Aidan Hutchinson belongs in the same conversation as Myles Garrett. And so does ... James Houston?
The Hutchinson parallel is obvious. The second overall pick is putting up similar rookie numbers as Garrett, the first overall pick in 2017. But Houston? A sixth-round pick out of Jackson State? A dude who was cut out of training camp and didn't make his NFL debut until two weeks ago? A man with 17 defensive snaps to his name?
The hell is he doing here?
Houston, as you may have heard, can't stop sacking the quarterback. He took down Josh Allen twice on Thanksgiving in his first game in the pros, then got Trevor Lawrence a week later. For those keeping score at home, that gives Houston three sacks in two career games. Turns out, that's pretty hard to do!
In fact, only two other players have done it in the last 20 years: Hutchinson and Garrett.
Once upon a time, Houston was a marquee college recruit with offers from the likes of Michigan, Clemson and LSU. He wound up at Florida for three seasons before transferring to play for Deion Sanders at Jackson State, where he wreaked all kinds of havoc last season to earn the nickname 'Da Problem.'
For the Lions, he's a good problem to have. Houston blew past the Jags left tackle with a devilish change-of-pace rush to get to Lawrence last week, a move that Lions defensive coordinator Aaron Glenn said Thursday he's never seen before. Asked what he'd call it, Glenn said, "The problem."
“Everybody’s different. Everybody has ways to get to the quarterback," said Glenn. "I’ve seen it done a ton of different ways. If you can get there, do what you have to do to get there. That move that he had, I don’t know if anybody’s ever replicated that, but he got there. So all good.”
The question now is how much Glenn and the Lions will play Houston moving forward. They bumped him up from five defensive snaps to 12 last week and they might have more for him Sunday against the Vikings. Few things earn you playing time in the NFL like getting after the quarterback.
At the same time, they don't want to overwhelm the rookie with too much too soon. Glenn said Houston needs "a total understanding of our defense" to play a bigger role on gameday.
"Base defense, third down defense, short-yardage. All those things he has to get better at, and he knows that," said Glenn. "That’s why we’re utilizing him the way that we are. We're going to make sure that we protect that player and not just throw him into different situations wheres he can lose his confidence.
"Right now, he’s riding high with his confidence and we’re going to continue to use him that way."
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