With their final premium pick in the 2019 draft, the Texans spent on another tight end: San Diego State’s Kahale Warring. Warring’s background is intriguing — he barely played football in high school and walked on for the Aztecs. He’s got basketball player attributes that many teams value highly out of the tight end position, and what I saw in watching him with the Aztecs is a player that is a lot more developed than I’d think.
Warring went to the NFL combine and ran a 4.67 40-yard dash, showing well in both jump metrics and both shuttles as well. His only poor time was in the three-cone drill, which does show somewhat when blocking. Warring isn’t great at reacting to quick moves.
As a receiver, Warring is quite polished and should be able to contribute if called upon. I like to focus my study for things that I think I see a lot on Texans tape, which is why it drew my eye that Warring was able to contribute often when the play broke down and he was making it all up:
He had another play like this against Nevada where the quarterback scrambled to the sideline, and Warring was able to dig a ball off the turf. When Deshaun Watson is your quarterback, being able to play outside of the structure of a play is important.
This play actually didn’t count, but get a look at the process that he shows:
I think he shows a lot of well-demonstrated fundamentals as a pass-catcher. He could be a little bit less obvious when he’s blocking downfield, and he could get a little bit better shaking off opponents at the line of scrimmage. SDSU moved him all around the formation, and jamming him was fairly effective.
I do think his blocking is still something in development. He was trusted to make a lot of blocks, including some I think are very common in the Houston offense:
But I felt like technically speaking, as a blocker, he was a little raw. The functional power was there, and he can definitely get his mitts on a linebacker and hold up. But quick NFL linemen are going to be able to shed him without a lot of problems as it stands. Watching these games kind of reassured me that Daniel Fells would have a big role with the Texans this year — don’t get me wrong, Warring has potential, he just might not be ready to go from Day 1.
Where I think he fits in with what the Texans do is that the Aztecs did plenty of combo blocking, and at times Warring would come off and hold a lineman on the backside. No cut blocks that I saw, which I’m guessing is something that the Texans will ask him to learn. He’s somebody that you have to beat with a real move, though. That does factor into the process.
So here’s my devil’s advocate version of why I think this was still a bad pick even though I like the player:
— The Texans literally never throw to their tight ends. Ryan Griffin was the main tight end last year, saw 743 snaps, and drew 43 targets. Jordan Thomas saw 470 snaps and drew 27 targets. Combined, they roughly got 17.3 snaps per target. Even though the target split was fairly even on a seasonal level, most of the time Houston’s No. 2 receiver is the actual target sponge. It just got hidden because of constant Will Fuller and Keke Coutee injuries.
— The only time in the O’Brien era where tight ends were actually a focal point of the offense happened with Brock Osweiler and C.J. Fiedorowicz, and that happened because Osweiler’s first reaction to pressure was to throw over the middle to anybody, no matter how covered they were.
— The Texans already had a receiving tight end they ignored last year despite good limited results: Jordan Akins. Maybe they’re out on him entirely — we can’t read all the way into it from the outside. But it does seem like a waste of resources to just freeze the guy out after one season.
— If the thing was “let’s train a better blocking tight end,” well, you can do that without spending a third-round pick. It’s true. Fells is on the roster, bring in some UDFAs and find one.
That said, look, I get the pick. I think he’s good. I just have my doubts that he can win the uphill battle of Texans offensive history, let alone the battle that most tight ends face to be relevant in their first season.