Biggest Roadblocks to Houston Texans Making the Playoffs
The 6-5 Houston Texans are alive, running, kicking, but most definitely not home free. With five games left in the season and their eyes on the postseason, they'll have to surmount a number of obstacles, from opponents to their own shortcomings, in order to secure their January fates.
To be certain, after rattling off four in a row, including a stunning Monday Night Football victory over the 8-0 Cincinnati Bengals, things are looking up for a squad, which, at 2-5 to start the year, was competing for draft position rather than postseason seeding.
Young receiver DeAndre Hopkins continues to be a mismatch for even the league's best (looking at you, Darrelle Revis) and the defense is red-hot—allowing only two touchdowns in 18 quarters, according to ESPN.com's Tania Ganguli.
Yes, the Texans are on a tear, but everything from the lurking Pittsburgh Steelers to the electrifying Kansas City Chiefs will be trying to stop the Bulls on Parade from marching.
Houstonians have a right to be optimistic, but before getting carried away, here are five grains of salt that could spoil the Texans' playoff feast.
Honorable Mention: Brian Hoyer
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First, credit must be given where it is due. Brian Hoyer has been doing, to this point, very well.
How well? His 94.4 passer rating puts him .2 off from the league's top 10 list.
But perhaps the most valuable aspect of Hoyer's game thus far has been his lack of mistakes—he currently has a 15:5 touchdown to interception ratio. It's not gaudy, but it's consistent, and that consistency deserves tremendous credit for Houston's success. Consistency, after all, is not something that the Texans have had much of in the past three seasons.
Those who remember his 2014 campaign as a Cleveland Brown will note, however, that, after a similarly sustainable start, Hoyer's play dipped considerably in the late November and early December months. In his last the five contests of the season, between Nov. 16 and Dec. 21, the former Spartan averaged a quarterback rating of only 55.48.
It's a stark contrast to Hoyer's first five-game average mark of the same year: 102.86.
Texans fans will be hoping that the same trend will not apply in 2015 and that the less-productive Hoyer doesn't rear his ugly head. With the help of receiver Hopkins' dynamic play, Hoyer has helped Houston cobble together a top-13 passing attack, with about 260.2 aerial yards a game.
With a less efficient ground attack, maintaining that productivity will be crucial for the Texans to sustain their even minimal offensive production, which ranks 23rd in points per game.
6. Alfred Blue and Co.
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Hoyer (and for a short time, T.J. Yates) were successful in large part for one reason—the resurgence of the Houston running game.
Just as the lack of a ground attack was the root of the Texans' earlier problems, the emphasis that has been placed back on making it work has become their salvation. Hoyer is under less pressure, the pacing of the game has slowed down, and the dynamic defense has the opportunity to be just that via resting for longer periods of time.
So what could be wrong?
Although running back Alfred Blue, along with Jonathan Grimes, Chris Polk and now recent addition Akeem Hunt, have picked up the slack as of late, putting up combined totals of 109, 90, 161 and 166 yards in their most recent four games, the lack of early season production suggests that this trend may be a tenuous one.
Even this improved production is mediocre at best. The Texans, which for so long relied on running back Arian Foster, now rank 19th in the league in rushing yardage, averaging only 97.7 yards/game.
For the sake of keeping opposing defenses off of Hoyer's back and out of Hopkins' hair, maintaining this benchmark should be the bare minimum if Houston truly hopes to make a run at the playoffs.
5. Buffalo Bills, Week 13
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Simply put, if the Texans cannot defeat the Buffalo Bills on Sunday, they will more than likely not be making the playoffs. Period.
From a win-loss standpoint, taking a step back at Ralph Wilson Stadium would put Houston back at 6-6, possibly as far down as ninth place in the AFC and on the wrong side of a tiebreaker with a fellow postseason-hopeful team.
With probable losses against the New England Patriots and the Indianapolis Colts, the Texans could not sufficiently recover ground in a very competitive AFC playoff race because of a defeat in what should otherwise be a winnable game.
The winnable nature of that game, however, is precisely why this contest is not a greater threat to Houston's playoff aspirations.
Since Week 6, Buffalo has only managed a 2-4 record, and its defense, once perceived as its greatest strength, has fallen to 19th in yards per game allowed with 355.9. To be certain, it has dynamic capabilities, and the Texans should not undermine playmakers like Sammy Watkins and its former defensive star, Mario Williams, but the greatest threat to Houston on Sunday will be the itself.
Getting caught looking ahead at a Sunday Night Football matchup against the New England Patriots could completely topple its plan for success.
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4. New England Patriots, Week 14
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With only five games left in the season, the Texans need wins. Badly.
Thus far, they've been able to impressively string four in a row, but it will take winning a minimum of three, perhaps even four, of their final handful to make a push for the postseason.
Their Week 14 Sunday Night Football matchup against the reigning Super Bowl champions will very likely not be one of them.
Texans fans will remember (or may have forcibly forgotten) the trouncing, 42-14 loss that the then 11-1 Houston team took on Dec. 10, 2012, in Gillette Stadium. It did so much more than add a figure to the right-hand column; it sent a dominant team into a tailspin, and resulted in a loss of a first-round bye and an early postseason exit (facing New England no less).
Since then, the Pats have come to represent an unbeatable foe or a bad omen of sorts for the Texans. A superstituous sports fan may be wary of this contest for that reason alone.
The bottom line, however, is that, in order for Houston to comfortably stay in playoff contention (and build momentum along the way), it will need to take down this AFC titan.
And it isn't entirely out of the realm of possibility. Most recently, the Texans kicked off their mid-season turnaround by improbably defeating the 8-0 Bengals. In 2013, an awful Houston team very nearly knocked off New England at home.
While superstar tight end Rob Gronkowski will more than likely be in the lineup, according to ESPN.com's Kevin Patra, the Pats, without receivers Julian Edelman and Danny Amendola as well as running back Dion Lewis, are still a decent matchup for a red-hot Houston defense.
3. Pittsburgh Steelers (and New York Jets)
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Are the Steelers really still alive and kicking? Much like its big-bodied quarterback, the resilient team has taken shot after shot, with injuries to Ben Roethlisberger himself and star running back Le'Veon Bell, but it refuses to go down.
At 6-5, Pittsburgh sits two spots behind the Texans in the AFC race at the No. 8 position, and looking ahead at its final five matchups, it stands to plausibly win certainly two to perhaps three of its upcoming games, with likely losses to the Denver Broncos or the division-rival Cincinnati Bengals (and perhaps even the Indianapolis Colts).
Although that hypothetical outcome would put the Steelers at either 8-8 or 9-7, a mark that Houston could somewhat feasibly keep ahead of, the leadership and experience of Big Ben down the stretch is hard to to bet against, particularly in contrast to a Texans offensive unit that has spent little time working together.
The Jets pose a similar threat, with the exception that, due to a Week 11 victory, Houston has given itself some breathing room via a crucial tiebreaker. Gang Green's final five games may leave them with greater room to take off, however.
New York will be facing the Giants, Titans, Cowboys and Bills—all teams that currently have records below .500, meaning that, by nearly sweeping its remaining schedule (and inserting a hypothetical loss to the New England Patriots), it will negate the Texans' tiebreaker by jumping ahead of them.
Either team has the potential to leap-frog the Texans, and, unlike upcoming contests, there isn't a thing that Houston can do about it but hold it's breath.
2. Kansas City Chiefs
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Houston is not alone in its reversed fate. The Kansas City Chiefs, who also ironically lost their star running back and offensive playmaker, Jamaal Charles, are all but guaranteed a playoff spot, likely the AFC's fifth seed.
How likely, in fact? According to ESPN.com's Adam Teicher, the Texans' Week 1 opponents, currently on a five-game wining streak, have a whopping 85.3 percent chance of making a postseason berth.
At 6-5, the Chiefs are currently slotted directly ahead of Houston via tiebreaker from their season-debut win, but don't expect the Texans to have any chance of keeping up, much less surpassing their win totals.
As Teicher reports, Kansas City has the easiest remaining schedule in the league with an opponent-combined winning percentage of .340. In fact, the surging Chiefs have anywhere from a 62.8 percent to 83.6 percent chance of winning every single one of their remaining matchups.
What does this mean for Houston? With the fifth seed all but locked up, the Texans will be one of the many teams vying for the AFC's final wild-card position—a competition that will no doubt be fierce and endure until Week 17.
In essence, the Chiefs have robbed Houston of a postseason option, closing at least some of its window of opportunity. It's now win the AFC South or fall into the melee of sixth-seed competition.
1. Indianapolis Colts
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More than any team, player, coach or game, the Indianapolis Colts have the potential to spoil the Texans season, and can do so in a variety of ways.
The first is by sealing the division crown (as they so often do). At 6-5, despite, or rather in spite of, injuries to quarterback Andrew Luck, Indy currently edges out Houston via a tiebreaker from a 27-20, Week 5 victory at NRG Stadium, forcing the Texans to surpass the Colts' win total for a shot at the fourth seed.
And they won't. For its final five contests, Indy will be taking on three sub-.500 teams, including the Jacksonville Jaguars, Tennessee Titans and Miami Dolphins in what should be, based upon the team's current level of play, three victories.
Its most challenging contest will be facing the Steelers in Pittsburgh in an upcoming Sunday Night Football matchup in what may be a win, too. The Colts will be taking on the Texans, as well, in Week 15.
At best, they finish the season on a sweep and, miraculously, finish the year at 11-5. At worst, they lose to a hungry Pittsburgh team on the road and go 10-6.
Why? The likelihood of the Houston Texans defeating the Colts in Lucas Oil Stadium is abysmally low. In 27 contests, the Texans have only ever defeated their AFC South rivals three times, and never while facing them on the road.
With a loss to the Colts in Indy, the Texans will not only be left out in the cold to scrap with the aforementioned many sixth-seed contenders, they'll be set one game back in that race.
Which is the second way that the Colts will manage to hurt the Texans' chances. It isn't simply that Houston will lose the opportunity to snatch its third division title, it's that, in losing to the Colts, it will possibly be driven behind the Steelers, Jets or Bills—perhaps even a combination of the two or all three.
Should Houston limp into Indy after two challenging contests against the Bills and Patriots with an 0-2 record in that stretch, forced to win or essentially be eliminated, it will be the definitive end of the Texans' season.
The Texans will need a little help from the Steel Curtain to knock off the Colts, but, with the likelihood of Indy still taking the crown, they may be better served hoping the Colts knock their direct opposition, the Steelers, setting them back a game and giving Houston a little extra breathing room.
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