RSS
Home
Bye week offers time to reflect on season to date
Print
Email
RSS
Subscribe
Bernard Pollard (31) has been a key to the turnaround of the Texans defense since Week 3 (AP Photo/Matt York)Finally, a break.
It's going to be strange with no game this weekend but I think the team and fans will benefit from this week off.
I might be worried about momentum if the team had won last week at Indy, but it would have been a good kind of worry.
Instead, I worry about a resurging Titans team coming in here a week from next Monday, followed by the Colts (need revenge) followed by a roadie to Jacksonville (need more revenge) in a season defining three game stretch coming out of bye week.
There's plenty of time to look at what's ahead, so while we have time to catch our breath, let's take a quick look back at the past nine weeks to see how the Texans got to 5-4.
I thought the best way to quickly summarize is to post links to my game reports from the first nine games. I added a quote from each article that kind of summed up the emotion of the day.
Week 1: Jets 24 Texans 7, Bully Jets beat up weakling Texans. "It's gotten to the point where you have to wonder if this version of the Texans, with their 'finesse' offense, will ever be able to beat physical teams like Pittsburgh, Baltimore, Tennessee, and now the Jets more than once in a blue moon."
Week 2: Texans 34 Titans 31, Let's go! me and you. "the signature of this game was how the Texans fought back, and how tempers really started to flare as a result. The intensity was off the hook"
Week 3: Jags 31 Texans 24, Houston, you need a defense. "The Texans are who we thought they were. A wildly inconsistent team with a defense that's emerging as one of the worst we've seen around here in a while - and that's saying something."
Week 4: Texans 29 Raiders 6, Texans D gets an A. "The Texans run defense entered the game as the worst in the league, allowing over 200 yards per game, but the Raiders could manage only 45 yards on 22 carries."
Week 5: Cardinals 28 Texans 21, Great comeback, deflating finish, run game fails. "The Texans have no inside run game and it's killing them."
Week 6: Texans 28 Bengals 17, I was out of town for a few days before, during, and after this one so I didn't get a chance to write about it. I did get to watch it the following Tuesday thanks to the DVR. This and the win at Tennessee have to be the most satisfying wins of the season to date.
Week 7: Texans 24 San Francisco 21, Texans escape with win as 49ers rally falls short. "Combine all the non-football related pageantry with a few hours of tailgating followed by thirty minutes of total domination by the Texans and 21-0 halftime lead and it was almost too good to be true. Check that - it was too good to be true."
Week 8: Texans 31 Buffalo 10, Texans - Bills game notes: Daniels lost for season. "When Kubiak came out of the locker room at halftime, he said the team played as bad as they can play. He also said 'we'll see what we're made of' in the second half. I think they met Kubiak's challenge and a 5-3 record at the halfway point means they are a playoff contender"
Week 9: Colts 20 Texans 17 (it still pains me to type that), Mistakes galore as Texans self destruct at Indy. "It's going to be a long two weeks to carry this bad taste around. No moral victories. We've been down that road too many times."
The Texans are 5-4 and if they want to make the playoffs, they need to come out strong in these next three games after the bye week. Anything less than two wins in the next three games and my season prediction of 9-7 (which appeared in an incredibly comprehensive historical perspective on the Texans written by Richard Connelly for the Houston Press) might be a best case scenario.
Related Articles:
Add a Comment
.jpg)
