(SportsRadio 610) - One of the most encouraging things to hear after Thursday's practice was the marked improvement the team showed on both sides of the ball, particularly on offense, mentioned by Texans head coach DeMeco Ryans.
"How the offense came out yesterday, it wasn't as clean as it should've been," Ryans said. "Credit to our coaches and players, the way they came out today, they operated in an efficient manner. It was really good to see how they were on schedule, everything was really good offensively today."
Here are a few more observances from day 2 of Texans training camp:
The former Texans Pro Bowl cornerback seemed to take every opportunity he could to coach up Derek Stingley Jr., Houston's No. 3 overall pick last year.
During a session with the defensive starting 11, in which the front-seven worked on alignment and gap assignments on-air (without an offense), Joseph and Stingley could be seen working on hand placement, read steps and other techniques between play calls and walk-throughs.
Having an accomplished former player coaching young defensive backs, particularly one as highly touted as Stingley at this stage is invaluable.
Green ran with the first team Thursday for the first half of practice, but was on the sidelines as an observer in the later sessions, with veteran newcomer Michael Dieter in at left guard.
Ryans spoke on the importance of having Green healthy and able to contribute.
"I think he'll definitely add a lot of value to our front," Ryans said. "Really hard worker, he's put in the work to be back out there. A lot of work, a lot to improve on and he'll continue to do that. Happy to have him back with us."
Stroud looked really good Thursday. He had some misses throwing to Tank Dell & others yesterday, but, he put in some extra work after practice with the former UH Cougar and hit him for what looked like a would be touchdown on an intermediate pass from the middle of the field on one of the best plays of the day on Thursday.
Stroud also connected with former Cowboys receiver Noah Brown on a deep ball down the sideline, which was probably the play of the day for both players.
It's early, so there hasn't been a ton of reps to observe between two days of training camp and OTA's/minicamp, but Stroud pulled the ball down Thursday during live action and found a nice seam for what would've been a sizable gain. Something of course we haven't seen him do much aside from his stellar performance in the Peach Bowl against Georgia.
Schultz spoke after practice regarding the offense and why it's such a beneficial system for a young quarterback to play in.
"Slowik has brought a very quarterback friendly scheme in," Schultz said. "So, I think there's a lot of answers built in to a lot of just the scheme stuff that he's got in so far and a lot of that is just going through progressions.
"What it comes down to is developing that trust with all of those guys. I think we've got some strides to go and I feel like we've made a lot of progress, especially considering where we started in OTA's."
Schultz's comments sort of reiterated what quarterback Case Keenum told me of the Bobby Slowik led offense earlier this offseason.
"It's a great system to come into right away as a rookie," Keenum said. "I think it's a great foundation for what NFL quarterbacking is about, get the ball where it's supposed to be, when it's supposed to be there."
Keenum said his familiarity in offenses like this, that have spawned from the Shanahan tree, are what he would describe as multiple and versatile.
"His nose to details, the why behind it, the origin of why you do things and taking out things that don't make sense," Keenum said of Slowik. "I've been in this type of offense a lot of different ways and it's cool because it's like the best of series, the greatest hits of the West Coast offense."
As training camp progresses, it's going to be interesting to see how much more we gather and learn about the offense and how well the veterans and younger players can grasp and mesh in such a complex, yet friendly system.
Nelson made his first interception of the preseason.
Davis Mills threw it.
A number of players and coaches have already mentioned how good it was to have him at camp this week because of his work ethic and ability.
We'll see if his performance this camp and preseason warrant a conversation with general manager Nick Caserio about a contract extension sooner or later, and whether the two sides will put Nelson's personal shots on social media behind them.
Anderson showed how disruptive he could be on Thursday. The Texans' third overall selection in April's draft got into the backfield during a team session of best-on-best for what would've been a big loss on a run play.
He's a huge individual who is going to look and hopefully play like more of a monster when the Texans put pads on next week.
