Houston Texans: Tytus Howard’s injury status remains hazy against Saints

The Houston Texans are primarily healthy going into their Week 1 matchup against the Saints but Tytus Howard’s status remains up in the air. What’s up?

It’s almost that time Houston Texans‘ fans — there’s nothing quite like it in terms of the giddy feeling you get at the start of an NFL season.  Our team has a ton of talent on deck and it’s going to be exciting to watch to see what they can do out on the gridiron.

The team made some significant investments on the offensive line this offseason to help protect Deshaun Watson, they’ve added depth to their receiving corps and they used their draft capital on guys that really needed to be around to fill the voids of the 2018 season.

Jadeveon Clowney will not be prowling the line of scrimmage in a Houston Texans‘ uniform as he was traded to the Seattle Seahawks for what I’d like to refer to as a bag of chips and a small soda.  It should be regarded as the worst trade in franchise history and I don’t think any move they make moving forward will top the debacle that occurred just one week ago.

But since the Houston Texans have a game to play in prime time tomorrow night, we wonder about the health of the 53 men that have been selected to represent the team in 2019.  For the most part, the team is healthy and will have a full staff ready to do battle in NOLA.

However, the Houston Texans have ruled wide receiver Keke Coutee (ankle) and guard/center Greg Mancz (leg) as questionable for tomorrow’s tango in the Big Easy.

In addition to that, 2019 first-round pick Tytus Howard (broken finger) has been ruled as questionable for the team’s Week 1 matchup as well.  Howard broke his finger in the first half during their preseason bout with the Dallas Cowboys and has been out since.

He has been limited in practice this week but his status of whether he’ll be available to play in Monday’s tilt remains up in the air.

Howard had come on strong while playing mostly left guard during the preseason, he did play some tackle on the left side but his strong suit continues to be at guard.

Because of the Houston Texans acquiring Laremy Tunsil in their massive trade haul, there isn’t such an immediacy to having Howard back in uniform, especially with veteran guard Senio Kelemete being able to fill the void at left guard satisfactorily.  But his presence as a backup getting quality snaps is most important for his development and we may not see that until his finger is fully healed.

This will certainly affect a player’s ability to block so I know they’re going to tread carefully with handling such precious cargo as Howard.

So how did Howard do this preseason?  Let’s take a look at the numbers.

Pro Football Focus graded Howard with a 47.0 offensive, 64.0 pass block and 40.1 run block

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grade through 79 snaps in the two games he appeared in this season.  His pass blocking remains his strongest suit and that’s certainly what’s needed to protect Watson.  Of course, with more snaps, we’ll see some improvement on his end but he still look more solid than most of the guys that were out there this season.

His 64.0 pass block grade only trailed Roderick Johnson (81.8), Max Scharping (71.9) and Rick Leonard (65.9).  Leonard did not make the 53-man roster but he was signed to the 10-player practice squad.

We can only hope that Howard is ready to go but if he isn’t, the world won’t come to an end because, for the first time in a while, the offensive line has some depth to it.

We’ll have to find out!

For more grades, advanced statistics and more at Pro Football Focus, subscribe to PFF’s EDGE and ELITE subscriptions at ProFootballFocus.com.