For better or worse, HC Curtis Johnson and OC Eric Price return for their third season at the controls for the Houston Roughnecks, a perennial bottom feeder with a 6-14 record since 2023 and a -88 point differential. Despite some of their shortcomings, there are a few offensive bright spots worth highlighting as we turn the chapter to a new season.
As OC, Price has attempted to orchestrate a run-first offense, which he was able to do in 2023, posting a 53.9% situation-neutral pass rate and 50.9% True Pass Rate, well below the USFL league average (58.8%) that season. However, with a 1-9 record in 2024, that routinely resulted in negative game script early and often, Price was forced to abandon his run-heavy ways, posting the league’s second-highest overall pass rate (59.7%) last year. Based on their offseason personnel decisions, I suspect Price and Co. would like to get back to their run-heavy ways. But, save for an unexpected third-year leap for the Roughnecks, we’re once again looking at an offense that is going to be forced into more dropbacks as they struggle to keep pace with the rest of the teams in this league. While that may not translate to on-field success in the traditional sense, it does create fantasy opportunities that we can take advantage of.
Rare boots-on-the-ground reporting from those in attendance at this week’s joint practice between the Roughnecks and the Arlington Renegades have indicated that QB Nolan Henderson took all of the reps with the first-team offense, a strong signal that the man who started two games for the Roughnecks in 2024 is going to get another opportunity to prove worthy of QB1 honors to start 2025. Henderson showed flashes in his limited sample, but he completed just 58.1% of his passes for 7.1 YPA and a 2:1 TD:INT ratio. He was a willing runner, tallying a 22/143/1 rushing line in his brief appearances. While that rushing upside keeps him in DFS play, it’s his cast of receiving options who I’m far more interested in.
An All-USFL selection in 2023, Justin Hall had an even more productive season in 2024 as one of the lone stars on an otherwise dismal Roughnecks offense. He racked up a 56/604/3 receiving line. Hall is an ultra-safe bet for fantasy production and still has access to a slate-winning ceiling on a weekly basis, running a route on 87.1% of dropbacks, 84.6% of which came out of the slot in 2024, where he led the team in target share (26.2%) on a PPR-friendly 5.7-yard aDOT. Joint practice reports also suggest Keke Chism will return to his rightful spot as one of the team’s top perimeter wide receivers after he ran a route on 78.7% of dropbacks last season, drawing a 17.7% target share and team-high 25.0% Air Yards share as Houston’s premier downfield threat. There is a far wider range of outcomes in Chism’s fantasy-point distribution, but when the price and ownership are right, he makes for an intriguing DFS option. Joint practice reports also suggest that offseason addition T.J. Vasher will likely round out 3-WR sets after he took a majority of the first-team reps on Saturday against the Renegades. Vasher is a big-bodied 6-foot-6, 215-pound receiver who spent the last two seasons with the San Antonio Brahmas but was mostly buried on the depth chart, managing just a 16/173/2 receiving line in 11 games. He’ll be on our fantasy radar as a tournament dart throw, assuming price and ownership are low.
Including Hall and Chism, RB/WR hybrid Kirk Merritt might be the player I’m most excited to see — and roster — from this Houston offense in 2025. Merritt’s 2024 campaign was cut short due to a dislocated wrist, but prior to that, the former New Orleans Saint looked like one of the league’s most explosive playmakers. As a rusher, he handled a meager 20.9% rush share, resulting in just three attempts per game, but he added an 18.8% target share, good for 5.3 targets per contest, running a route on 55.7% of dropbacks. If properly utilized as an offensive weapon, it’s reasonable to expect Merritt to earn 3-5 carries per game along with his 4-5 targets, making him a valuable commodity on a PPR-friendly site like DraftKings. T.J. Pledger will likely get a bulk of the true “running back” work, handling a majority of the early-down and short-down-and-distance opportunities. But where he’ll lose valuable pass-down work to Merritt in an offense that doesn’t figure to often benefit from positive game script, he’s mostly a fantasy afterthought.
