00:00general preview and scouting of the texans so i started going down this route yesterday since
00:072000 115 teams have started a season oh and three only two went on to make the playoffs
00:16the texans last year and the texans in 2018 so they can do it but they're also at a point
00:23where
00:23this is a must win game for the texans do we all agree on that yeah all right and if
00:28you don't
00:28agree consider this in the super bowl era so since 1967 so we're talking about almost 60 years coming
00:37up now only one team ever has made the playoffs off of oh and four that was the then san
00:44diego
00:44chargers in 1992 they started oh and four and then went 11 and one to close out the regular season
00:53that was that was a different shot and marty yeah and so that's i guess you could lean back on
01:02that
01:02but this feels like a must win for the texans but at the same time if you lose this game
01:07to the texans
01:08and you're now one and three this feels almost like a must win for the cowboys i can see how
01:13you might
01:14not specifically define it like that but these are two desperate teams and we're talking about the
01:18desperate team theory these two teams both seem pretty desperate who do you think's more desperate
01:23texans definitely the texans yeah i would i would definitely say so as well um i don't see here's
01:30the thing i don't know about the cowboys desperation oh i feel like they they came home from this game
01:36and they're they're like man we almost won that game and not that they had their teeth kicked in
01:43right somehow there's a there's sometimes where you get your teeth kicked in you're like that's
01:50never happening again and then you get so motivated and you're you just do things differently and now
01:54you're on a different level and there are other times kevin i don't think you're like this i don't
01:59think i'm like this where you're just almost there and you back off a little bit and i think the
02:05cowboys are like no man we we figured something out we're good and i i needed to see a different
02:12obviously it's tough because they have so many injuries we just discussed those but i need to
02:17see a different version of them right and their hunger coming out of this because i don't feel
02:23like they're the same way i feel like shoddy feels like he let everybody down but i feel like the
02:28rest
02:28of the team also needs to be like we let shoddy down too i mean and that's that's a good
02:32way to look
02:33at it all right would you like to start general offense defense the running game offensive line game
02:38management um i'd like to start with the houston texans running game all right they have been
02:45stuffed on fourth down too many times their running game get ready for some nuance alec
02:52sucks so part of the reason for the run game being poor is subpar or at best run blocking mediocrity
03:06from the offensive line now if you think some of this falls on david montgomery as well certainly
03:11i will listen to that we've talked many times about the symbiotic nature of the offensive line
03:15and the running back but consider this david montgomery his average yardage before contact
03:22is half a yard half a yard and you don't get handed the ball at the line of scrimmage
03:28right so in the average running play for the texans this year montgomery is taking his first contact
03:38behind the line of scrimmage as an average so that is terrible terrible terrible and that's part of a
03:46bigger issue for the texans they can't run the ball they don't have difference makers at receiver
03:51they still can't consistently save drive sustained drives in the middle of their interior line
03:58specifically their center and then if you want to go center and right guard but their center evan brown
04:03has not been playing well their right side of the interior has not been playing well whatsoever so to
04:11sum it up that houston texans running game has been hugely problematic from a statistical standpoint
04:18but you can see along the way all of the reasons that those statistics have emerged but that being
04:24said that does not give you an out to be like okay we don't have to treat it like the
04:28ravens for sure
04:30you still have to you still have to defend the run with the same the same prowess because
04:36otherwise you're going to leave yourself open for okay now that we've established this run now that
04:41we had to pull that say they had to pull that safety down now they're having to commit more resources
04:45defensively to stop it now we can go over the top on them so them being poor at running this
04:52is where
04:52your guys up front have to win their one-on-ones and this is where you have to win your
04:55matchups
04:56it's in a weird way i would say it adds like a different variation of even more pressure because
05:01i think about it from the perspective of the rangers you'll get irritated when they don't hit well
05:09right right but you really get irritated when they don't hit well against that pitcher who came in
05:14with a six era so if your run defense gets gashed again you're going to be like you just went
05:21up
05:21against arguably the worst running team in all of the nfl right now and if not the worst certainly
05:26one of the five worst and if you have problems against them when they're struggling on their own
05:31offensive line along with their struggling running back that is huge that's a huge issue the a17 sounds
05:37like q and clark need to have big games agreed yes tito also i would say good point and then
05:43also
05:43i think this is a game this is a game for barham uh if they're going to decide to run
05:48the ball much
05:49at all this is the game where barham probably has uh three of stuffs in the backfield again all right
05:55so i'm glad that you said that because this feels like a game where we'll leave barham out for the
06:01moment okay but those other three that you mentioned i feel like you need to get at least a
06:06combination of three tackles for loss okay or if you want to say or no gain i would listen to
06:12that
06:12but again no gain yeah no gain is good okay so no gain or loss you have to have at
06:17least three from
06:18that group of three and that doesn't even factor in barham which you were just mentioning yeah i think
06:23and this is one of those where mickey kind of mentioned it a little bit yesterday about hey you
06:26can even use him on the run blitz too absolutely and i think this is like this is if you're
06:30feeling
06:31like they're going to try to establish a run against you and this is one of those games where
06:35you you definitely can do it and on fourth down situations this is going to be the most important
06:41thing fourth down situations you have to be disciplined you cannot you cannot jump off sides
06:48on fourth down and and and one fourth down and two if they're going to try and run against you
06:52because they can't do it anyway so you're you don't even have to worry about just do not jump
06:57be disciplined in that now the interesting kind of other side of the coin here and we can get to
07:05game management and special teams and a couple different things like that i want to talk about
07:09the defense right because the houston texans defense has been the best or like certainly one of the best
07:16right and they're still one of the best unless they're not okay because they certainly have one of
07:22the best defensive players i think you can make an overwhelmingly strong argument that what at worst
07:28they have the third best defensive player in the game yeah even that feels kind of tough so will
07:35anderson is doing really great stuff so he set up the offense with the strip sack on the colts opening
07:44possession if you go back to last weekend's game and he had nine pressures and two and a half sacks
07:54okay will anderson is now the favorite for defensive player of the year and let's take it a step further
08:01that defense as a whole they generated three turnovers and the offense didn't give the ball up one single
08:08time they still only scored 17 points and they still only lost and that's because even though you give up
08:1419 points like for this cowboys defense you're like hooray what a great time the defense has been fine
08:20for the texans this year not great but fine so they're seventh in epa per play and 20th in points
08:31against per drive through three games so they're decidedly mediocre this year and that has been the
08:39calling card is what did we say at the beginning of the year is the offense going to be good
08:44in
08:44enough to get this team through and not only has the offense not been good enough the defense
08:49hasn't been elite through only three games of course but they haven't been elite enough
08:54to even make this team particularly competitive at times yeah and i don't know how much of what
09:00buffalo did inflated some of the things that we're looking at right now but buffalo is one of those top
09:05teams if you're expecting to compete against them then you better be able to win a game against them
09:10and not give up 34 points uh but the deep ball has definitely been something they've been susceptible
09:16to so far defensively and a lot of times don't we just go well that's pass rush well that's also
09:22what
09:23you're doing deep and that and that this is this does happen with certain defensive schemes this is why
09:30you see the train the move around so often you start figuring a defense out and you start figuring out
09:35how to take it apart and once a team does it then you have a blueprint for it i'm not
09:39saying there's a
09:39blueprint to do with this one but if they're going to be susceptible to the deep ball that seems to
09:45favor the cowboys now i do want to get to some of the parallel special teams and game management
09:52issues that the texans have had along with the cowboys but i would also like to throw it over
09:57to our professor of football mr metford as well to give us some thoughts about scouting the texans
10:02a few things that are interesting one is something that is totally out of everybody's control
10:07sounds like there's a good chance that their stud linebacker aziz al shair does not play in this game
10:13oh which that's how fascinating is that since obviously that is somebody that the cowboys were
10:19most definitely interested he's been a tackling machine to start this real real quick along those
10:25lines and this is going to kind of point back at the cowboys too that being a factor that was
10:29a target
10:30they wanted to the middle linebacker spot the kobe dean was a target that they were looking at and
10:35kubiak's talking about how great of a leader to kobe dean is right now and those were guys that
10:39the cowboys pursued in the offseason and that's what that you know that feels like it's still kind
10:45of that missing link so that's another factor there is that is that a groin issue for a groin issue
10:51and
10:51he exited the game against the colts twice returned and still led the team in tackles in that game
10:58he is awesome and you can look back at that move already you know how like we lamented not getting
11:04devin lloyd after the two picks in week two like this is a player that you can be like
11:08really wish we could have made that move and one thing that's interesting you talked about their
11:12offensive line the texans offensive line being really really bad this year cj stroud is not
11:19getting pressured a lot he's in the bottom 10 of starting quarterbacks this season in terms of how
11:25much they're getting pressured by design but he's still been sacked the second most in the nfl even
11:32though he's not facing a ton of pressure by design they're just letting anybody and everybody get
11:37through so that yes so the conversion rate for pressures to sacks is must be unbelievably high
11:44for the texans which is hugely problematic and look that's not to say that this is going to be a
11:52walk
11:52by any stretch of the imagination in this game for the cowboys in fact when you look at it the
11:58cowboys
11:58are the underdog in this game because like what alec just said what we talked about before that
12:04the things that the texans struggle at are things that the cowboys defense has struggled to take
12:10advantage of as well whether it's continuously stuffing the run or whether it's converting
12:14pressures into sacks but that doesn't mean that the texans are the tonic that's going to fix the
12:22cowboys defense at all don't you think the texans are looking at this game and they're being like
12:26hey i know we've struggled at not giving up sacks but we're going up against a defense that doesn't
12:32get sacks i know we've struggled at protecting the line of scrimmage and giving some cleaner running
12:39lanes for our running back in our running game but guess what we're going against a team that
12:43struggles at disrupting the line of scrimmage defensively i have no doubt in my mind that the
12:48texans are looking at the cowboys defense and says this is the fix this is what's going to get our
12:54offense going again yeah if you're cj stroud yours is your get right game absolutely uh defensively
12:59because also what one other factor you said pressure you said sacks they don't get turnovers
13:04either cowboys defense doesn't do that enough exactly make you in or force you into those
13:10mistakes to create those turnovers and that's going to be a big factor i i do wonder nico collins
13:16if he's on the field how much that just completely turns the tables on the cowboys defense and i feel
13:22like today will give us a better will give us a better insight into that because i know the texans
13:29have said they're hopeful that he can be back but we will see oh that might be an interesting
13:36question would you rather collins be out than al shayer collins okay because i that being said i still
13:47think a lot of people can beat you on the texans defense because your defense you're on offense
13:51because your defense isn't good right now so like it could be some random dude that you're just like
13:56who the hell is that right it's like oh no this is season high his nickname is because that's what
14:00the cowboys are right
14:02right
14:02right
