- 2 days ago
Seth and Sean dive into what they learned from yesterday's game between the Texans' next to opponents: the Colts and the Chiefs.
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00:00We went into this weekend saying, hey, well, at least, you know, last Wednesday and Thursday,
00:05we were saying, at the very least, the Texans, they've got to win two of these next three,
00:09including the Bills game. So the Bills, the Colts, the Chiefs. And the Chiefs,
00:16you know, we were kind of torn over whether we wanted the Chiefs or the Colts to win.
00:21And I look back with a little bit of shame and disgust. Because at the time, at the time,
00:27honestly, what a bunch of sad saps we were. Because we thought, well, I don't know,
00:34the wild card is more attainable. So maybe I want the Colts to beat the Chiefs. Because then
00:40we'll have a better shot in the wild card. But then after the Chiefs beat the Colts,
00:46you realize, man, the Texans control, they're in the driver's seat in terms of,
00:51can you surpass the Colts within the division? Yes, you face them twice. You're two games behind
00:57them. And you face them twice. Yeah, you control your own destiny against the Colts.
01:02The fly in the ointment is the Jags and their easy schedule, just sitting right there. That's
01:06the fly. Look, if you watch that Jags-Cardinals game yesterday, which if you watch Red Zone,
01:12like I do, the late window, you pretty much get everything you need from all the late games,
01:16because there's only three or four games. Trevor Lawrence sucks. Trevor Lawrence will find a way
01:20to lose one of these games that they're not supposed to lose. So I'm not super worried about the
01:24Jags. I'm just pointing out the math of the situation. I was thinking about this this morning
01:28multiple times. And I'm with you. Just to circle back to what you just said, I was on the fence
01:34about who do I want to win between the Chiefs and the Colts. And I thought the best case that was made
01:40for rooting for the Chiefs in this game was actually made by Super Chiefs fan Ron Hughley in
01:45the afternoon on Friday when I was listening to him. And he said, man, if you want to be a real team,
01:51you still want to attack the division. You don't want to sit here and concede, all right, well,
01:56we're going to be in the wild card. Because let's face it, the Chiefs win that game yesterday,
02:00as they did. And now, yeah, you're two games back. Like, this is a very attainable thing.
02:04And I will point to, and you pointed to this via the probability percentages many times. Back in
02:10two years ago, when the Jags had like a 98% chance to win the division after beating the Texans in week
02:1812, that was the game where the Matt Amendola 58-yard field goal bounced off the crossbar to
02:24end the game. And the Texans lost 24-21. The Jags had, by the playoff percentages,
02:31essentially clinched the division that day. Air quotes around clinching the division. We know
02:34how it played out. They were identical records to what the Texans and the Colts have right now.
02:40Again, back then, there was no team sitting in between the two teams. But on that day,
02:44the Jags went to 8-3 and the Texans fell to 6-5 on the season. That's where we sit right now with
02:51these two teams. And the Colts have a, the Colts, it's really interesting because I think anybody
02:57outside of Indianapolis has been pointing this out. Like, let's wait until after the bye week on
03:01the Colts because their schedule, it tamps up in difficulty. Their last seven games of the year
03:07starting yesterday, the Chiefs, the Niners, and the Seahawks outside the division, and then four games
03:14against the good teams in their division, the Texans and the Jags. So, yeah. So, we got to pump the
03:18brakes. The Colts are going to come back to the pack here. And Daniel Jones is starting to look
03:21more and more like Daniel Jones. That, that game yesterday, go find the yardage numbers in the
03:27fourth quarter. Daniel Jones generated 18 yards of offense starting in the fourth quarter.
03:33Their last... Oh, they got, when all they could, if they could have just gotten a first down to help
03:36out the defense, they get one yard. Yeah. They, they, they went three and out four times to end
03:43the game. Four times. Three in the fourth quarter and then one in overtime. So, let's hold off. Daniel
03:49Jones is starting to, they're starting to, we're starting to see some cracks, some, some dents in
03:53the armor here. But I, I'll tell you what, Seth, that game yesterday. So, I went into it, I begrudgingly
03:59rooting for the Chiefs. It's hard to sit and root for either of those teams in any material way just
04:03because I don't like either of those teams. When it got to overtime for the first time ever,
04:08I'm starting to go, you know, this Polian guy may have been onto something when he went with the
04:1210 minute overtime here. Cause I started going, you know what tie, a tie, you pick up a half game
04:17on each of them, you know? Yeah. But alas, the Chiefs, uh, Patrick Mahomes found a way to get it
04:22done. The, so the Colts game already is we start talking about it this week because it's very,
04:27very relevant obviously is that for one, you know, as Ross Tucker told us a couple of weeks ago,
04:32I'm not, I'm not a hundred percent sold that that defense is as good as they look
04:36statistically. So, there's some, there's some potential there. Um, the other side of it is,
04:43is Jonathan Taylor is the engine that drives that, that offense. The reason Daniel Jones can be as
04:50good as he is, is because there's a good offensive line and there's a, and Jonathan Taylor is so good.
04:55The Texans in the past, I've worried about when they face the Colts because it used to be that
05:01when the defense loaded up to stop Jonathan Taylor, they would be really susceptible to the
05:07play action. This year, they're one of the best defenses against play action in the league
05:12to the point where, I mean, I, I showed you the one, or I think you saw the one clip I showed
05:17of, um, the first Kalen Bullock interception. You look at the linebackers and the safeties at the
05:24snap. Josh Allen is under center. They're running play action and all four across the board,
05:29the linebackers and the, or in miles Bryant, the, the, the nickel at that point, not a single one of
05:35them took budged. They just sat at five yards, basically like a nice, nice play action, man.
05:41And, and then even further than that, you talk about D'Amico understanding tendencies. They,
05:48the linebackers and the slot completely let the tight end and the running back run free underneath
05:55on first and 10, Aziz Elshire gets depth, tips the ball and Kalen Bullock gets the interception
06:02to the point where you could tell that those guys knew exactly what play was coming or exactly what
06:07Josh Allen's tendencies were in that moment. And that's where these guys have been coached by D'Amico
06:13for going on three seasons. Now they are a really smart defense and the, the, so their discipline
06:21versus Jonathan Taylor, that offense and everything that Shane Steichen does, it's just night and day
06:28what it would have been a couple of years ago. Yeah. It's really cool to see. Um, the, the other,
06:32the other lens, I was kind of watching that Colts chiefs game through, I was watching it set through
06:36the lens of like, okay, what's the impact on the Texans in the standings, but these are their next two
06:40opponents. You know, they play the Colts, as you pointed out, they play the Colts, this play the Colts
06:44this coming weekend in Indianapolis. And then they play in that very stadium in Arrowhead the weekend
06:50after it's on Sunday night football. It's going to be cold. It's going to be rowdy. Um, but I watched
06:55it through the lens of, all right, you know, where do the Texans fall in terms of playing with these
07:01two teams? And I'm like, all right, they'd fit right in, in this game, their defense, their defense
07:04can, can most definitely get a win against either of these two teams. It's not, it's, you know,
07:10Daniel Jones is starting to show a little bit of, you know, a little bit of fallibility.
07:15And I, and I still don't think, I still don't think it's a great chiefs offensive team. You
07:20know, they, they did what they needed to do in the fourth quarter of that game yesterday,
07:23but my home still looks a little off. At least he did in that game. Yes. He missed some throws
07:28yesterday. Xavier Worthy's working through some injuries. I know there's one viral clip of
07:32Xavier Worthy catching a ball in the flats and just running out of bounds when he could have
07:37turned it upfield. Chiefs fans are saying that's pretty much what he's been coached
07:40to do because he's so banged up. Um, and, uh, yeah, that's there. They're pretty much
07:47the same. I mean, a lot of respects to the same team. They were last year, last year,
07:50they won 11 one score games this year. They've lost all, but one of their one score games.
07:56I would say the biggest difference with the chiefs is Rishi rice compared to last year
08:01like that when they needed plays, they go to number four and he makes plays. They didn't
08:06have that. He tore his ACL last year and then he was suspended for the first six games this
08:10year. Um, he is a weapon and they use him. It's, you know, it's not just in the passing
08:15game. They get him the ball around the line of scrimmage little, you know, the little pop
08:19passes. Um, they, they use him in the run game. So, but that, you know, two weeks from
08:24now, I mean, we have the Colts coming up this weekend, but as I'm watching that game, I'm
08:26like, all right, Stingley versus rice is going to be a fun matchup in a couple. It is when
08:30you have these, when you have these teams you play that have these offensive weapons, especially
08:33on the outside, it is fun rooting for the Texans because you're like, Oh, that'll be fun to
08:38watch Stingley and Lasseter go against these guys. And that's the big question. So these
08:41last two weeks, while the Texans have had to play a couple of replacements in the defensive
08:46backfield, they'll get one of them back most likely this week. Jalen Petrie will be back
08:50and you're, you know, MJ starts out for good. But the, the big question these next two weeks
08:58compared to the previous two weeks is that neither of these two previous teams had really had good
09:03wide receiving cores where now the Texans are going to face some serious threats on
09:07the outside. And the, as, as well as the defense played, the difficulty level goes up a notch
09:14or two and they're going to have to be that much better. You know, we go back to that Titans
09:18game, man, what I was saying last week was, well, if Josh Allen was playing in that Titans
09:23game, instead of Cam Ward, the, some of those completion, like that there would have been
09:28some opportunities downfield that Josh Allen probably would have capitalized on Texans
09:32up to the notch and turn Josh Allen to a horrendous quarterback at times. I mean, by the fourth
09:38quarter, Josh Allen was so beat down that he didn't know which way was up, right? That
09:42was, that was just awesome. I mean, and a lot of people have pointed out that Josh Allen
09:48on the final interception had, had a receiver coming wide open across field. It was offensive
09:53pass interference. Anyway, it wouldn't have worked, but it looked like Josh Allen was completely
09:57unaware of it regardless. I, I can't blame him at that point. He gotten sacked eight
10:02times. He really was a mess. And the funniest and the best, the best thing about that game
10:08was so many times when I go back and I watch some of the great defensive plays, Josh Allen
10:14was about to pull it down and run for what he thought was going to be an easy five yards
10:18up the middle and a defensive tackle all of a sudden just shuffled into place. Like those
10:23guys were very, very aware. There was another place, Sean, where Daniel Hunter on one of
10:28Will Anderson's sacks, I can't remember. It was, it was, it was somebody got a sack.
10:32Daniel Hunter had a brilliant spin move to the inside and he would have had a clear path
10:38to Josh Allen, but he realized that he would have been losing contain. He like turned back
10:45upfield. Like he was the, that, that right there is such a display of discipline by a guy who's
10:52wired to go get sacks. The whole defensive line rushed with so much discipline and Will Anderson
10:58sacks came partly because there was a really disciplined pass rush around him. Those guys are,
11:04they're just operating at such a high level right now.
11:06Well, and it's a selfless thing too. Yeah.
11:08You know, it's a selfless thing. You've got guys that are wired, especially on the edges there
11:13with Will Anderson and Daniel Hunter. You're right. Like he could go for a sack and then,
11:16and, and after the game, he'd have been a 12 sack guy on the graphic they're showing on sports
11:21center. But I get the sense that I get the sense that, that Daniel, I get the sense that definitely
11:26Daniel doesn't seem to care about that stuff. And having sat next to Will Anderson in the post game
11:30show when they were showing literally his highlights and then his sack totals afterwards,
11:35I'm like, man, what's that like? And he's pretty nonplussed by the whole thing. You know,
11:39like he'd say, well, it is, it's one of those things where it's, you got to genuinely buy
11:45into the concept of what you're doing and understand that, look, everybody cares about
11:50getting sacks, but that you're, you'll get yours as long as you're also really contributing to the
11:57team effort and, and rushing as a group discipline with discipline. And the early in the game, remember
12:05Will Anderson went inside once and Josh Allen seeped out and I'm, I'm sure I wish I, I wish he
12:11was mic'd up cause I'd love to hear what he said on the sideline. He would have been very critical of
12:14himself, you know, for taking that inside move. And, and you didn't really see many instances of
12:20that after afterwards, um, including like the one, the one sack that he ended up getting later on,
12:26the one that the play took like 12 seconds cause he chased around everywhere. Mario Edwards
12:31almost lost contain, but just did enough to push Josh Allen to the sideline before he turned back
12:36in and we'll got him. Yeah. Yeah. It was, uh, it was fun. We'll, we'll continue to look back at
12:41that bills game on Thursday. Um, we'll in the next segment, the national perspective, how it's flipped
12:47on the Texans based on 60 minutes of football on Thursday. We'll hit, we'll hit that Texans right now
12:52are three and a half point underdogs on the road. So basically Vegas is saying that the Colts and
12:57the Texans are about equal teams. The Colts get that three point advantage, um, at home.
13:03Yeah. Texans were what they end up as six point underdogs to the bills. They did. Yep. And there
13:07was no flukishness about that game that you do the box score math on that. And they just, they,
13:13they whooped up on the bill. They did. Well, I mean, look, if, if they do anything offensively in the
13:17second half, that's a two score win. I mean, they were the bills game. Yeah. The Texans, I'm sorry.
13:21Yeah. The Texans, if the Texans do anything in the second half of that game, if the Texans do
13:27anything in the second half of that game, offensively, they win that game by 10 points.
13:31Like they did nothing. They had 30 something yards of offense in the second half of that
13:35game. Can I, um, can I ask you a question? Of course, Seth. Okay. Yeah. I'd be shocked if
13:40you said no, I'm trying to figure out whether is this, this supposed infighting amongst Texans
13:49fans about whether CJ Stroud or Davis Mills should be quarterback. This is really like
13:53four trolls on, on X, um, claiming that, that Davis Mills is a guy and then everybody else
14:00fighting back. It's four trolls on, and you know, I know it's four trolls on X cause none
14:04of it's showing up on my timeline. I'm not seeing, I'm not seeing any of it muted or something.
14:08I'm not seeing any of it. It might be guys that muted or, or the algorithm is doing its job.
14:13I I I'm seeing none of this. It's hard for me to watch, uh, because I see people like getting
14:18disgusted that Texans fans would be saying that Davis Mills is better than CJ Stroud.
14:24And, and I'm, I'm honestly not really seeing it other than a few people that are doing a really
14:28good job of engagement. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, you go like, you look at the number of three and outs
14:34the Texans have had in key and critical moments. And it's just, uh, with Davis at the helm,
14:39Davis has had a few really good quarters here and there over the last few weeks. And he's played
14:44all credit to him. I think he's played way better than I thought he was going to. Um,
14:49but there's nothing. If CJ had played these last two games, if that had been CJ out there
14:54at quarterback, you would be kind of concerned about the way CJ had played a hundred percent,
14:59which, which is enough to tell me. Yeah. That's not enough to supplant CJ Stroud. When the
15:04guy gives a performance that you would have been concerned about if that was your starting
15:08performance versus versus two, one really bad defense. And then one very questionable defense
15:16in the bills. I mean, the Texans have scored what, uh, six, 16 against the Titans and 19 and 23
15:24against the bills, right? 40 points over the last two games. Basically it's, it's been kind of
15:28concerning. We need a better offensive output than that. I hate this conversation because, and again,
15:33I've not been privy to it. I've not seen any of it, but just, you hear about it the same way you do,
15:38like, you know, you like you, you go to your HOA page there and you're seeing things about
15:42parties on the other side of the neighborhood or whatever. I'm like, okay, I don't, they're not
15:46bothering me at night. They live on the, all the way on the other side of the neighborhood,
15:49but okay, I guess this is going on right now. I hate the conversation because it takes what
15:54Davis Mills accomplished as a backup quarterback, right? And it forces us to evaluate him like he's
15:59a starter. And the fact of the matter is he did an a plus job the last three weeks by backup
16:04standards. He won the game all three times. He was 16 of 30 against the Buffalo bills on Thursday
16:11night there. I was keeping a side list of throws that he, that he missed that CJ would make early.
16:18He started out three for 12. CJ starts that game seven or eight for 12. And I'm basing that not on,
16:23not just giving CJ shine because he's a better quarterback. I'm talking about the types of
16:28throws like Davis missed some easy ones in the early part of the game. And the other part too
16:32is that, and this is, I think many of us, including myself are guilty of this because there was such
16:39a malaise about the offense before CJ Stroud got injured. I think that Kaylee is being judged over
16:45these last three weeks as if he's got his starting quarterback out there, right? I've kind of,
16:51I've kind of consciously had to take a step back from any kind of real criticism of Nick Kaylee,
16:56because I have to keep reminding myself, Oh, wait a second. They're playing with a backup
17:00quarterback. He had one really impressive performance three weeks ago against the Jaguars.
17:05But like, this is a bad, this is an offensive coordinator with a backup quarterback. The
17:09thing I'll give him credit for is that the pass protection in that game against the bills was
17:15the best it's been since 2023. Zero sacks. The pressure rate was the lowest it's been since week
17:21five of 2023. And there were some really nice moments where Davis Mills had a very clean pocket
17:28for many, many seconds and ended up making a completion. And I'll criticize them for taking
17:33this long to figure out exactly what the old line should be. But I think they're onto something
17:38with the current version of it. Indeed, indeed.
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