- 15 minutes ago
Seth and Sean re-live the Texans' finishers from their winning streak via the voice of the Texans, Marc Vandermeer.
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00:00WWE fans know the importance of a good finisher, Seth.
00:02You got that stone-cold stunner or the rock bottom or you got, you know?
00:07Well, I mean, that's been, I guess, I don't want to call it the problem with the Texans defense
00:12because they've been great all year, but as great as they were in the first half of the season,
00:17there were times where usually because the offense just kept putting the defense back out on the field,
00:24they would break in the fourth quarter.
00:26They would have an incredible game versus the Broncos and then allow Bo Nix to scramble.
00:30They allowed Baker Mayfield to scramble for yardage.
00:36They've, well, they allowed that in the Bills game.
00:40I mean, they allowed that hook and lateral.
00:42They ended up ultimately making the plays they needed to do to close that game out.
00:47Yeah, yeah, yeah.
00:48But as good as the defense is, it feels unfair, and yet that's the reality of this team this year
00:55is that they can't get away with just being really, really good.
00:59They have to be four quarters of one of the most incredible defenses you've ever seen.
01:05Yep.
01:05And I think they've gotten better as the season has gone along,
01:08despite having to suffer through some injuries at times.
01:10The one game where the offense really came up big throughout this stretch
01:13was Davis Mills in the second half of that game against the Jags.
01:17That was the, I mean, the offense was clicking.
01:21I credit the Jags for not having that torpedo their season.
01:25If you had told me after that game that the Jags would be leading the division by a full game
01:30in, you know, four weeks from now or, you know, a month from now,
01:34the Jags are going to be alone in front in the division, I would have said, man, I don't know.
01:37I mean, that allowing Davis Mills to piece you throughout the second half of a game
01:42where you could have finished the Texans' season pretty much would be a lot.
01:46That would kill most teams.
01:49But the Texans came all the way back, and the offense was able to secure the comeback.
01:54Ultimately, the finisher was this move right here.
01:56Seven seconds to go.
01:57Here's the snap to Trevor Lawrence.
01:59Backing up, stepping up.
02:00Lawrence tripped up.
02:01The ball is out.
02:02The Texans have it.
02:03Across the 20, 15, 10, 5, touchdown, Houston, Rankins, game over.
02:11The Texans win it.
02:14Houston comes all the way back to defeat the Jaguars.
02:18The Texans have changed their season around.
02:22Yeah, that's wild.
02:23It is really wild to think.
02:24They were down 20 to 10 at halftime.
02:25They were down 29 to 10 in the third quarter of the Jags.
02:28And I know I was looking.
02:30Dude, I was starting to think of Monday's show.
02:32I'm like, all right, when is mock draft injection time coming?
02:36That was week 10.
02:38Is it week 15?
02:39Do we start looking at the mock drafts when the college season is over?
02:42And Trevor Lawrence now is coming up.
02:44One of the maybe better games he's played as a pro.
02:46The big fear I've had about the Jaguars this whole time is that Liam Cohen, I think,
02:51might actually be a good coach.
02:52Yeah.
02:53And is just like many other coaches before him that had goofy intros, press conferences,
03:00he might pull a Dan Campbell or a Nick Sirianni.
03:03It's worked out.
03:03You've got to keep an eye on this Liam Cohen fellow.
03:05Yeah, yeah.
03:07If I'm the rest of the NFL right now, the fact Lawrence, he's strung a couple good games
03:12together now.
03:13So we'll see.
03:14The arm talent's always been there.
03:15Week 11, Texans-Titans, this is a game the defense actually did not finish very well.
03:23They allowed that deep shot to, I forget who the deep shot was to on the Titans, but
03:28they allowed a tying touchdown.
03:29I was shocked that Mike McCoy didn't go for two in that game just because you're one and
03:34whatever, one and eight, one and nine.
03:36Why not?
03:36To me, the finishing move in that game actually came from the Texans' offense.
03:41It's third and 16 for the Houston 42.
03:43Marks in the backfield.
03:44Mills in the gun.
03:45And here's the snap.
03:45Davis firing downfield.
03:47And he's got Nico Collins on the sideline at the 40.
03:50Toe tapper.
03:52They say catch.
03:54Yes.
03:55What a clutch reception by Nico Collins.
03:58Get to the line of scrimmage and run a play.
04:00Snap this football at the 41-yard line.
04:02Oh, he's definitely in.
04:03Yeah, you're good, man.
04:04Chill.
04:06Both feet down.
04:07Plus, it doesn't matter as much as it used to with the old booth review up there.
04:10Yeah, the eye in the sky.
04:11The booth review giveth and it taketh away.
04:13Yeah, yeah.
04:14Sometimes twice on the same play as we learned on Sunday night.
04:18Bastards.
04:19Booth review overturns the call.
04:22Wait a second.
04:23Booth review says, ah, just messing with you.
04:26Yep, yep, yep.
04:27So that was a great, it was honestly, it was a really good, it was a beautiful pass by
04:32Davis Mills.
04:33He had to get that, he got that about two inches above the safety's outstretch, or the
04:39cornerback's outstretch hands to drop it into the honey hole there and cover two.
04:43It was really, it was beautiful.
04:44Yep.
04:45The next week against, you just touched on this one, Seth.
04:48D'Amico, again, we're going through, D'Amico, the mantra that we've heard throughout this
04:52five-game winning streak more than anything else is how we're finishing.
04:55We're finishing games, we're finishing, we're making plays at the end of games, and they've
04:59had to because these games have all been close.
05:02That would be nice to get a game this Sunday.
05:04I don't want to get too greedy, but a game where you and I can just kind of joke around
05:07in the third and fourth quarter about things, and we're not just sitting there sweating
05:09our, you know, just sweating out the outcome of the game.
05:12That's true.
05:12Yeah, or like it has been with some of these games during this stretch where the first
05:16three games were just absolutely horrendous football, or first three quarters were absolutely
05:21horrendous football.
05:22Yeah.
05:22That's when I start, I just start, I start eating sugar stuff.
05:26Yes.
05:26I break all my refined sugar vows and eat 17 ice cream sandwiches.
05:31Yes, play prettier, save Seth.
05:34Yeah.
05:34Pretty.
05:34Don't care about my pancreas.
05:35That's right.
05:36Just go ahead and just make it interesting from the beginning, okay?
05:39But you nailed this one, this week 12 game against the Bills.
05:43They were on their way to a collapse here with that hook and lateral play, which was a great
05:49play call on a fourth and 27.
05:51Fourth and 27, but a few plays later on fourth and six.
05:55It was fourth and one.
05:57Bills get a motion penalty, so they're backed up fourth and six, and then Kalen Bullock comes
06:01up big.
06:01At the Houston 22, orbit motion, Shakir.
06:05Allen, back to throw.
06:06Allen, airing it out.
06:07Allen, picked off by Bullock.
06:10It's over.
06:11The Texans are going to do it.
06:12There's a flag down in the secondary.
06:15It's against the Bills.
06:17The Texans pull it off.
06:19They're going to knock off Buffalo tonight.
06:22All right.
06:22I just love reliving these calls.
06:26Vandy's been on one this year, man.
06:27It's been a whole lot of fun.
06:29Hey, text in names for some of these finishing moves on the Tex page.
06:32713-572-4610.
06:34Send those in.
06:36It'll push the other Tex further down the board.
06:39That was one of the games where Bullock really emerged into the national consciousness, I think.
06:47Because he had two interceptions in that game.
06:50It's versus the Bills.
06:51I said after that game, I said, Kalen Bullock is going to make the Pro Bowl this year.
06:57And he's had games where he's played at a Pro Bowl level.
07:00But when you do that on Thursday Night Football against the reigning MVP, that's the type of
07:05thing that gets narrative started.
07:06So we went through the Pro Bowl ballot, I think, late last week.
07:09I think like last Friday, Seth and I did.
07:12And Kalen Bullock is second still.
07:14They came out with the new tabulations yesterday.
07:17Kalen Bullock is still second among safeties or free safeties in the voting across the entire league.
07:22He's got the second most votes.
07:24But Seth and I were opening.
07:26Seth opened up the ballot.
07:27And we noticed that, oh, they don't put the players alphabetically.
07:31They put them in order at this particular position.
07:33They put them in order, the number of interceptions that they have.
07:37So Bullock's second in interceptions and second in voting.
07:40And all the voting mirrored the interception tallies.
07:43Fans really putting in the heavy-duty work, consulting their advanced staff sites and everything,
07:48trying to see.
07:49That was what was so impressive about Stingley.
07:51Stingley was the first guy that's high up in the fan voting who wasn't one of the interception leaders.
08:00That's how even it managed to get the voters to sway away from the interception.
08:07Yeah, he's still Stingley.
08:08I'm looking at it.
08:08Stingley's still – Stingley's now third.
08:11He's actually moved up.
08:12He was fourth last week.
08:14He's now third.
08:14Bullock's still second.
08:15It credits Sheldon Rankins also for the pressure on that interception.
08:18Will Anderson was coming from one side.
08:20Sheldon Rankins and Daniil – I think it was Daniil – yeah, it was Daniil and Sheldon on the right side ran a game.
08:25And Sheldon got in Josh Allen's face, and you've got to remember, everybody, he'd been sacked eight times up to that point.
08:30Yeah, he was –
08:31And I probably should have tried to take advantage of the defensive holding that was eventually called on that play
08:36because he had somebody wide open but made an errant throw instead.
08:40Week 13 against the Colts.
08:42This is the play to me.
08:43This is probably the least sexy of all these plays.
08:47I mean, we played a Rankins touchdown, a Niko third and 16 that was a season saver.
08:52The Bullock intercepted and ended that game.
08:54I thought this was the play in the Texans-Colts game that, you know, ironically, this is another play that the offense made
09:00to get a first down to allow the Texans to kill the clock.
09:04Motion by Higgins in the backfield.
09:06Stroud hands off to Marks running left.
09:09Marks taking the ball across the 40.
09:11Marks close to a first down.
09:12He's got the first down at the Houston 42-yard line.
09:15And that was a huge run by Woody Marks.
09:17The entire stadium urging on the Colts' defense to stop them.
09:22They couldn't do it.
09:23And with a minute 34 to go, the Colts are down to one timeout.
09:26This is beautiful.
09:27That was the equivalent, Seth, when they played in Indianapolis last year
09:31and the Texans had the ball at the end of the game.
09:34Now, granted, that was a game where the Texans were running the ball a whole lot better than they did in that game.
09:38And this was a pass.
09:39But that was the equivalent of that third and 11 to Niko in week one last year in Indy
09:42where they're trying to possess the ball and keep the ball away from the Colts.
09:47And C.J. made that throw to Niko along the sideline.
09:49And you look up at the clock, you go, oh, my God.
09:51They're going to be able to – they just got to run a couple normal plays
09:54and they can take a knee on this last one and you win the game.
09:57That was the finisher there, I thought.
09:58And Woody Marks, who plays much larger than his body weight,
10:03he just bulldozed his way there for the last four yards or so.
10:09That was a classic.
10:11The equivalent of smelling the end zone.
10:13He was smelling the line to gain on that one.
10:16And you just very much felt that it was force of will that carried him over those last few yards.
10:21Woody Marks was a DNP Wednesday last week.
10:25He did not practice before the Chiefs game.
10:28He was back at practice on Thursday.
10:29I think it's almost a lock he doesn't practice today after 26 carries for 68 yards.
10:35Yeah, he hadn't had more than 19 carries in a game before that.
10:39And I think it was last week that he did.
10:41I mean, he's had in the high teens for a few weeks in a row now.
10:44So for a rookie running back who's a smaller guy, they've turned him into their bell cow.
10:50And as D'Amico said in the press conference on Monday, it's taken a toll on him.
10:55You know, and I don't know whether it's the litany of injuries or whether it's just wear and tear.
11:02They signed Cody Schrader, a running back yesterday, who hasn't played hardly at all in the NFL.
11:07But it's worth noting.
11:09You know, and I'm guessing he'll play, but they might be starting to worry about the wear and tear.
11:14Yeah, yeah, for sure.
11:16All right, last one.
11:16This is last week's game.
11:19We're going through D'Amico talking about finishing in the fourth quarter.
11:22The last one here, you know, the Texans, you can pick any number of them because Andy Reid gave plenty of opportunities for them to have plays that you would call the finishing move.
11:31Two fourth down stops in the fourth quarter.
11:33But the Chiefs were still getting the ball back, and it was still a one-score game.
11:36The Chiefs got the ball back with three-plus minutes to go, down seven.
11:41These were, Seth, for eight years, these have been situations that Mahomes marches that team down the field and goes and gets a touchdown.
11:48Against good teams, against bad teams, at home, away, he always seems to have a knack for doing that.
11:54Two plays in.
11:55In fact, on this very play, Chris Collinsworth was saying, was warning everybody that, hey, this is Mahomes here, you know.
12:02Collinsworth was talking about Mahomes in that game.
12:03Believe it or not, yeah.
12:04I didn't know if he neglected him or not.
12:06Yeah, yeah, yeah.
12:07I don't know if he was talking about him pretty much half the time the Texans' offense was on the field.
12:12It was, hey, great play by C.J. Stroud.
12:14Let's take a look at Mahomes on the bench here.
12:16It was gross, man.
12:17Remember after C.J. made that one conversion where he was running to the right on third down to Jaden Higgins?
12:22They went to Mahomes on the sideline, and Collinsworth started talking about all those types of plays that Mahomes has made in his career.
12:30It's awful.
12:31And I've said I like Collinsworth and Tirico might be my favorite combination covering the NFL right now,
12:38but that was unbearable on Sunday night.
12:41At any rate, here was the finishing move.
12:43Aziz Alshair.
12:44Mahomes to throw, four-man rush.
12:47Mahomes unloads downfield and tipped and intercepted.
12:51Aziz Alshair has it off the deflection.
12:55Another pick, third of the game for Houston.
12:59Wow.
13:00Kelsey could not hang on.
13:02Aziz got it.
13:04Hot potato pick.
13:05And the Texans have the ball in Chiefs territory again.
13:09I should have had this audio ready, and I didn't, and it's my bad.
13:12But on the coach's show, John Harris asked D'Amico about that play,
13:17and Johnny had said that he referenced Aziz on the postgame show with me and Clint,
13:23saying, yeah, I dropped seven interceptions as a Texan before that.
13:27He never had an interception as a Texan, but he had plenty of opportunities.
13:30And Johnny asked D'Amico, what was going through your mind?
13:32And D'Amico goes, Aziz caught it.
13:35Yeah.
13:35I know, and Aziz, when he was with you guys, or in the postgame on TV,
13:39I can't remember which one it was, was he was talking about how the guys never let him,
13:43you know, they remind him constantly of how many interceptions he's dropped.
13:46Yeah.
13:46And I did, I did think, man, that's, that's not like what D'Amico really wants.
13:51D'Amico wants guys visualizing the good stuff and everything.
13:54Yeah.
13:55The, uh, and yet at the same time, you got to let guys be guys.
13:57Yeah.
13:58And you got to let them, you know, kind of jab at their soft spots and their weak moments.
14:02Yeah.
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