentioning that “losses” for defensive players are going to outnumber “wins” almost every time. That’s simply the nature of their roles.
One of the first takeaways from Houston’s numbers this season is that his win rate remains very high. In fact, it was higher than his 2017 season and significantly higher than Ford’s was in 2018. This goes against the now-prevalent narrative that Houston is no longer an impact player or has lost his effectiveness. While there’s an argument that Houston received less attention from defenses this year, an examination of the number of chips and double teams he drew show that he still received plenty of extra attention from teams.
The reality is Houston continues to be an extremely good pass rusher and an effective run defender. Perhaps the best example of this came against the Los Angeles Rams, arguably the toughest matchup the Chiefs’ edge rushers faced this season. The Rams sent multiple blockers after Houston throughout the day, and his primary opponent, Andrew Whitworth, is one of the better left tackles in football. Despite this, Houston had a highly productive game.
Houston collected a sack, two hits and three pressures despite the difficult matchup, and it’s representative of what makes him so valuable: Tougher opponents don’t prevent him from making plays. This trait sets him apart from most pass rushers in that he isn’t dependent on beating up lesser opponents.
Houston has changed his pass-rush approach over the past year. Where he once was a combination of speed and power off the edge, he seems to have lost a step and no longer has the freakish athleticism he once did off the line. As a result, he has adapted to become a power/technique rusher. He wins in a variety of ways, starting with his favorite move: a combination of dip-and-rip and swat moves.
Houston usually initiates contact when rushing the passer, using his long arms to keep tackles from getting inside his pads. His favorite method of winning to the outside is to establish contact, then swat the tackle’s hands aside with one or both of his hands. He then dips his inside shoulder and transitions into a “rip” move around the corner.
Because of Houston’s combination of strength, technique and functional bend around the corner, this is a tough move for opponents to stop. And while Houston, as noted earlier, is a step slower than he was at his peak, he still possesses solid athleticism and is capable of cornering quite quickly.
Houston uses some combination of the swat/dip/rip frequently, varying the timing of the move based on how the blocker sets up. It’s effective on its own, but it’s made even tougher because Houston uses a variety of other moves to complement these. One of those is a modified bull rush in which Houston starts off with power then converts into an inside rush toward the quarterback.
Houston starts this move as though he’s going to use a traditional bull rush to power the blocker straight into the quarterback. However, he’s not trying to go that direction, instead moving the tackle backward to provide a lane to move inside. This is highly effective in combination with Houston’s outside swat/dip/rip in that if a tackle sets up for the outside move, he’s vulnerable to being moved backward. Additionally, Houston can use a more traditional bull rush to push the blocker right into the quarterback rather than straight backward, so the tackle never knows what direction he’ll be fighting.
Pass-rushing with a plan defines what Houston does, and he can be seen altering his approach throughout games with a plethora of moves. Even in the course of one snap, he’ll transition from one move to another to gain the advantage.
On this play, Houston starts off with an attempted double-handed slap in an apparent outside rush. However, even as the tackle attempts to adjust his set to get deep, Houston converts to a long-arm move to take advantage of the blocker’s momentum and shoves him off-balance. This provides an open path to the quarterback.
At times, when other moves fail, Houston will use his unnatural strength to simply throw offensive linemen to the side with an impressive push-pull.
Houston’s unique power and veteran savvy makes him a very difficult matchup once he has engaged the blocker. He varies his moves so consistently that there’s no one way to play him, and it shows over the course of a game. In many games, Houston would win more often against tackles as the game moved along, taking advantage of blockers’ attempting to “read” him as a rusher and anticipate his moves. He uses a bull rush, dip-and-rip, long arm, double- and single-handed swat, a modified inside bull rush and a push-pull with frequency.
And just when a tackle begins to anticipate Houston initiating contact and using some sort of power move, he uses a quick inside juke to leave them blocking air.
There’s really no consistently “correct” way to block Houston. If a tackle sets up wide in preparation for a dip-and-rip, Houston will either bull rush or use his modified inside bull rush to quickly close the distance to the quarterback. If a tackle tries to initiate contact and lean on Houston, he’s subject to a push-pull or having his hands swatted aside as Houston moves around the edge. Houston’s varied ability also allows him to move around the line. Former defensive coordinator Bob Sutton had him rush from every conceivable gap in 2018, from wide-9 to just over the center, and he did it all well.
As a run defender, Houston continues to be solid, though he wasn’t as dominant as in years past. He’s very strong at the point of attack and is able to hold the edge against any blocker. He also sheds tackles and tight ends quickly when the run is in his direction.
Houston’s run defense has been so consistent that there really isn’t much to discuss. Teams don’t run at his edge as often as they run the other direction, which doesn’t give him a lot of opportunities to collect “wins” in that area. However, he’s consistently in the right position and often forces plays to go away from him even when they are designed his direction initially, which doesn’t show up in the stats sheet.
The run game, however, is also where it makes sense to start talking about Houston’s negatives. There was a time when he was flawless in this area. However, in 2018, he collected more losses against the run than in the past. It often wasn’t an issue of being overpowered at the point of attack or being driven off the ball. Rather, Houston had more times when he failed to diagnose the run and what direction it was going and found himself washed out of a play because of it.
While these failures weren’t often, mind you, they were higher than in previous seasons. Additionally, Houston wasn’t as capable as a pursuit defender as he was in years past given his lost step.
That lost step is worth discussing. Houston is certainly not a “slow” defender, but he’s slower than he used to be. He’s now a rather average athlete for an outside linebacker. (It’s a different story with him at defensive end, but there’s no way of knowing where new defensive coordinator Steve Spagnuolo will use him.) In particular, Houston’s change of direction in open space is not what it used to be.
Because Houston is no longer able to simply win with sheer athleticism, he has a difficult time when blockers are able to battle him to a stalemate in the hand-fighting contest or are strong enough to stand up against his power. This resulted in more snaps in which Houston was stonewalled than previous seasons, even though the number was still not very high.
Houston no longer being an elite athlete has also affected how quickly his wins as a pass rusher affect the quarterback. Because he’s often reliant on winning after making contact with a blocker, it takes him a split-second longer to generate pressure even on good snaps when compared to the much faster Ford. This is the biggest reason for the discrepancy between the two players in win percentage vs. sacks/hits/pressures.
Both Ford and Houston “win” on this play, but it happens differently. Ford blows by his blocker around the edge. Houston wins as well, but it’s after contact and through the result of his strength and balance. While Ford had the advantage of not having to worry about a potential chip — even when running backs do not actively chip, their presence forces rushers to alter their approach — the speed of his win is noticeably faster than Houston’s.
Houston’s lost step could be the reason his loss percentage increased this season. He historically has lost at a rate lower than virtually any other edge defender. While his loss percentage remains solid, it’s significantly higher than past seasons. Going from “elite” to “good” in loss percentage is a small step, but an important one that must be noted.
While the idea of Houston losing a step might be frightening to Chiefs fans, he remains a highly effective player who has adjusted to life past his prime years. Winning with strength and technique is something that will age nicely, and worked very well for him last season.
Of course, Houston being a very good player wasn’t much in question outside of a vocal minority. The problem remains his contract. Despite the fact that Houston is one of the top-10 edge defenders in the NFL, his contract is designed for a player who is more than that. “Very good” just isn’t enough when a player is set to cost $21.1 million against the cap.
This is the rock and a hard place Chiefs GM Brett Veach finds himself in with Houston, who is such a good player that replacing him would be quite difficult without signing a top-end free agent. Those players rarely hit the open market, and when they do, they’re generally signed to extremely high-end deals. On the other hand, paying a defensive player who is not Aaron Donald or Khalil Mack that much money is not sound cap management. Also to be taken into consideration: the new system the Chiefs will be utilizing and where Houston fits in it. He may be best off as a defensive end with his current skill set, but that’s Ford’s obvious fit as well.
There is no “easy answer” with Houston. He’s too good to cut, but too expensive to keep. It would have been simpler had his detractors been correct and his play had fallen off last season, but he remains good enough to be a cornerstone of the defense. As it stands, the Chiefs put themselves in a tough position if they keep Houston barring a restructuring of his deal. But they put themselves in a tough position if they move on as well. Whatever direction they go will likely set the stage for the rest of the offseason decisions the Chiefs must make.
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