The Houston Texans struggled to defend Carolina Panthers running back Christian McCaffrey on Sunday… and yet Bill O'Brien had a different view.
McCaffrey, the do-it-all star, tallied 179 total yards (93 rushing, 86 receiving) and a touchdown on a career-high 37 touches as Carolina prevailed in a 16-10 win in Houston.
McCaffrey didn't just impress in the box score. He also recorded 11 broken tackles in the game, according to Pro Football Focus, via Ian Rapoport of NFL Network, which is an all-time high, no matter the player.
One would think the Texans would believe they did a subpar job defending McCaffrey. That's not the case. On Monday, coach Bill O'Brien said his Texans did a “decent job” defending the Panthers running back.
“Christian’s a great player, Christian McCaffrey’s a great player,” said O’Brien on Monday. “I thought we did a decent job against him overall, though. He made some plays, he’s going to make some plays, he’s a great player. But I thought our guys held up pretty well.”
The new standard for defending McCaffrey: anything under 200 yards allowed can count as a good game. At the rate in which he's going, that may hold some truth.
For the season, McCaffrey has 411 rushing yards and 629 yards from scrimmage. Both lead the NFL. In addition, he has four rushing touchdowns. According to Adam Levitan of Establish The Run, McCaffrey is on pace for 344 carries, 100 catches and 2,516 yards. The yardage metric would beat Chris Johnson's most scrimmage yards in a season set in 2019.
McCaffrey is officially a problem for the rest of the NFL. At least the Texans did a decent job defending him.
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