NFL Playoff Schedule: Texans Enter Postseason in a World of Trouble

How many quarterbacks can the Houston Texans lose?

Matt Schaub, Matt Leinart and now TJ Yates have all been victims.

Yates appeared to have landed hard on his shoulder in the first quarter of the Texans 23-22 loss to the Tennessee Titans. He was replaced by Jake Delhomme, a free-agent signee who joined the team in early December.

While Yates should be ready to roll for the first playoff game in team history, the writing is on the wall—the Texans are dead ducks. They are destined to get the early Saturday playoff game that will be the lowest-rated of the four wild card games.

There is no team that enters the postseason with less moment than a team that’s missing its top two quarterbacks, its best defensive player in Mario Williams and has been without All-Pro wideout Andre Johnson for the vast majority of the season.

Houston is going to start a banged-up rookie that the Texans themselves passed up four different times in the 2011 draft. While Yates displayed a certain amount of poise when leading the Texans to a come-from-behind victory over the Bengals, his play has dipped significantly as opponents have gotten more film of him.

In his first two starts, Yates threw for 488 yards and three TDs with only one INT. In his last two games against two bad teams he has thrown for 344 yards with zero TDs and two INTs.

The offense has really struggled scoring points. Sunday’s 22-point performance was the highest total for the Texans since Nov. 13. Aside from Arian Foster, nobody is playing with an ounce of consistency and that does not bode well in the playoffs. Their 5-3 home record suggests the Texans are beatable at Reliant Stadium, and almost no one on the team has any postseason experience.

Regardless of if they play the Bengals and their terrific Andy Dalton and AJ Green combination or the Tennessee Titans and the ultra-experienced Matt Hasselbeck, the Texans are not going to win a playoff game.

The future is bright with a solid young defense and the second-ranked run game, but now is not the time.