3 things we learned from the Houston Texans Hall of Fame Game

The Houston Texans' 2024 season is officially underway as they took on the Chicago Bears in the opening preseason game of the season. Taking place in the neutral city of Canton, OH, right in the shadows of the Pro Football Hall of Fame, the Texans came up short in a 21-17 loss to the Bears. A loss that didn't feature many of either team's best talents.

Names like Caleb Williams and C.J. Stroud were held out, mostly due to the fact that each team will play four preseason games this season, while everyone else only plays three. Thus, it's fair to say that neither team was really going to put anyone through their paces in this area. Especially not the biggest and best of your roster.

Even though the biggest names sat out, and didn't get any reps, that doesn't mean we didn't find some things out. There was a lot to learn here.

Davis Mills and Case Keenum look really good against second-teamers

The idea that many are about to be a high-value trade target is a bit of a lark. Neither Mills nor Keenum (especially Keenum) is new to the game. No GM in the NFL is going to look at Mills and go "You know, I was wrong about him". No, we had two years' worth of starts. We know that Mills is a solid quarterback, but that may be all he is. Keenum hasn't been a worthwhile starter in years. Neither is going to fetch a lot, if anything at all, as far as a trade goes. You may have someone take a run at them should their respective backups go down, but there's a lot of hype over Mills getting traded right now. Hype that shouldn't exist. A good outing against subpar backups isn't the performance some think it is.

The running game doesn't look improved

Some will say "It's only preseason" and "It's week one of preseason" and you're not wrong. But this isn't the first brick in the road, so to speak. This is the same crew we saw last year, more or less, and the struggles they had then are persisting. Maybe they get better. I can't and won't rule that out. It's a long season after all. Yet, the one constant complaint that needed to be addressed all offseason was upgrading the interior of the offensive line and they didn't do that. So there's a good possibility that we have a repeat performance this season. Though, I'm hoping this is more of an outlier for the season to come.

The Houston Texans have no depth with their pass rush

The Texans weren't able to get after the quarterback that much against the Bears on Sunday. Brett Rypien played like Patrick Mahomes out there and didn't seem bothered by anything going on from the Texans' front seven. The Texans did muster three QB hits, but no sacks. Leaving some of us wondering what this team will look like if Will Anderson or Danielle Hunter struggles or miss time.