Two weeks into the NFL season, and your league leader in cumulative point differential is … the Houston Texans. That’s right, the team with last year’s league-worst record (2–14) has already matched its win total — and we’re only halfway through September! Houston has outscored its opponents by +27, just ahead of the also-surprising Carolina Panthers (+23) and Buffalo Bills (+22).

Sure, the Texans’ wins have come against decidedly non-elite teams in Washington and Oakland, and it would take quite a few twists and turns in the broader AFC picture for the Texans to be considered playoff contenders. But this team wasn’t getting wins against anybody last year. And this is happening without No. 1 overall pick, Jadeveon Clowney (knee).

Surprisingly, quarterback Ryan Fitzpatrick is currently obliterating everyone’s notions of what he’s capable of, too. His 68.3 percent completion rate easily eclipses his previous career high (62.0 percent), and he is tied with Drew Brees for sixth-best such mark in the entire league. Sample size be damned, Fitzpatrick’s 8.4 yards per pass attempt rank second in the NFL, and his 118.4 Quarterback Rating trails only Peyton Manning’s.

So, what the hell is happening here?!

While it would likely astonish even Fitzpatrick himself if he maintained this level of production come Week 17 — to be fair, it’s the fifth NFL team he’s helmed already — unless you want to believe that the Harvard product has suddenly achieved enlightenment on the nuances of the position at age 32, credit must be given to the Texans’ first-year head coach, Bill O’Brien.

As the offensive mastermind behind the devastating New England Patriots of 2008–’11 — an era spanning from Randy Moss to Rob Gronkowski — O’Brien has designed some of the most dynamic offenses of the modern era. And though Fitzpatrick is only averaging a miniscule 172.5 passing yards per game, the elements of O’Brien’s new offensive system will make life a lot easier for the QB, especially when compared with his struggle-filled 2013 campaign in Tennessee with the Titans.

Here are the three ways Houston is setting Fitzpatrick up to succeed:

1. The Five-Man Pocket

Thus far in 2014, the Texans have been running a lot of their passing plays with five route-runners. No matter the formation, some combination of Houston’s running backs, fullbacks, and tight ends are running routes after the snap. Often times, O’Brien has not hesitated to go four or five-wide — which may seem like a bizarre call when he’s relying on unknown commodities like Damaris Johnson and Ryan Griffin — but in Fitzpatrick’s case, the sets are music to his helmet-clad ears.

In contrast, the 2013 Titans’ offensive line was a strength — and they bolstered that line with lots of blocking tight ends. The Football Outsiders Almanac shows that last year’s Titans ran 35 percent of their plays with two tight ends and/or six offensive linemen. That’s a huge number. The San Diego Chargers, for example, who deployed two excellent tight ends in Antonio Gates and Ladarius Green, ran 38 percent of their plays in this formation, but the Philadelphia Eagles, rostering both Brent Celek and Zach Ertz, ran just 23 percent of their snaps from such a formation.