LINE OF ATTACK
It is Duane Brown, gray Texans T-shirt torn and frayed at the shoulders, recalling how he kept telling everyone that this team would be able to run the ball in 2016.
It’s Xavier Su’a-Filo, slowly unwrapping layered tape around his battered fingers, finally starting to understand the thankless but highly rewarding life of an NFL offensive lineman.
And it’s Mike Devlin, sounding every bit like a Bill O’Brien clone, as the Texans’ O-line coach captures what has gradually become the underlying force of an attack that is on the verge of blocking and blasting its way back into the playoffs for the second consecutive season.
“I’m here by 5 (a.m.) and I leave when the job is done,” Devlin said. “I don’t really look at the clock. I don’t look at the days. I just put my head down and work just like every coach in the building does.”
The grit that continues to define O’Brien’s Texans? It’s cemented between the toes, fingers, legs, hands, torsos and hearts of huge guys named Greg Mancz, Chris Clark, Brown, Su’a-Filo and some other big dudes who pave the way for Lamar Miller every week.
“They have a great bond,” Miller said. “They have that connection.”
Rookie Nick Martin was supposed to center the churn but was lost before Week 1. Brown, coming off a major injury nine years into his career, didn’t receive a green light until Week 5. Derek Newton was lost to a horrific injury just two weeks later. Little-used Oday Aboushi was a sudden starter in Indianapolis last week. Twelve-game starter Jeff Allen can’t take the field Sunday against Jacksonville because of a concussion.
“It’s plug and play,” Clark said.
An appetite for success
It’s the fifth-best running game in the NFL, Miller rolling off 1,000-plus rushing yards in an Arian Foster-type season and an endlessly rotating cast of mostly anonymous men only giving up 24 sacks, which is tied for ninth best in the league.
“Coach O’Brien has a lot of faith in us, and he repeatedly dials it up,” Brown said. “We just try to make him right.”
The best thing about the 7-6 Texans is obviously their defense. But the offensive hope — and the key to winning just the third postseason game in franchise history — is centered around a line that has been decimated by injuries since the start of 2016, yet has continued to dig out enough weekly yards to push the Texans into first place in the AFC South.
“Everybody is unique and different,” Devlin said. “You’ve just got to try to find what triggers them.”
Good luck knowing which five guys are starting every week and also finishing games. Even better luck pointing out any of the Texans’ current O-line faces in public, outside of Brown.
“A few people know us — people that really know ball,” Clark said.
The tipping point for praising the Texans’ sewn- and patchedtogether line came against Indy, when Aboushi was an unexpected starter, four running backs combined for 185 yards and every Texans fan yelling at the TV knew O’Brien’s team could cream the Colts if they just kept running the ball.
To get to that point, it took Devlin’s next-man-up system, a close-knit film room, years of friendship and all those Thursday night dinners that keep bringing the Texans’ O-line closer and closer together.
“It’s our brotherhood,” Clark said. “And we’re going to do whatever we can to get the win. That’s what it’s about.”
Since Brown, 31, is in his ninth year and has 129 starts to his name, he started the season off right by paying the initial Thursday bill. The check moved down the line as the weeks rolled by and the Sunday names were switched out. It was the River Oaks-area Steak 48 last week. It was supposed to be Kendall Lamm’s (12 games, three starts) turn this week.
Devlin in the details
The Texans’ line follows a morning weigh-in by watching whoever’s on “Thursday Night Football” and rolling down the menu. But it’s not about making the young guys whip out their new credit cards or seeing who can rack up the fattest tab. It’s the chemistry and camaraderie that have kept this O-line together through the injuries and changes that just won’t stop.
“We put down a lot. … Pretty good numbers,” Clark said. “We’re some big guys, so the appetizers keep rolling. The food, the entrees — it’s just never ending.”
Brown has the heart, depth and soul to fire his line up pregame. But the Texans pointed the primary light at Devlin, who has excelled at in-week preparation and moving pieces around during practice, so that anyone who could go in Sunday knows exactly what they have to do when their name is called.
“(Devlin has) been around it his whole life and he brings a great perspective to that room,” O’Brien said. “He’s a tough coach, but he’s not a coach that’s in your face all the time. He’s demanding but he’s real. He’s a real guy and I think they respect that.”
It took three months and 13 games for these Texans to discover their offensive identity. Thus far, it has had little do with a $72 million arm. It’s ripped shirts, battered fingers and bruised bodies. It’s Brown, Mancz, some other guys, Devlin and eight straight games of at least 100 gritty yards on the ground.
“We’re playing meaningful games in December. And I think on offense we’ve got to try to establish the line of scrimmage, establish the run, then everything kind of works off of that,” O’Brien said. “Whatever we need to do to win the game, that’s what we’re going to do. But I think we need to run the ball.”
All the way back to the playoffs.
BRIAN T. SMITH If the Texans return to the playoffs, some of the credit will belong to the team’s plucky ‘plug and play’ offensive front