Houston Texans Games by Difficulty: No. 13

Coming in at number 13 on the countdown of most difficult Houston Texans games is the week one showdown against the Chicago Bears. The Monsters of the Midway have not made the postseason since 2010 and are looking to get back on top under John Fox.

Marc Trestman was fired after two unsuccessful seasons as the head man in Chicago. It left John Fox to come in and pick up the pieces after he was let go by the Broncos. He also brought in Vic Fangio from San Francisco to fix up a leaky defense and Adam Gase to coach the offense.

Gase has moved on to be the head man in Miami, and now Dowell Loggains is the new offensive coordinator. Loggains worked as the quarterbacks coach last season and led Cutler to one of his best seasons. Before that he was in Cleveland in 2014 for Brian Hoyer‘s many comebacks and before that he was in Tennessee, so he has seen the Texans a time or two.

After losing to Miami last season, the Bears are the only team remaining that the Texans have never lost to. In 2004 the Texans took the first ever meeting with a 24-5 win at Soldier Field–David Carr hit Corey Bradford for the first touchdown, then Domanick Williams ran for another and Charlie Anderson returned a fumble 60 yards for a touchdown. The defense held the Bears to just over 200 yards of offense that day.

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In 2008 the Texans won 31-24 in Houston in week 17, finishing the season 8-8. Matt Schaub threw for 328 yards while Andre Johnson caught two touchdowns. After going down 10-0 in the first quarter the Texans scored 21 unanswered points to spur them on to victory.

The most notable meeting was in 2012 at Soldier Field, pitting the 7-1 Texans against the 7-1 Bears on Sunday Night Football. The lone touchdown was scored by the Texans on a Matt Schaub pass to Arian Foster. It was a rainy game, and as you can guess from the 13-6 final score, there wasn’t much offense in the game–the two teams managed just 21 first downs.

The Bears have had three different quarterbacks in their three meetings against the Texans–Chad Hutchinson in the first, Kyle Orton in the second and Jay Cutler in the third (who was benched for Jason Campbell after throwing two interceptions).

The Texans should have a very good shot to get their fourth win in four tries against Chicago. However, Jay Cutler often starts the season well but falters later, which means I have to give the Bears a decent chance in this game. But if the Texans can get good pressure on him and make a couple big plays in the passing game on offense, they should win.

We roll on tomorrow with #12 on the countdown.