Texans vs. Bills: Houston Grades, Notes and Quotes

The Houston Texans shouldn't point to poor officiating or amazing play from the Buffalo Bills as to why they lost on Sunday—they let this game slip through their fingers by missing several opportunities for big plays.

Bill O'Brien isn't one to make excuses, so that last comment wasn't to say they normally would, but the Texans only have themselves to blame for this loss.

More than just two plays decide a game, but the dropped interception from Andre Hal and the blown coverage on the game-winning touchdown pass to Charles Clay stand out as the two biggest reasons why Houston lost.

Did the refs miss holding calls against J.J. Watt and Jadeveon Clowney? Did Buffalo's offensive game plan to attack the edge defenders with the running game work perfectly?

The answer to both questions is obviously yes, but despite all that, Houston would have won the game if Hal makes the interception and if anyone had decided to cover Clay.

The season isn't over at 6-6, but their odds of earning a wild-card spot are pretty slim now. Houston has now lost the tiebreaker to Kansas City, lost the tiebreaker to Buffalo, trail the New York Jets by a game and now also Pittsburgh after it defeated Indianapolis at home.

There is a safety net, however: After Indianapolis' loss, the Texans are in a tie for first place going into Week 14.

Even if Houston loses their Week 14 game to New England, they'll still be alive despite falling back under the .500 mark.

If the Texans win their final three games, which all come against AFC South opponents, then their worst-case scenario would be going to the third or fourth tiebreaker for the division title, which is record in common games, followed by record in conference games.

Much remains to decide those two tiebreakers, but the Texans have a shot to win both. It's fair to say that the most likely scenario involves the Texans missing the playoffs, but they're not dead yet.

Position Grades for the Texans

Bill Wippert/Associated Press

Quarterback: D

The Texans should have been flagged, as two or three players were not set at the snap, but the quick snap and touchdown pass to Ryan Griffin showed how comfortable and in command of the Texans offense Brian Hoyer is at this point.

Sure, many quarterbacks would have made that same play, but are you convinced Ryan Mallett would have? Just compared to the other quarterback with whom Hoyer competed during training camp and the preseason, Hoyer is much better at making reads before the snap and making adjustments to the play.

Unfortunately, one area where Hoyer continues to struggle is with his accuracy. For the second week in a row, the Texans left points on the field because Hoyer's passes were too often behind his target and/or low.

He was guilty of that the entire game, but it was most noticeable on the possession after the touchdown to Charles Clay when Hoyer on consecutive passes turned would-be big completions to DeAndre Hopkins and Cecil Shorts into incompletions with terrible accuracy.

The overthrow and under/behind throw on those two plays alone cost the Texans at least 30 yards, but if the passes had been on target, both receivers would have been able to run after the catch and put the Texans deep inside the Bills' side of the field and into scoring range.

Earlier in the game Hoyer also underthrew Nate Washington twice on deep passes. On both plays Washington had several steps on the defenders but had to slow down for the pass, which allowed the defensive backs to make a play on the ball.

If Hoyer had put either one of those passes out in front of Washington, they would have likely had another touchdown.

Hoyer wasn't the single biggest reason the Texans lost, but he completed less than 50 percent of his passes, threw an interception, nearly threw a couple more and his deficiencies certainly contributed to the defeat.

Running Back: B-

Buffalo's run defense had been solid for most of this year, but the running backs of the Texans found room to run all day.

After only one game with over 100 rushing yards as a team through their first nine games, the Texans have now topped the century mark for the third week in a row.

Alfred Blue was predictably mediocre, but both Chris Polk and Jonathan Grimes averaged over five yards per carry. Polk also made a tremendous play with his second effort on a touchdown reception in the second quarter.

Blue also got called for two penalties on special teams. They should make him a healthy scratch next week.

Wide Receiver: B-

DeAndre Hopkins started slowly and was barely noticeable during the first half, but he made his presence felt in the fourth quarter. Hopkins caught three passes on a tying touchdown drive including another incredible one-handed reception and a record-breaking touchdown grab.

Hopkins finished the game with five receptions for 88 yards and a touchdown, but his no-show during the first half has to drop this grade a little bit. Plus, it should be noted that Hopkins got away with a push on his touchdown catch in the second half and committed a silly penalty after the Polk touchdown.

Cecil Shorts had a season-high 98 receiving yards, while Washington caught six passes, but both players had a few drops and ran a few routes poorly that caused incompletions.

Tight End: C

Including one reception from offensive tackle Kendall Lamm, who often lines up as a tight end, the position caught a combined five passes for 44 yards and a touchdown. Not spectacular production, but compared to what the team got out of the tight ends earlier this year it wasn't bad.

The worst play made by the tight ends in this game came on the boneheaded illegal block in the back from Griffin on what would have been a 17-yard completion to Grimes.

Not only did Grimes not even need the block to pick up those yards, but the defender Griffin pushed in the back had his back turned for several seconds. It wasn't a bang-bang situation where the defender quickly turned and put the blocker in a bad spot. He was right in front of Griffin, yet he just shoved him.

That decision to shove the defender in the back wasn't even a rookie or college-level mistake, that was something even high school football players shouldn't do. If you can see the last name of the defender on his jersey, don't block him.

It's pretty simple, not sure what Griffin was thinking.

One penalty from each of the three tight ends during the second half also resulted in a loss of 24 yards; it would have been 29, but one penalty was declined.

Offensive Line: B

The Texans came into this game averaging just 3.4 yards per carry but averaged 4.8 against a Buffalo defense that ranked inside the top 10 for that stat before this week.

Hoyer got sacked twice, but most of the pressure he felt was a result of either him holding on to the ball for too long or the Bills bringing a blitz with one more rusher than the Texans had blockers.

It wasn't their best game of the season, but the offensive line had a solid game. 

Defensive Line: C

Watt and Clowney got pressure on Tyrod Taylor in the second half, but they were largely invisible early in the game. The refs let a lot of grabbing and holding go from the Bills' lineman, but Watt and Clowney still need to do more.

It's been talked about before on here, but the one weakness in Watt's game showed up against Buffalo. His tendency to freelance and attempts to beat blockers with inside moves can sometimes lead to big plays, but when the offense uses that aggressiveness against him, the big plays go the other way.

Buffalo did a great job of using Watt's momentum, pushing him further inside and pinning him to seal the edge on sweeps and other runs to the outside, keeping Watt out of the play.

Watt seemed to catch on and become more aware of that strategy in the second half, but if you go back and watch the big run plays by Buffalo early in the game, Watt got pinned and pushed inside out of the play on most of those runs.

The 187 yards given up by Houston is the second-biggest rushing total—Miami gained 248 in Week 7—the team has allowed all season.

Linebackers: D

Two defensive backs—Kareem Jackson and Andre Hal—finished first and third in tackles for the Texans, which is never a good sign on how well the front seven played.

In particular outside linebacker John Simon had an awful game as the Bills attacked him with edge runs all game long. They clearly saw something on tape—probably the Kansas City game—that made them believe that Simon and the other edge defenders would struggle to set the edge if attacked enough.

Not including Clowney, who really lines up as a lineman in their sub-packages, the linebackers didn't have a single tackle for loss against Buffalo and were largely responsible for the big plays allowed in the running game, as they lost contain on Tyrod Taylor and rarely set the edge strongly enough. 

Defensive Backs: C-

Sammy Watkins is tough to cover one-on-one and sometimes even with bracket coverage, as the Texans secondary found out in this game.

Watkins only had three receptions but gained 109 yards and scored a touchdown against the coverage of the Texans. 

Hal also missed a big opportunity when he dropped a near-guaranteed pick-six with just under four minutes remaining. If Hal had made that play, the Texans would have taken their first lead of the game, but instead the next possession started at their own 6-yard line after the Buffalo punt.

It can't be oversold how huge dropping that interception was to this game. Factoring in the missed extra point by Dan Carpenter after the go-ahead score, the Texans would have likely won had Hal made that play.

It also can't be oversold how poor their coverage was on the long, game-winning touchdown pass to Charles Clay. Where were the safeties on that play?

They were in Cover 4; how does someone run wide open against that coverage? Inexcusable bust by the secondary.

Special Teams: D

Nick Novak missed an extra point, which is enough to drop this grade a letter by itself, but the special teams unit also got called for several bizarre penalties in this game, which drops the grade even more.

The Texans were called for four penalties on special teams, including three flags for an ineligible player downfield on punts from Shane Lechler. I don't remember ever seeing three penalties for ineligible player downfield on a punt in a full season, much less one game.

Lechler had four punts downed inside the 20-yard line, but that's hardly enough to make up for the other poor plays from the special teams.

Coaching: C

If you followed my postgame recaps last season, then you might remember some of the criticism of Bill O'Brien those articles had for his clock management and decision-making on when to be aggressive or conservative.

O'Brien not using a timeout toward the end of the first half after the 2nd-and-goal play from the Bills was inexcusable. The Texans lost 45 seconds by not using one of their two timeouts and gave up any chance they had of scoring before the end of the half.

It was going into third down and the Bills were at the Texans' 5-yard line, so using a timeout wouldn't have helped the Bills at all. If Buffalo had been at its own 45-yard line after second down, then of course you don't use a timeout and give it more time to advance the ball, but that wasn't the case here.

Time and distance were not a factor for the Bills, so there was no potential negative for the Texans had they used a timeout.

On the other side of that, the Texans could have had over one minute remaining with a timeout available to get a score before half if Coach O'Brien hadn't fallen asleep on the sideline.

Teams should take every opportunity to score in the first half regardless, but the Bills got the ball after halftime, so they couldn't afford to be conservative. Buffalo punted on its first possession of the second half, but O'Brien should have still given his team a chance to score.

Not going for two after their second touchdown could also be viewed as a mistake, but that's an arguable point.

Mathematically, going for two made sense because in that situation down two after the score, an extra point or a failed two-point conversion both meant the Texans would need a field goal to take the lead.

So looking at it only from a mathematical view, going for two had no downside. Failing on the conversion attempt would leave them needing the exact same thing as kicking the extra point, while a successful conversion would have obviously tied the game.

It's a debatable decision and they later got the point back after the touchdown to Hopkins, but O'Brien should have gone for two after the touchdown from Polk.

Rookie Cornerback Gets Targeted Like a Rookie

Tom Szczerbowski/Getty Images

Rookie corner Kevin Johnson didn't have bad coverage on any of these plays, but he did allow a 53-yard bomb to Sammy Watkins and two short touchdown passes near the goal line against Buffalo. 

"

Kevin Johnson: 'It was a frustrating game for me personally. I wanted to do better. I didn't have my best day.'

— Aaron Wilson (@AaronWilson_NFL) December 6, 2015"

Even before this game, Johnson had allowed four other touchdown receptions this season, which was the second most allowed by any rookie corner so far.

Before this week, Johnson also ranked eighth in QB rating and seventh in completion percentage allowed among 11 rookie corners who have played on at least 25 percent of their team's snaps.

Johnson has shown plenty of positive flashes and rebounded to make a big pass breakup later in the game, but as expected he is still raw and has plenty of room for growth.

DeAndre Hopkins Breaks Single-Season Team Touchdown Record

Bill Wippert/Associated Press

No player in the history of the Houston Texans franchise has caught more touchdown passes in a single season than DeAndre Hopkins.

In just his third season, Hopkins accomplished something that future Hall of Fame receiver Andre Johnson couldn't in over 12 years with the team by reaching double digits in receiving touchdowns for a single season.

Johnson caught nine touchdown passes in 2009, but Hopkins now has 10 with four games still left to play this season.

Hopkins had already broken Johnson's team records for most catches, receiving yards and receiving touchdowns through the first three seasons of a career earlier this year.

The young star, affectionately referred to as "Nuk," is on pace for 114 receptions, 1,558 yards and 13 touchdowns, which should earn him his first Pro Bowl trip but would leave him just one catch and 40 yards short of breaking Johnson's single-season team records for receptions and receiving yards. 

Bill O'Brien Said Brandon Brooks Missed the Game Due to a Food Bug

David Richard/Associated Press

Starting offensive guard Brandon Brooks missed just his second game of the season due to what Coach O'Brien described as a "food bug," according to Aaron Wilson of the Houston Chronicle. 

"

Bill O'Brien on Brandon Brooks: 'He was sick. He had been throwing up all night. One of those food bugs, I suppose.'

— Aaron Wilson (@AaronWilson_NFL) December 6, 2015"

The offensive line had a solid game against Buffalo, but Brooks is one of their best lineman and they need him back as soon as possible. Before this week, Brooks had the second-best grade from Pro Football Focus for the season among Texans offensive lineman behind only Duane Brown.

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