Jaguars QB Trevor Lawrence, Texans C.J. Stroud may have entertaining rivalry for next decade
During preseason, Seth Payne saw glimpses of a Houston Texans offense looking better than he anticipated.
What the Houston sports radio talk-show host didn’t envision was rookie quarterback C.J. Stroud having the team in playoff contention, emerging as the top threat to the Jacksonville Jaguars repeating as AFC South champions.
Between Stroud lighting it up in Houston and Trevor Lawrence leading the Jaguars in a four-team dogfight for the AFC No. 1 playoff seed, Payne is hoping these young quarterbacks form a rivalry in the next decade that could elevate both franchises to sustained success.
“Hey, I’m in the sports media, I want as much juice as possible,” said Payne, the former NFL defensive tackle who spent five seasons each with the Jaguars and Texans.
“That’s a big gulp size container of juice,” added Payne. “I’d have a lot of fun with that. Great [quarterback] rivalries are few and far between.”
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Nearly two-thirds through the 2023 season, it’s impossible to ignore how the 24-year-old Lawrence and 22-year-old Stroud could be starting a lengthy, riveting quarterback duel that is quite rare in NFL history within the same division or even outside of divisional play.
Lawrence, a prodigy since his early high school days in Cartersville, Ga., and the California kid igniting a Texans’ franchise previously hamstrung by the Deshaun Watson fiasco look to be on a delightful collision course.
The AFC South quarterbacks will clash for a second time Sunday when the Jaguars face Houston at NRG Stadium, with Lawrence banking on some payback after the Texans administered a surprising 37-17 beatdown in Week 3 in Jacksonville.
Imagine these gunslingers, the No. 1 and No. 2 picks of the NFL draft two years apart, fulfilling the promise of those draft slots. Just picture the drama and entertainment for fans of the Jaguars and Texans into the 2030s if Lawrence and Stroud become anything close to elite at their position.
“You hope so,” said Jaguars’ head coach Doug Pederson. “That’s what makes the NFL so special, when you have great quarterbacks, especially in the same division. We hope this is one of those in the beginning [stages] and in the makings.
“You just go every year. It’s back-to-back, toe to toe. The better quarterback that day is going to win. You’re hoping that’s the case.”
Payne, whose sarcastic wit on Twitter and other platforms makes him both popular and open to criticism, adds this about a budding Lawrence-Stroud rivalry: “The really fun thing would be if they actually hated each other, but they both seem like nice gentlemen.”
Stroud looks part among rookies
There didn’t appear to be anything special brewing early on from any of the three top-five quarterback selections in the 2023 draft.
Bryce Young, the No. 1 pick, has had typical growing pains with the Carolina Panthers, who are 1-8 and have the NFL’s fourth-lowest scoring offense at 16.3 points per game. Anthony Richardson, the Indianapolis Colts' selection at No. 4, only got through four games before a shoulder injury that required surgery ended his season.
Stroud also got off to an inauspicious start in his first two games, getting sacked 11 times behind a makeshift offensive line. It wasn’t until the Texans’ offense put up 30 points on the Jaguars (excluding an 85-yard kickoff return touchdown), capped by a 68-yard TD bomb to Tank Dell, that Stroud began to turn some heads.
“He was good back then and he’s even better now,” said Jaguars’ defensive coordinator Mike Caldwell. “It’s pretty amazing to see him come in and do the things that he’s been able to do.”
When he rallied Houston for a 39-37 win over the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, throwing for a rookie record 470 yards and five TD passes three weeks ago, the Stroud bandwagon began filling up.
Though he threw an uncharacteristic three passes to the wrong team last week in beating Arizona, Stroud’s touchdown-interception ratio of 17-5 is still off the charts for a rookie.
A big reason why Houston has the league’s No. 2-ranked pass offense is Stroud has no reservations about getting balls down the field. Three of his receivers — Nico Collins, Noah Brown and Dell — have yards-per-catch averages well above 15 yards.
Pederson admires Stroud’s poise, the way he looks more like a quarterback with two or three years NFL experience instead of barely out of Ohio State.
“He’s putting the ball where he wants to put it, meaning it is very accurate throws,” Pederson said. “He’s got the ability to escape and move and still keep his eyes down the field. That’s a unique trait for a young quarterback to be able to do.
“If you’re not willing to take risks from time to time, you’re not going to be one of the great ones. [Stroud] continues to shoot the ball. Our guy [Lawrence] does the same thing.”
Budding QB rivalry
When Lawrence was asked if there were any quarterback rivalries that he paid attention to as a kid, he brought up the obvious one with Tom Brady and Peyton Manning. They faced each other 17 times, with Brady winning 11 and Manning getting the upper hand in their last three playoff meetings.
“That was probably the main one because Peyton was my favorite player growing up,” Lawrence said. “Obviously, the player Tom was his whole career, every time he was on TV, you wanted to watch him and the way he plays the game. That was probably the biggest one.”
Then Lawrence remembered the somewhat overlooked NFC South clashes between the Atlanta Falcons’ Matt Ryan and the New Orleans Saints’ Drew Brees. Those two quarterbacks squared off an NFL-record 23 times, all in the regular season, wtih Brees holding a 14-9 edge.
For anyone growing up in Lawrence’s generation, those two QB rivalries were the only ones that had any kind of high profile.
Going back a couple more decades, many great quarterbacks simply didn’t face each other often enough to develop a real rivalry.
One exception was the Dallas Cowboys’ Troy Aikman and the San Francisco 49ers’ Steve Young, who split eight meetings, including three consecutive matchups in NFC Championship games that led to Super Bowl titles for both Hall of Famers.
But when it comes to QB rivalries within a division, like a potential one for Lawrence and Stroud, one shining example is what developed between the Miami Dolphins’ Dan Marino and the Buffalo Bills’ Jim Kelly in the AFC Eastern Division before the 2002 NFL realignment.
Marino and Kelly were already linked by being members of the famed NFL Draft class of 1983, spearheaded by top pick John Elway, where that trio all made it to the Hall of Fame.
From 1986-96, Marino and Kelly met 21 times. Though Marino was considered the greater arm talent, Kelly’s Bills won 14 meetings, including all three (1990, ‘92 and ‘95) in the postseason.
But what made these rivalries so pertinent was how the quarterbacks brought long-term success to their teams. Marino and Kelly combined for eight division titles and 13 playoff appearances in 11 seasons of head-to-head competition.
Ryan and Brees had nine combined division championships from 2008-20, while Brady and Manning went on an unprecedented run of success that will likely never be duplicated.
In the 11 seasons where the quarterback icons faced each other, their teams won every division title and they combined for six Super Bowl victories and seven league MVPs.
Jaguars backup quarterback C.J. Beathard is all for Stroud and Lawrence having an intense, fierce rivalry in the next decade because it likely translates into winning.
“It’s not a bad thing, it’s a good problem to have,” said Beathard. “It means there’s a lot of success in the future for us. It makes it fun to look forward to.”
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Will AFC South become QB central?
Hall of Fame coach Tony Dungy, who won five consecutive AFC South titles and a Super Bowl during his seven seasons with the Indianapolis Colts, thinks the division that has been QB-starved except for the Manning years is sitting on a time bomb.
Depending on what happens with Richardson in Indianapolis, and another rookie in Will Levis with the Tennessee Titans, he believes the AFC South could explode and land a lot more prime-time TV games in the future because of Lawrence and Stroud.
“This could be phenomenal. I haven’t seen a rookie quarterback play with that much moxie and poise,” Dungy said of Stroud. “So few interceptions, that says a lot. It should be a fun division in the coming years. Hopefully, you get this brewing rivalry with all the young quarterbacks, but to have [Lawrence and Stroud] playing twice a year will be sensational.
“It’s important to have stability instead of quarterbacks playing under two or three different offensive systems. Richardson will have stability with [head coach] Shane Steichen just starting in Indianapolis. We’ll probably see some great rivalries develop out of this.
“Who knows, maybe Levis [in Tennessee] becomes a fourth guy. That’d be something to have four quarterbacks in the same division who are the real deal.”
For now, the AFC South spotlight is on Lawrence and Stroud, two quarterbacks that are leading franchises out of the NFL wilderness. Except for 2017, the Jaguars went through a decade-long stretch of misery before they hired a Super Bowl-winning coach in Pederson, who has brought out a much better version of Lawrence.
Since the Watson scandal and his subsequent trade to the Cleveland Browns sent Houston into a tailspin, the Texans have recovered from 4-12, 4-13 and 3-13-1 to become the NFL’s biggest surprise team.
“We went through some tough years of being a soap opera and a spectacle for all the wrong reasons,” said Payne. “It’s nice now to turn on ESPN or read a Peter King story saying good things about us. It’s better than struggling in anonymity.”
Trevor Lawrence and C.J. Stroud are bringing a measure of prominence to the Jaguars and Texans, respectively. One or both could lead their team to the 2023 playoffs.
Even better, maybe we’ll be watching an epic quarterback rivalry unfold for the next decade.
Gfrenette@jacksonville.com: (904) 359-4540; Follow him on X, formerly Twitter, at @genefrenette
This article originally appeared on Florida Times-Union: Quarterback duel: Jaguars' Lawrence, Texans' Stroud could make hot rivalry
