Whether it’s creating the emergency plan, or just giving Matt Schaub a day off, the Texans let their backup quarterbacks run the place yesterday.
And coach Gary Kubiak said he was impressed by the results of T.J. Yates and Case Keenum.
“I told the guys that it says a lot about your team when the coach can sit down 12 veterans and watch the way you practiced today,” Kubiak said, via Dale Robertson of the Houston Chronicle. “We’re going to have guys get hurt. We’re going to have guys miss games. We can never use [injuries] as an excuse. That was my message today. I liked the way we practiced.”
Yates has played sufficiently well in spurts, and led the franchise to its first playoff win when Schaub was injured in 2011. He regressed a bit last year, but seemed to be off to a better start.
“T.J.’s career has been interesting because it was like, ‘Boom!’ – so many great things happened [at the end of his rookie year] and his confidence was sky-high,” Kubiak said. “Then you come back your second year and play the preseason but not play but about 20 snaps in the regular season, and it seemed like nothing went right in those 20 snaps. That’s part of being a backup quarterback.
“We just need to get him going again. He’s working hard. He’s doing good stuff and getting pushed extremely hard. I’m expecting him to continue to grow as a player.”
And by giving him a chance to run with the majority of the starters, they’re only speeding up that process.