Texans may just be serious contenders
More than just AFC South champs in 2019?
The second-best team in the conference as November kicks in and Super Bowl LIV moves closer?
Those possibilities remain for Bill O’Brien’s 6-3 Texans. Just like they did a year ago, when his team saved its season by winning nine consecutive games, finished 11-5, then faceplanted in a home wild-card game.
The Texans have made the playoffs five times since their 2002 inception. They have always been forced to play a wild-card game and have never received a first-round bye.
Will this be the season — Year Six of the O’Brien era, Year Three of Deshaun Watson — when the Texans find a way to the next stage of their evolution?
Some of you are going to
laugh out loud. Others will immediately say no.
Lamar Jackson’s Ravens (6-2) just trounced Tom Brady, Bill Belichick and previously undefeated New England (8-1) in Baltimore on national TV. The Texans’ follow-up to beating up Jacksonville in London and a much-needed bye week is playing Jackson’s Ravens … in Baltimore.
That will be the first true test of their season. Not knocking off the uneven Chargers (4-5) on the road. Not fighting back to overcome beat-up Kansas City (6-3) in the Chiefs’ home.
Take down the increasingly impressive Ravens. Hold down Jackson, who rivals Russell Wilson as the NFL’s leading midseason MVP candidate. Reach 7-3 and record a “W” after a bye. Then the rest of the NFL — especially the AFC — will
be forced to take these Texans much more seriously.
But it’s also foolish to, again, overlook where the Texans are and what could still be accomplished before the 2019 regular season is complete.
Watson isn’t far behind Wilson and Jackson in the MVP conversation. Could you imagine the local buzz if the Texans ended up with a home divisional-round game with DW4 leading the mid-January charge?
“Deshaun can make the case for himself (for MVP) from his play,” said wide receiver DeAndre Hopkins, after the Texans won 26-3 on Sunday and reminded the NFL that Jacksonville is still the Jaguars. “I can get up here and say a thousand words. But if you watch him play … his play speaks for himself and what he can do. Not just run the football, but throwing the football, getting out of the pocket and helping his team win.”
I expected the Texans to be
6-3 after Week 7 and they are. They could also be 8-1 (or a perfect 9-0, if you really are a believer) and their three losses have been by an average of just five points.
Should have beaten New Orleans at the Superdome. Definitely should have beat Carolina at NRG Stadium. Still could have beat the Colts in Indianapolis, despite trailing 28-16 in the fourth quarter.
Also could have lost a few of the ones they won. But 6-3 with four wins in the last five games is just that, especially with team-altering injuries on both sides of the ball and O’Brien yet again finding a way to get the best out of his roster as the season unfolds.
The final four games could all be victories: Denver (3-6), at Tennessee (4-5), at Tampa Bay (2-6), the Titans at NRG.
The next three should determine where this season is really going: at Baltimore, Indianapolis, New England.
The Colts (5-3) left Pittsburgh with Brian Hoyer leading them — painful pick-six, costly fumble, tough late loss despite gutsy play from a former backup … you know the drill — and are now looking up at the Texans in the division, with O’Brien’s squad hosting the second part of the AFC South duel.
No offense to Buffalo, but I don’t trust the 6-2 Bills.
Which means that the top two spots in the AFC should come down to four teams if the Texans live up to their part in this column: Patriots, Ravens, Chiefs, Houston’s NFL team.
Kansas City will soon get a healthy Patrick Mahomes back. Baltimore is suddenly every expert’s favorite team. Brady, Belichick and the Pats don’t do midseason collapses.
J.J. Watt is gone. Lamar Miller never suited up. Jadeveon Clowney is playing with Wilson and 7-2 Seattle in the other conference. Altogether, there might be seven or eight teams that are
stronger than the Texans, on paper, nine games into their 2019 season.
But here the Texans are. Carried weekly by Watson, a professional magician. Making themselves heard in the AFC. Atop the South again, during a season when Andrew Luck retired, Nick Foles got hurt in Week 1, Marcus Mariota lost his job, Jacoby Brissett was hurt in Week 9, Gardner Minshew became NFL famous and Ryan Tannehill was promoted by Mike Vrabel.
The Texans should win their division and again make the playoffs.
But can they be more than just AFC South champs?
The bye week is for healing. The Ravens, Colts, Patriots and the final four games that follow will tell us if the Texans can actually be contenders in their conference.