Week 6 Houston Texans Grade Card
Oct 13, 2013; Houston, TX, USA; St. Louis Rams running back Zac Stacy (30) rushes during the first quarter against the Houston Texans at Reliant Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Troy Taormina-USA TODAY Sports
It seems like every week, the play of the 2013 Houston Texans continues to get worse, rather than better.
In this week’s episode of “Who defeated the Texans,” the St. Louis Rams made a surprise appearance with a 38-13 defeat of the now 2-4 Texans, who are currently on a four-game losing streak.
Their play has been described in numerous negative ways, and I can’t say I disagree with any of the descriptions that have included the words “stale,” “pathetic,” and simply “bad” the past four games.
My opinion is the Texans are lucky they even have two wins this season, because those wins, which seem like ages ago, were even too close for comfort.
What are the Texans to do now with the undefeated Kansas City Chiefs next up on the schedule? The 6-0 Chiefs, now coached by Andy Reid, may not be the best undefeated team in the NFL (that honor goes to the Denver Broncos), but they are a darned good football team and are very capable of causing trouble for the Texans. More on them later in the week.
As for this look back at Sunday’s horrific loss to the Rams (they lost by 25 points in a game in which they were the Vegas favorites by six points), nothing seemed to go the way of the Texans.
Easily explained … it was awful.
Really awful.
The only bright spot was the play of running back Arian Foster, who I’m giving an “A” for his play, because if not for his 20 carries for 141 yards, the Texans would have probably looked even worse. No, they would have been worse, bottom line.
I’m giving quarterback Matt Schaub a “C” for his play. He was average against the Rams, and even though he didn’t throw an interception, average doesn’t win football games in the NFL. To go with his zero interceptions, he also had zero touchdowns, and really did nothing to give the team a spark.
The offensive line gets an “F” for their pass protection and a “D” for the rest of their game. There is no excuse for a professional offensive line to allow five sacks in a game.
T.J. Yates gets an “F” for his pick-six interception, his regular interception and his fumble, proving he’s not ready to be a full-time NFL quarterback. He tallied all of that mess in less than two quarters of play.
DeAndre Hopkins wasn’t much to cheer about. In the past three games, Hopkins has failed to reach the 50-yard mark in any of those outings. Agains the Rams, he had three receptions for 47 yards. I’m giving him a “C-” for his efforts.
J.J. Watt was shutout in all categories on defense, and the tackle leader for Houston has just four. The defense played their worst game of the season against an offense that isn’t knowing for being all that great. The defense as a unit gets an “F.”
As for the head coach … coach Gary Kubiak must have not evaluated his team much last week like he said he was going to, because they managed to play even worse. Nothing about his team said they wanted to win, and there was no excuse for them to get manhandled by the Rams.
I’ll credit the Rams, they wanted this game more and played like they were in an NFL game. The Texans were simply out-played and out-coached, so the coaching staff of the Texans, you guessed it, gets an “F.”