Texans Add Veteran Linebacker E.J. Speed on One-Year Deal, Bringing Special Teams Punch and a Stroud Subplot

The Houston Texans have reached agreement with free agent linebacker E.J. Speed on a one-year contract, multiple reports indicated over the weekend ahead of April 1, 2025. Speed spent his first six NFL seasons with the rival Indianapolis Colts.

He is Houston's second outside addition at linebacker this offseason. The team signed former Los Angeles Chargers linebacker Nick Niemann to a two-year deal earlier in March and also re-signed Jake Hansen. The Texans have lost depth at the position as well: Del'Shawn Phillips joined the Chargers, and Devin White signed with the Las Vegas Raiders. Neville Hewitt remains on the open market.

Speed, who turns 30 on June 1, is listed at 6-foot-4 and 227 pounds and played college football at Tarleton State. Indianapolis chose him in the fifth round of the 2019 draft, and he first made his mark as a special teams player. Over his first two seasons he took just 34 defensive snaps, yet he was on the field for close to half of the Colts' special teams plays.

That work paid off. He blocked a punt that was returned for a touchdown in a 2020 loss to the Tennessee Titans and was named AFC Special Teams Player of the Week. He earned the same honor in 2021 after returning a blocked punt for a score in a close win over the Jacksonville Jaguars. Later that year he added another blocked-punt touchdown against the New England Patriots, giving him the second-most non-offensive touchdowns in the league that season. He played 384 special teams snaps (85%) in 2022 and 249 (53%) in 2023, though his kicking-game role shrank in 2024 once he became a full-time defensive starter.

His defensive responsibilities grew steadily. After his first start in 2021, he made five starts in 2022 and recorded 37 solo tackles, a career high at the time, along with his first career sack, which led to a two-year extension. In 2023, he started five of the first seven games while three-time All-Pro Shaquille Leonard was hurt, and Indianapolis later released Leonard. Speed started six of the last seven games and set career highs with 78 solo tackles, 12 tackles for loss and three forced fumbles.

His 2024 season was his most productive. He logged 93 solo tackles, third most in the NFL, along with five pass deflections and his first career interception. He also missed 17 tackles, among the league's highest totals, which contributed to some big plays for opponents. He played 1,010 defensive snaps, a workload Houston is unlikely to ask of him. The Texans' top linebackers, Azeez Al-Shaair, Christian Harris and Henry To'oTo'o, missed a combined 23 games last season, including in the playoffs, so Speed offers experienced depth.

Speed also arrives with some history involving Texans quarterback C.J. Stroud. The two share an agent, David Mulugheta, and Speed said on his podcast with Colts teammate Zaire Franklin that he had visited Stroud and his family in Houston. He then added, "I respect that, but I'm going to (mess) C.J. up for the rest of his career."

Stroud responded on the Million Dollaz Worth of Game podcast in June 2024. "You could have shut me up right there, but you didn't," he said. Speed had sacked Stroud in a 31-20 Colts win in 2023 and had 10 solo tackles in a 23-19 Texans victory in Week 18 that knocked Indianapolis out of the playoffs. He later told the Up & Adams Show, "I have a bone to pick with the Texans." In the 2024 season opener, Stroud threw for 234 yards and two touchdowns and led a game-sealing drive in a 29-27 Houston win, while Speed had eight solo tackles.

The schedule release later this spring will show when Speed returns to Indianapolis for the first time as a Texan and when his former team visits Houston.