Film Room: What do Joe Mixon and Dameon Pierce Fix on Offense?
Exploring what Houston's star running back and their former rookie standout can save in the run game and what might have to wait until next year.
John Crumpler dives deep into the rushing attack in the wake of Joe Mixon’s return to the Texans. Follow John on social media.
It was an odd week for the Houston Texans last week as the offense saw many shifts. They lost leading receiver Nico Collins to injured reserve due to a hamstring injury. After two weeks of featuring primarily backup and special teamers Cam Akers and Dare Ogunbowale at running back, the team returned star running back Joe Mixon and former rookie phenom Dameon Pierce to the lineup.
The net result came out as a wash, with Houston’s offense still showing off their massive talent advantage over the New England Patriots scoring 41 points. That’s what is expected when C.J. Stroud plays like a top quarterback and DeMeco Ryans and his defense face a rookie quarterback. The run game, with Mixon (13 carries, 102 yards) and Pierce (8 carries, 76 yards) in tow, achieved beyond expectations.
The team had 28 rushing plays for 192 rushing yards, a stunning 6.9 yards per carry, and 87 rushing yards over expectation per Next Gen Stats. That leaves an important question moving forward as Houston prepares for one of their toughest opponents of the season traveling to Green Bay.
How much can be expected from the run game moving forward?
The film room and the statistics tell a complicated but interesting narrative of what to expect from offensive coordinator Bobby Slowik’s beloved running game. Let’s dive into what should be different and what might not be fixable compared to the team’s first five weeks.
They Can Fix It: Broken Plays
The most important immediate observation from Mixon and Pierce’s return to the football field is that they can cover up a variety of sins from the running game. Specifically, Mixon has the requisite explosiveness and finishing power to compensate for a missed assignment or when a Texans offensive lineman is flat-out beat.
This is a play that likely would have resulted in no gain or potentially one yard during the past few weeks with Ogunbowale or Akers. Instead, Mixon’s explosive cut and driving power turn it into a three-yard gain. The ability to stack these runs for a Houston offense that loves to keep defenses honest on the ground is the difference between manageable third downs and the frightening number of third and nine or third and 10 that were seen throughout the first month.
If the running game can improve to be closer to the league average in efficiency, Slowik’s offense becomes virtually impossible to stop while Stroud is quarterbacking at an MVP level.
Maybe Next Year: Offensive Line Struggles
No matter how optimistic one may have been about the offensive line entering 2024, there is a sufficient body of evidence to suggest that it’s time to face the music: this is a league-average unit at best.
Specifically, in the running game, it is not an imposing line and one that can struggle in multiple different areas. Neither tackle Laremy Tunsil nor Tytus Howard are dynamic run blockers, Kenyon Green and Juice Scruggs have moments that show their youth, and a ton is asked of both Dalton Schultz and Cade Stover in the blocking department. Put it all together, with some questionable calls from Slowik himself (like asking Stefon Diggs to take the edge in the above clip) and you have multiple avenues where runs end up dead on arrival.
It’s hard to imagine *all* of these issues improving this year. There is hope for the interior players to take some strides forward but the tackles largely are who they are. As much as Slowik is working to manifest Stover as the second coming of George Kittle, he is not that caliber of player this season. The playcaller is the playcaller.
Houston is left with a lot of plays that are going to see zero or negative yardage. The Texans were stuffed on 28% of their running back carries per Next Gen Stats, a number that ranked in the top ten across the league for week six.
It’s a good thing those backs can salvage the occasional play.
They Can Fix It: Running Efficiency (via Explosive Gains)
The run game entering week six was one of the least efficient in the entire league. Outside of their opener against the Indianapolis Colts, Houston had a success rank of 23.3% and an EPA/carry of -0.38, both good for dead last in the NFL. A large part of that was the aforementioned ‘dead on arrival’ runs that are unfortunately a part of his offense. The other big contributor was that neither Akers nor Ogunbowale were capable of generating big plays.
That’s simply not the case for Mixon and Pierce.
Both backs have the talent to turn well-blocked, or at least adequately blocked plays, into massive gains for the Texans and that was evident with each having two rushes over 10 yards. Above, Mixon can take this well-executed “wham” concept (would highly recommend the breakdown from Texans Cap) for a career-best 59-yard run in the second quarter.
That same speed translates on Mixon’s fourth-quarter touchdown when he’s able to get to the second level, dart to the outside and ultimately beat the defense to the end zone. Even Pierce showed flashes, specifically on his 54-yard touchdown run, of his star talent from the 2022 season. His ability to shed arm tackles and steamroll down the field when the blocking scheme creates a lane is still present.
These massive gains can largely erase the overall down-to-down efficiency of the run game and yield a net product that leaves Houston both viable and dangerous on the ground. There may be some frustration with how this facet of their offense looks, but the net result at the end of games should look reasonable with how Mixon can churn for big yardage.
It may not be sustainable to the degree it happened against New England, but I would continue to expect these backs to find big gains in the future.
Maybe Next Year: Pass Blocking
One of the biggest concerns when Joe Mixon came over from Cincinnati was his ability to function in pass protection. The Bengals in 2023 had all but given up on the idea of Mixon protecting the quarterback on passing downs, often substituting a tight end to stay in the backfield and protect backup quarterback Jake Browning towards the end of the season.
Based on how they played against the Patriots, it would appear that Houston’s staff does not have much more faith than Mixon in this aspect. Every time that Mixon was lined up in the backfield, he either received the handoff or ran a route. He was never tasked to protect Stroud on any of these downs and Pierce functioned in a similar role.
Ogunbowale appears to be the preferred third-down back for Bobby Slowik when they want to call plays with a backfield pass protector. This works reasonably well as he also can go out for routes and check downs. However, it's worth watching to see if this is a tendency for defensive coordinators to begin to hunt when they know #28 will not be staying in the backfield to help.
They Can Fix It: Check Downs
On the note of running backs running routes, there is a notable positive aspect to this: Mixon is a huge boost to the passing game as a receiver.
That same explosiveness that allows for big gains in the running game translates nicely to turning small checkdown passes into first downs. With a quarterback like Stroud who can work towards the end of his progressions having a legitimate option to receive those checkdowns is a difference-maker.
Stroud knows exactly where his checkdown option is and quickly works to it when New England brings pressure. Mixon’s speed, and the gap left by the defense, generate a nice chunk gain for the Texans on what the Patriots certainly hoped would be an explosive play for their defense.
Mixon’s ability as a pass catcher also means that this offense has one more player that they can design passes for and further stress the defense. In the red zone, the offense motions Mixon into a flat route from the backfield behind the ‘trips’ passing concept and there’s simply nobody to account for him.
Despite this team’s commitment to the run, they’re most dangerous when Stroud has the ball in his hands. Another weapon that can seriously hurt defenses in that equation will be a huge boost moving forward.
They Can Fix It: Play Action
Generally, the belief goes that play action is effective regardless of how dangerous or demanding a team's run game is each week. What nobody disputes, however, is that defenses pay more attention when there is a dangerous player in the backfield. It should come as no surprise that Houston found success with play action and manipulating the linebackers with Mixon back on the field.
In the red zone, the offense was able to use his gravity in the backfield to vacuum the linebackers toward the line of scrimmage and allow Stroud to pass right over their heads for a touchdown to Stefon Diggs.
On the subsequent drive, the play action sequence drives the linebackers down and towards the potential run and creates a massive gap where the remaining defensive backs are unable to sort through the pseudo-dagger concept. Diggs is left with plenty of space over the middle of the field, Stroud has a clean pocket, and it’s a huge gain for the offense.
Final Takeaway: It’s Not Perfect, but it’s Enough
Mixon can’t fix every issue in the Houston running game. However, there are ample positives to his return to the field that make the offense more efficient, more dynamic, and ultimately far more difficult for defenses to plan for moving forward. His ability to feature as a bell cow in the offense will be critical in the coming weeks to fill the Nico Collins-size void in the general offensive infrastructure.
Notably, Pierce’s development this season is worth keeping an eye on. If he can even be an adequate substitute to keep Mixon healthy by taking a few carries a game, that would be a great development for the season-long prognosis of this team. If Pierce can return to form and once again appear like the running back they had in 2022, it could mean this team has their running back situation settled for the future as well.
We’ll have to watch how this ground game evolves as they have more games for Mixon and Pierce to get comfortable behind the line. An average defense in Green Bay, in a contest where they’ll need plenty of points to beat Jordan Love, should be another strong data point.
Good stuff John and Cody. Thanks for the plug.