Facing a Bill Belichick defense, even in a preseason dress rehearsal, was a difficult draw for second-overall draft selection C.J. Stroud in his Texans debut on Thursday night.
Although the national pundits will likely focus on Stroud's shaky performance, what caught my eye from the contest was how much even the Patriots second-stringers threw at Houston's offense in the roughly 25 snaps of work that projected contributors like Mills, White, and first-round draft pick Christian Gonzalez got on Thursday night.
The preseason is usually as vanilla as it gets scheme-wise, and it mostly was on the other side of the ball.