Houston Texans: It’s Gut-Check Time For This Franchise
By Bryson Jones
The Houston Texans are out and only four teams remain standing in the 2017 NFL playoffs.
The Houston Texans are out and only four teams remain standing in the 2017 NFL playoffs.
They all have one thing in common — elite play at the most important position in football.
Yes, I’m talking about revered position of the quarterback.
Matt Ryan (Atlanta Falcons), Tom Brady (New England Patriots), Aaron Rodgers (Green Bay Packers) and Ben Roethlisberger (Pittsburgh Steelers) all are the faces of their franchise and all play the quarterback position at a high level.
Even the teams that lost either in the wild card round or in the divisional game all have at least above average quarterback that they can depend on.
Those are:
Eli Manning (New York Giants), Matthew Stafford (Detroit Lions), Derek Carr (Oakland Raiders injured), Russell Wilson (Seattle Seahawks), Ryan Tannehill (Miami Dolphins injured), Dak Prescott (Dallas Cowboys) and Alex Smith (Kansas City Chiefs).
One team that is not listed of these teams although they made the playoffs, is the Houston Texans.
After signing Brock Osweiler — former back up quarterback of the Denver Broncos — to a four-year $72 million deal with $38 million guaranteed — last offseason, many people in Houston thought the Texans had found their guy.
They were sadly mistaken, as the Texans trotted out arguably the worst quarterback of all-time and the offense suffered.
As a matter of fact, the club was ranked 29th in points per game (17.4), 29th in yards per game (314.7) and 29th in passing yards per game (198.5) in 2016.
Their only bright spot was rushing yards, where they were ranked 8th (116.2).
As mentioned, the Texans are ranked bottom of the league in all of the most important offensive categories in the NFL.
In my opinion, this has been a problem for the Houston Texans since their inception.
Even though they had seasons under Gary Kubiak where they had a Top 5 offense and had a QB that one season led the league in passing yards, come playoff time the QB for the Texans is severely out-played.
It is flat out embarrassing as a fan of this organization that the Texans continue to put an inept player at that position yearly and seem content with winning the AFC South.
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This team showed on Saturday against the New England Patriots that they can play with anyone if given a chance with competent quarterback play.
Unfortunately, this team refuses to pay attention to that position and the window on this team and on this defense can shut within the blink of an eye.
At this point, the Texans do not need draft picks, they do not need to take a chance on an unproven rookie QB no matter where you take him in the draft.
The Texans should be willing to part ways with the first and/or third round pick and try to get a proven commodity like Tony Romo, Drew Brees or Philip Rivers.
No more back up QB’s, no more rookie QB’s and no more Osweiler if Texans can get any type of consistency for that position they will be a force in the NFL.
We’ll see what happens but it’s gut-check time for this franchise.