David Montgomery

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• Week 3Sep 28, 2026

  David Montgomery — Week 3: Eleven Carries, Thirty-Three Yards

  Montgomery carried 11 times for 33 yards and one first down, and was stopped for no gain on fourth and one at the Indianapolis 31 in a scoreless first quarter, on Houston's fourth snap after taking over on a strip-sack. He caught both targets for 15 yards, and his own incomplete throw drew the interference flag that set up Houston's first touchdown, in a 19–17 loss to the Colts.

• Week 2Sep 21, 2026

  David Montgomery — Week 2: Six Carries, None After Halftime

  Montgomery carried 6 times for 10 yards, all before halftime, a week after 20 carries and three touchdowns. His fourth-and-one run at the Cincinnati 18 lost a yard with 6:58 left in a scoreless second quarter, the largest win-probability loss of any play in the game. He added two catches for 14 yards; Woody Marks had 13 touches to his 8, in a 20–6 loss to the Bengals.

• Week 1Sep 14, 2026

  David Montgomery — Week 1: Three Touchdowns on Twenty-Three Touches

  Montgomery scored three times in his first game as a Texan — a one-yard run on third and one, an eighteen-yard run up the middle, and a seven-yard catch on second and seven that put Houston up 28–27 — on twenty carries for sixty yards and three catches for nineteen. Twenty carries were worth minus zero point three expected points; the three catches were worth plus two point six, in a 36–31 loss to the Bills.

• Camp · Aug 31, 2026Aug 31, 2026

  David Montgomery Camp Update — August 31: A Backfield Cut to Three

  Houston's cut to fifty-three left three running backs — David Montgomery, Woody Marks, and British Brooks — with four backs waived behind them. Montgomery had no attributed work in a week when most starters rested, and the thinned room concentrates the September touches he was signed to take.

• Camp · Aug 23, 2026Aug 23, 2026

  David Montgomery Camp Update — August 23: Rested While the Backfield Thins

  David Montgomery's week was mostly rest: no attributed line in the Raiders game, carries with mixed results in Saturday's practice, and a backfield around him suddenly down to two healthy names plus one.

• Camp · Aug 16, 2026Aug 17, 2026

  David Montgomery Camp Update — August 16: The Play of Camp and a Peanut Punch

  David Montgomery caught an eighty-yard wheel-route touchdown from C.J. Stroud, the play of Texans camp so far. The juice is intact, and the role reporting says tandem — both halves of the June read, on schedule.

• 2026 PreviewJun 13, 2026

  David Montgomery 2026 Season Preview — a decline, a trade, a new lead role

  WATCHLIST — efficient but volume-starved in Detroit, now the lead back in Houston. Betting a role reverses a decline.

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  Show notes & transcript

  David Montgomery just posted the worst fantasy season of his recent career as the small slice of a three-man Detroit committee — and then got traded to Houston, where he's the lead back. So you're betting that a bigger role reverses an age-and-usage decline. That's a watch. The Muffed 2026 preview.

  The 2025 season was a part-time line: a hundred 58 carries for 716 yards, eight touchdowns, RB32 per game — the smallest share of a backfield where Woody Marks and Nick Chubb ate into the work. But the efficiency held up: +125 rushing yards over expected, eleventh among backs, facing stacked boxes on a third of his carries. He could still run; he just didn't get the volume. Seven games under 10 points tell the committee story.

  The arc is a clean decline: 14-two, 14-six, then nine-one. The touchdowns that propped up his earlier seasons faded, and the committee shrank his touches. He's a career-year-seven back.

  What the data says: the efficiency is genuinely still there — rank-11 over expected isn't a washed back. What's gone is the volume and the touchdown rate. The question 2026 answers is whether a lead role restores the touches enough to matter, on legs that are seven years in.

  The situation is the entire bet, per the reports: Houston traded a package including offensive lineman Juice Scruggs to Detroit to acquire him, and he enters as the number-one back after Joe Mixon's release in March — Nick Chubb also left in free agency. Woody Marks, who started as a rookie last year, sticks around in more of a pass-catching role; offensive coordinator Nick Caley has talked about using the two of them together in split-back sets. An efficient back with a real lead role is a genuine value; an aging back inheriting a new offense's question marks is a real risk. Both are true.

  The price: pick 50, the 20-first back. Verdict: WATCHLIST — the efficiency and the new lead role argue up, the age and the 2025 collapse argue down, and the Houston backfield isn't fully settled with Marks still in the mix. The counter for him: proven efficiency plus a feature role at RB21 is how value is found. Against: year-seven backs coming off a down year don't always get the volume back, and a coordinator who wants to split the work is still a coordinator who wants to split the work.

  September watch: the carry share in Houston — lead role or a real split with Marks; and the touchdown rate, where eight on part-time work could climb with volume. He's one of your guys? This show covers your whole roster — every player, every week, all season.

• 2025 ReviewMay 11, 2026

  David Montgomery 2025 Season in Review

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  Show notes & transcript

  David Montgomery finished the 2025 season as the number 27 running back in total PPR scoring and the number 33 running back in points per game. That gap tells you the shape of the year — 17 games played, but a three-way Houston backfield that never settled on a lead. Woody Marks actually out-touched him on the ground with 196 carries. Nick Chubb chipped in another 122. Montgomery's 158 carries were the smallest slice of a committee that never crowned a true lead back. He was efficient when he ran — he just didn't run enough, and every Texans red-zone trip felt like a coin flip.

  Now let's dig into the numbers. Montgomery averaged 9.8 PPR per game on 158 carries for 716 yards and 8 rushing touchdowns, plus 24 catches for 192 yards on a five percent target share — replacement-level pass-game work for a starting back. The efficiency was genuinely good: plus 125.5 rushing yards over expected, plus 0.8 per attempt, 11th among qualified backs, and he did it while seeing eight or more defenders in the box on 34 percent of his carries. The per-touch work was there. Volume and consistency weren't — this was boom-or-bust in miniature. A 29.4-point explosion against the Jaguars in Week 3, an 18.2 in the Baltimore blowout, but seven games under 10 PPR and three games under 2 points. Weeks 4, 16, and 18: 1.2, 1.4, and 6.5. No floor — just a touchdown-dependent scoring pattern in an offense that converted only 50.7 percent of red-zone trips into touchdowns, second-worst in the league. Houston's run game as a whole posted minus 44.9 rushing expected points added, 30th in football. Even with Montgomery running above expectation, the unit around him was dragging him down.

  The identity of Montgomery's season lives in that touchdown share. Eight scores tied him for 15th in the league in rushing touchdowns despite the part-time workload — he was the guy Houston trusted near the goal line when they got there. The catch: they didn't get there enough, and when they did, they kicked field goals more than any team in football. That's the Montgomery 2025 portrait — a back running above his blocking, finishing drives at a starter's clip, stuck in a committee on a team that turned touchdowns into three-pointers.