The Houston Texans signed backup quarterback Davis Mills to a one-year, $7 million contract extension.
This new deal will keep Mills with the Texans through the 2026 NFL season.
Mills’ contract makes him one of the highest-paid backup quarterbacks in the league.
Davis Mills is set to spend his third season as the Houston Texans’ backup quarterback behind C.J. Stroud in 2025.
Evidently, the Texans are happy with that arrangement and want it to continue long-term.
Houston is signing Mills to a one-year, $7 million contract extension that will tie him to the franchise through the 2026 NFL season. The contract will be fully guaranteed and will make the 26-year-old one of the league’s highest-paid backup quarterbacks.
It also marks the second consecutive offseason during which Mills agreed to a one-year extension with the Texans. He inked a one-year, $5 million deal on eve of the 2024 NFL season that tied him to Houston through the 2025 campaign.
Here’s what to know about Mills’ unique contract as well as his history with the Texans.
Davis Mills stats, history
Mills has been with the Texans since the team selected him in the third round of the 2021 NFL Draft. The selection, No. 67 overall, was Houston’s first in that year’s draft thanks to a couple of trades that had depleted the team’s early-round draft capital.
The Texans chose Mills with the intention of developing him into the team’s eventual replacement for Deshaun Watson. The Stanford product was given a chance to start frequently during his first two NFL seasons.
Mills completed a respectable 63.6% of his passes for 5,782 yards, 33 touchdowns and 25 interceptions over his first two NFL seasons. However, he posted a record of just 5-19-1 as a starter. That led the Texans to target Stroud when the team earned the No. 2 overall pick in the 2023 NFL Draft following a 3-13-1 record in 2022.
Stroud has started all 34 of the Texans’ regular-season games since being drafted by the team. Mills has completed 50.7% of his passes for 385 yards and two touchdowns in limited action backing up the Ohio State product.
Texans coach DeMeco Ryans has spoken glowingly of Mills when given the opportunity. Specifically, the third-year coach lauded Mills as being ‘in complete control’ after he completed 4 of 5 passes for 50 yards and a touchdown in the team’s 20-10 preseason Week 1 loss to the Minnesota Vikings.
‘We couldn’t be more pleased with where Davis is. He’s continued to grow every single year,’ Ryans told reporters. ‘He’s been a very valuable asset to us.’
With that endorsement in tow, it’s little surprise Mills received another contract extension. Nonetheless, extensions for backup quarterbacks have not been all too common for NFL teams in recent seasons.
Why Davis Mills’ contract extension is unique
Mills is one of just two current backup quarterbacks – meaning, in this case, the No. 2 quarterback on a team’s depth chart – who have signed a contract extension before the final season of their previous contract. The other is Chicago Bears backup Tyson Bagent, who inked a two-year, $10 million deal that could be worth up to $16 million in incentives just weeks before Mills’ deal.
Comparatively, most of the NFL’s other 30 backup quarterbacks were either extended as pending free agents – like Carolina Panthers quarterback Andy Dalton, who inked a two-year extension with the Panthers after the 2024 NFL season and just one month before his contract expired – or signed as unrestricted free agents.
That makes Mills’ extension rather unique. And the fact that he has twice been extended before the final year of his contract is exceedingly rare for a backup quarterback.
While Mills’ deal may be rare, it is about market-value for a high-end backup quarterback. His new deal’s $7 million in average annual value (AAV) places him third among the league’s backups, with only Anthony Richardson (who is still on a rookie deal) and Marcus Mariota ranking ahead of him.
Mills will make more on his new contract than two of the NFL’s 32 starting quarterbacks in 2025. Denver Broncos quarterback Bo Nix, who is still playing on a rookie contract, is set to play for $4.65 million in his second season while the recently announced Cleveland Browns starter Joe Flacco will make $4.25 million.
USA TODAY Sports’ Jack McKessy contributed to this report.