The Houston Texans have been blessed with No. 1 receivers since Andre Johnson’s rookie year in 2003. In 2015, when the club released Johnson, DeAndre Hopkins immediately took over.
Now, the Texans enter a season not knowing who their No. 1 receiver will be. In fact, it may be fair to say they don’t have one on the roster.
For the 2020 season, the Texans will have Will Fuller, Brandin Cooks, Randall Cobb, and Kenny Stills. This will be the first time since the Texans came into the league where they will have such a versatile set of weapons for franchise quarterback Deshaun Watson to throw to.
Losing Hopkins hurts — it hurt really bad. But coach and general manager Bill O’Brien took one player and divided him into four players. Cooks and Fuller bring speed and separation on the outside while Cobb and Stills will work the middle of the field.
Fuller produced 670 yards and three touchdowns for the Texans. However, his problem was staying on the field as he played in 11 games for Houston.
Like Fuller, Cooks missed time in 2019 with 14 games played for the Rams. Still, he managed to collect 583 receiving yards and two touchdowns.
Stills had a productive season for the Texans with 561 receiving yards and four touchdowns. The former New Orleans Saint and Miami Dolphin played in 13 games, starting in five of them.
Cobb had a decent bounce back year in his one-season stint with the Dallas Cowboys, tallying 829 receiving yards and three touchdowns.
With Watson’s ability to move out of the pocket these wideouts can shift with ease to help Watson create plays on the run. It will be hard for defenses to cover and account for this much speed and versatility. Also this isn’t even factoring in the running backs, David Johnson and Duke Johnson, who have a knack for pass-catching.
Watson will honestly have the most diverse weapons he has ever had Houston drafted him in the first round in 2017.
Losing DeAndre Hopkins is not good, but on the bright side the Texans have an abundance of wideouts that can give defenses fits. O’Brien the general manager also can use that second-round pick from the Hopkins trade (40th overall) to help O’Brien the coach assemble a better defense.
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