Week 11 – Houston Texans vs. Oakland Raiders: Game Breakdown

Troy Taormina-USA TODAY Sports

Confusion.  Disarray.  Shambles.  Frustration.  These are just a few of the many words that describe the hot mess that is the Houston Texans football team right now.  The Texans fell to the Oakland Raiders 28-23 today in Reliant Stadium during their Salute to the Troops game.

Sorry, gang.  I don’t really know what to say.  This is the hardest thing I’ve ever had to write because I’m at a complete loss for words.  There is no making sense of this anymore.  There is no sense to be made.  It’s chaos.  I said earlier that I feel like I say the same thing every week:  Just when you think the season could not get any worse…

I said the Texans would have to actively try to lose this game.  Well, you be the judge:  After a lackluster first half from Case Keenum, he was benched for Matt Schaub. I thought Reliant was going to implode in on itself.  I couldn’t believe it.  Admittedly I took a sick pleasure in Schaub coming back into the game, because to me this signifies that Keenum is not the QB of the future and that we’re closer to drafting one first round in 2014.  Then again, I don’t even know what the hell to expect from this organization anymore.  Keenum finished with 170 yds., 1 TD, 1 INT and Schaub had 150 yds. passing.

Keenum can’t read a blitz to save his life, our offensive line can’t stop a blitz to save their lives and Schaub can’t throw a ball down field to save his life.  Ben Tate is damn near dying on the field and the rest of the team can’t seem to capitalize on any opportunities given to them.  Combine it all together and you have a non-existent offense which causes a constantly exhausted defense… Which apparently means you lose to god awful teams.

But who’s to say that the Raiders are god awful with their new found Golden Boy, Matt McGloin?  The kid balled out going 18/32, 197 yds., and 3 TDs.  I don’t know whether that means we played just that poorly or if the world just wasn’t prepared for how good he actually is.  I wouldn’t be surprised if Terrelle Pryor stayed “injured” for one more week.

Adding insult to injury, Andre Johnson and Matt Schaub “had words” on the sideline after the Texans’ final drive 4th down play failed.  In the post game press conference, Johnson insisted that the play fail was his fault.  But he was clearly very frustrated.  I don’t like to make a big deal about players yelling at each other on the sidelines when things are going south.  They’re human, this is very frustrating, hormones are raging and tempers are flaring.  They both insist that they’re fine afterwards and I truly believe they are.

I tried to focus on the positives but I’m sure you all would agree on how difficult that is.  We played so poorly on both sides of the ball I couldn’t even get excited about Keshawn Martin finally getting the punt return for a touchdown that he’s been trying ever so hard to get each week (87 yds., the longest in franchise history).  If you can believe it, special teams was the one bright spot today.  Randy Bullock made all three of his field goals, including one from 51 yards out.

If I absolutely had to pick one more positive from today’s game (and trust me, this was hard), then it would have to be the play of J. J. Watt and Jeff Tarpinian.  I am very quickly becoming a Jeff Tarpinian fan.  He had 11 tackles today.  The dude is all over the field and you can’t help but love it.  J. J. Watt was just being himself today with 5 solo tackles and 2 sacks for a total of 21 yds lost.

It’s time we embrace the suck and tank the rest of the year for that high draft pick.  Our schedule isn’t really cake the rest of the way (Colts, Titans, Broncos, Patriots, et al.) so it’s not like the tank would be obvious.  Admittedly though I’d like just one more win.  I don’t really care who that comes against, who’s playing at Quarterback, or who our head coach is.  Just one more win and I’ll be fine with whatever else happens.  I just miss that feeling.  I think we all do.

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