Davis Mills: Career Stats, Scouting Report, and Role with the Houston Texans

Davis Mills QB Profile: Career Breakdown, Stats, and What the Film Actually Shows

Who He Is

Davis Compton Mills was born October 21, 1998, in Atlanta, Georgia. He’s 6-foot-4, 225 pounds, has spent his entire NFL career with the Houston Texans, and as of 2026 he’s their backup quarterback behind C.J. Stroud. Third round, 67th overall, 2021 draft. Four-year rookie deal worth $5.2 million. Now on a one-year, $7 million extension he signed in September 2025. That’s the short version.

The longer version is more interesting. Mills was the top-ranked quarterback in the 2017 recruiting class – above Tua Tagovailoa, above Mac Jones – and arrived at Stanford as a generational prospect. He threw 438 passes in college. He started 11 games. He came out anyway, crushed his Pro Day, and went to the worst roster in the NFL at the exact moment that roster was imploding over the Deshaun Watson situation. None of this is his fault, but all of it shaped who he became.

From Norcross to Stanford: The Setup Nobody Remembers

Greater Atlanta Christian School in Norcross, Georgia. Three regional titles. Two state championship game appearances. By the time Mills was a senior, he was the consensus no. 1 quarterback in the country, and Stanford beat out the schools chasing him.

He redshirted in 2017. Appeared in exactly one game in 2018, going 0-for-2 with a 5-yard run against UC Davis. In 2019, K.J. Costello got injured and Mills stepped in, eventually starting six of eight games and completing 65.6 percent of his passes for 1,960 yards, 11 touchdowns, and 5 interceptions. He set a school record against Washington State that year – 504 passing yards, a number that still stands. Then came 2020, a pandemic-shortened Pac-12 season, 129-of-195, 1,508 yards, 7 TDs. He graduated with a degree in Science, Technology, and Society. He was team captain. He entered the draft.

The rap against him was always the same: 11 college starts isn’t enough. It’s a fair point. But it’s also worth asking how much development time a quarterback actually gets when he spends his first two college years waiting on a depth chart and dealing with a knee injury that had been around since high school. The limited sample size was real. Whether it was his fault is another question.

The 2021 Pro Day That Changed His Stock

The combine got canceled that year. So the Stanford Pro Day mattered more than usual, and Mills delivered in rain that would have given most quarterbacks an excuse. He completed 50 of 54 passes. His unofficial 40 time came in at 4.58 seconds. NFL Network’s Daniel Jeremiah, who is not a man given to hyperbole, said: “He answered the bell. A lot of pressure on Davis Mills with a limited number of starts, no combine, no all-star game opportunities, this was his one shot, and I thought he crushed it. He crushed it from the testing numbers that we got, and I thought it was a clean, really pure throwing session.”

One NFL quarterback coach told Mills’ trainer it was the most impressive Pro Day he had ever seen. That might be a slight overstatement. But it wasn’t far off from what the scouts in attendance described. He was already a Day 2 prospect. After that afternoon, the Texans came calling at pick 67.

His NFL Seasons, Year by Year

The Texans selected him with the intention of sitting him. Tyrod Taylor was the starter. Deshaun Watson was technically on the roster but inactive. Week 2 against Cleveland, Taylor went down with a rib injury, and Mills threw for 102 yards, one touchdown, and one interception in a 31-21 loss. The week after that he made his first start against Carolina. Then Buffalo shellacked him 40-0, he completed 11 of 21 for 87 yards and threw four interceptions, and most people wrote him off by mid-October.

Week 5 against New England he went 21-of-29 for 312 yards and three touchdowns. That’s what Mills has always been: a player who follows a terrible game with a very good one, or vice versa, in a way that makes him genuinely difficult to evaluate. By the end of his rookie season he had started 13 games, completed 66.8 percent of his passes for 2,664 yards, and thrown 16 touchdowns against 10 interceptions. That completion percentage was third-best all-time among rookie quarterbacks at the time. He passed David Carr’s franchise rookie record of 2,592 passing yards. His closest peer in that class, statistically, was Mac Jones – nobody else was really in the conversation.

2022 was worse. With Watson dealt to Cleveland and Taylor gone, Mills was the starter from day one. He lasted until Week 11, when a five-game losing streak ended with a 10-23 loss to Washington and head coach Lovie Smith benched him for Kyle Allen. The numbers that year – 62.8 percent completion, 2,073 yards, 11 touchdowns, 8 interceptions in 11 starts – aren’t catastrophically bad, but the Texans were 1-6-1 in his starts and scored fewer than 20 points in six of them. When the offense doesn’t work for six straight games, someone has to take the blame, and it’s almost always the quarterback.

C.J. Stroud arrived in 2023 as the second overall pick and Mills moved to the bench. He completed 18 of 39 passes across six appearances that year, mostly garbage time. 2024 was more of the same – 20-of-36 for 212 yards across four appearances. Then 2025 came around and actually meant something. Stroud suffered a concussion in Week 14. Mills stepped in, won three straight games, and finished the regular season completing 91 of 159 passes (57.2 percent) for 915 yards, 5 touchdowns, and 1 interception across six total games. The Texans made the playoffs. Stroud came back. Mills didn’t get off the bench in the postseason even when Stroud threw four interceptions in a 28-16 loss to New England, which remains one of the stranger coaching decisions of that playoff round.

What the Film Shows: Strengths

Start with what’s real: Davis Mills has prototypical size, a live arm, and mechanics that scouts genuinely respected on tape. His throwing motion is clean – compact release, consistent footwork on dropbacks, and enough arm strength to push the ball vertically when he steps into it. WalterFootball’s Charlie Campbell compared him to Andy Dalton, which is a reasonable landing spot: not a star, but a quarterback who can operate a structured offense without embarrassing the organization.

His pocket composure has always been there. In 2021 he took 31 sacks behind an offensive line missing Laremy Tunsil and got pressured 137 times on 293 passing attempts – roughly once every other throw. He mostly didn’t panic. He stood in, took hits, and delivered. For a quarterback in his first real NFL exposure, that matters. A lot of quarterbacks who struggle with consistency are also flinchy under pressure. Mills isn’t.

Field vision when plays break down is another legitimate strength. Chris Simms, ranking quarterbacks ahead of 2026, put Mills at no. 38 overall and specifically said: “He sees the field really well.” That’s not a backhanded compliment when it comes from someone who evaluates mechanics and processing for a living. Mills reads coverage reasonably well when he has time, and his touch on intermediate routes – the 15-to-25 yard range where a lot of NFL offenses actually operate – is functional. His 2025 average depth of target was 9.1 yards, and he added 58 scramble yards and a rushing touchdown on the ground.

What the Film Shows: The Problems

Consistency. That’s always been the word, from every scout, every analyst, every coach who has publicly discussed him. Not consistency in the sense of showing up to practice on time – consistency in the sense that a Mills who looked like a franchise quarterback in the first half could look undraftable by the fourth quarter of the same game. The 2021 Bills game was the extreme version: 11-of-21, 87 yards, four interceptions. But softer versions of that game showed up throughout his career.

His PFF overall grade in 2025 was 64.0, ranking 33rd among 43 qualified quarterbacks. His passing grade was 67.6, 28th at the position. Through 174 dropbacks that season he threw 7 big-time throws and 8 turnover-worthy plays. That ratio – where the negative decisions slightly outnumber the outstanding ones – is probably the most honest single-number summary of his career. He has the arm to make great throws. He also has a tendency to force the ball into coverage when he shouldn’t, particularly under pressure when his mechanics deteriorate and his eyes lock onto his first read.

Mobility is limited. He’s not immobile, exactly – the 2025 scramble yards and the rushing touchdown show there’s something there – but he can’t manufacture plays with his legs. In a league where the median starting quarterback can extend drives with his feet, Mills is genuinely below average at that specific skill. Pre-snap recognition is the other persistent issue. He can read a defense after the snap when things unfold in front of him. Reading it before – identifying coverage disguises, locating blitzes – is where he’s been slower to develop than his physical tools would suggest.

Davis Mills and C.J. Stroud: How the Quarterback Room Actually Works

Stroud is the starter. That part isn’t complicated. The Texans took him second overall in 2023 and he threw for 4,108 yards as a rookie, smashing the franchise’s own rookie record that Mills had set two years earlier. Mills accepted the backup role without any reported friction, and by multiple accounts has been a genuinely useful presence for Stroud’s development – watching film together, managing the practice reps, being a professional.

What’s less clear is the 2026 outlook. Stroud’s 2025 ended badly: four interceptions against New England in the playoffs, a season in which he wasn’t as consistent as his 2023 debut suggested he could be. The Texans exercised his fifth-year option, which means they’re committed through 2026 at minimum. But if Stroud struggles early in 2026, Mills has now won three consecutive starts as a proven data point. The team drafted Graham Mertz in the sixth round last year; he’s not jumping Mills on the depth chart anytime soon.

Simms ranked Mills ahead of Deshaun Watson in his 2026 quarterback rankings, which tells you more about Watson’s current situation than Mills’ ceiling, but it’s not irrelevant. Mills at 27 is a functional, experienced backup on a contending team. Worse situations exist.

Fantasy Football: The Honest Version

When Stroud is healthy, Mills has no fantasy value. Full stop. He’s a roster spot you don’t take unless you’re in a two-quarterback league and desperate.

When Stroud isn’t healthy, Mills is a streaming option – not an exciting one, but a viable one. In 2025 he put up workable fantasy numbers across his three starts: the underlying stat line (57 percent completion, 5 TDs, 1 INT in his active stretch) is what it is. He won games. He didn’t blow the doors off anyone statistically. For fantasy purposes in 2026, monitor the injury report. If Stroud goes down again, Mills is startable in single-QB leagues in a pinch – not because he’s good enough to start in the NFL, but because the situation around him (Nico Collins, Christian Kirk, a competent offensive line) gives him a functional floor.

Career Highlights Worth Knowing

He set Stanford’s all-time single-game passing record against Washington State in 2019 – 504 yards. That record still stands.

His 66.8 rookie completion percentage in 2021 was third-best all-time among rookie quarterbacks at that point. Mac Jones beat him; everyone else in that class didn’t come close.

Week 5, 2021, against the Patriots: 21-of-29, 312 yards, 3 touchdowns, the week after that 40-0 shutout loss to Buffalo. That’s the Mills paradox in back-to-back weeks.

He was the first Texans rookie quarterback to throw for 300-plus yards with three-plus touchdowns and a passer rating of 140.0 or higher in a single game. He also completed 14 consecutive passes to open a game, a franchise record. These are facts that exist. They’re also surrounded by enough inconsistency that they tend to get lost.

In 2025, he quarterbacked Houston to three wins in a row – including against the Buffalo Bills in Week 12, where he threw two touchdowns – when the team was teetering on the edge of playoff elimination. DeMeco Ryans praised him specifically for what he didn’t do: force throws, take unnecessary risks, blow up a season that was already fragile. That’s a quietly significant thing for a backup quarterback to accomplish.

Where He Fits Among NFL Quarterbacks

Mills is a quality backup. That’s a real thing in the NFL – teams pay good money for quarterbacks who can win three games if the starter goes down, and most backups can’t do that. The one-year, $7 million deal he signed in 2025 is in the range of what a legitimate no. 2 quarterback earns. He earned it.

The Andy Dalton comparison, first made by WalterFootball in the 2021 draft cycle, holds up reasonably well five years later. Both are pocket passers with real arm talent and real consistency limitations. Both look like franchise quarterbacks in good games and like backups in bad ones. Dalton started for eight years in Cincinnati and made three Pro Bowls; that’s probably above what Mills’ ceiling turns out to be, given that his best opportunities came on a team that wasn’t built around him. But the structural similarity in how they process the game and where they break down is genuine.

He’ll never be a Josh Allen. He probably can’t survive as a full-season starter on a playoff-caliber team over a 17-game stretch – the 2022 season was the evidence for that, and the supporting cast that year was bad enough to muddy the conclusion but not bad enough to explain it entirely. What he can do is step in for six or eight games, protect the ball, make routine throws at a high clip, and give his team a chance. In the right moment, like October and November 2025, that’s worth quite a lot.