Houston Texans can make San Francisco 49ers sweat their playoff chances

Another week, another matchup where the Houston Texans are facing a team whose coach is in hot water over their latest loss.

Remember going into last week’s game vs. the Los Angeles Chargers that their head coach. Brandon Staley was under fire for in-game decisions that cost the Chargers the game against the Kansas City Chiefs?

That’s exactly what the San Francisco 49ers did in their Thursday night matchup with the Tennessee Titans. Kyle Shanahan decided to not try for points with 1:20 left before halftime and the ball on their own 10-yard line. Shanahan elected to kneel the clock out and get into halftime. citing that he didn’t want to risk the idea of turning the ball over.

Infer from this what you will about Shanahan and the 49ers starting quarterback, Jimmy Garoppolo. If there is anything to take advantage of in the NFL, it’s tiny patterns like this. Hence Houston’s upset win last week, and now the formula is here once again.

The Houston Texans can push San Francisco to the fringe of the playoff race

It’s starting to be clear that Davis Mills is getting comfortable being in the NFL, only missing six passes en-route to a 200 yard-plus performance where he also threw two touchdowns. On top of that, the Texans brought pressure all day on Justin Herbert, which led to two interceptions (one for a touchdown).

This is exactly what a team that has nothing to play for will do. The Houston Texans won’t go away that easily, and that consistent persistence could drive the 49ers crazy, as a loss here would put them in the final wild-card spot with an 8-8 record. San Francisco gets to travel to SoFi stadium to close out their regular season, and it could come down to having to beat the Rams to get into the playoffs.