Following a disappointing 0-3 start to the season, the Houston Texans have done all they could ahead of their Week 6 bye to course-correct, right the ship, get back on track or turn things around. Choose whatever idiom you like to describe Houston's back-to-back wins in Week 4 and Week 5 over the Tennessee Titans and Baltimore Ravens respectively, but in H-Town, the Texans are calling it 'flipping the script.'
"You want to take a step forward every game. I thought today, we did that in a lot of ways. We still have to clean some things up, but I'm happy with the win," quarterback CJ Stroud said after a 44-10 victory over the Ravens, per DJ Bien-Aime of ESPN.com. "I think we'll be able to flip the script in these next couple weeks to finish October really well."
Now let me be clear... just in terms of the amount of success they're having on the field, I don't doubt that the Texans can effectively flip the script. Two weeks ago I made the case that the Texans could overcome a slow start to the season to make the postseason. I believe that Houston's defense may end the season as an historically great unit, and I think that Nick Caley's offense will continue to progress and look better throughout the year. On that second point, head coach DeMeco Ryans agrees.
"Caley has done a great job," Ryans said. "It didn't show the first weeks because we didn't execute well. We came out [against the Ravens] and executed. We ran our offense the right way."
Where my Texans optimism hits a minor speed bump is when we turn this football conversation into a math problem, and unfortunately, that's the stage we're at. Consider, if Houston manages to make the postseason, they'd become just the seventh team since the NFL/AFL merger to overcome an 0-3 deficit to clinch a Playoff berth. For the record, that's about only 2 percent of 0-3 teams who have gone on to make the Playoffs.
But when we zoom out further and look at the early season success of both the Indianapolis Colts AND Jacksonville Jaguars, AFC South foes who each enter Week 6 with a 4-1 record and could easily make the case that they should be 5-0, the percentages for the Texans worsen. Not only does Houston have three games remaining on their schedule versus the Colts and Jaguars -- in addition to matchups with the Seahawks, 49ers, Bills, Chiefs, Chargers and Broncos -- but getting three teams into the postseason from one single division is a relatively rare anomaly.
Since the NFL realigned and shifted to an eight-division model back in 2002, the AFC South has produced three Playoff teams in a single season just one time (2007). Other divisions have achieved this feat more recently -- the NFC North and AFC West each sent three teams to the Playoffs just last year -- but historically, the AFC South has struggled to get even two teams above .500 in a single season.
So as the Houston Texans enter their bye week with a well-deserved renewed sense of optimism, it's time we take a look at both the Colts and the Jaguars and answer an important, potentially season-defining question... are these teams for real?
Evaluating the Indianapolis Colts
Wins: Miami Dolphins (33-8), Denver Broncos (29-28), Tennessee Titans (41-20), Las Vegas Raiders (40-6)
Loss: Los Angeles Rams (27-20)
Key Stats: 32.6 points per game (2nd in NFL), 17.8 points allowed per game (3rd in NFL), 63.6% score percentage (1st in NFL), 46.6% on 3rd down conversions (3rd in NFL), Top Ten in both passing and rushing yards
The Skinny: By the numbers, the Colts have been one of the league's best and most complete teams this season, a legitimate surprise for myself and everyone else who believed Indianapolis would be among the worst teams in the NFL in 2025. And while both the numbers and the eye-test do indeed back that up, I'd advise that we don't overlook the fact that Indianapolis has wins over three of the eight teams that have 1 or fewer wins at this point in the season.
Now of course, you can only play the teams on your schedule, and while the Colts have certainly benefited from playing a light schedule through the first few weeks of the year, the schedule is going to toughen up soon enough. We're going to find out what Daniel "Indiana" Jones, Jonathan Taylor and co. are made of by the end of November. Not only do the Colts play the Texans on the final Sunday of the month, they've a game in Berlin versus the Atlanta Falcons sandwiched between road trips to Pittsburgh and Kansas City.
Until the Colts get through that month-long gauntlet, I'm not prepared to say whether or not they're for real. The jury is still out.
Evaluating the Jacksonville Jaguars
Wins: Carolina Panthers (26-10), Houston Texans (17-10), San Francisco 49ers (26-21), Kansas City Chiefs (31-28)
Loss: Cincinnati Bengals (31-27)
Key Stats: 25.4 points per game (10th in NFL), 20.0 points allowed per game (8th in NFL), 14 forced turnovers (1st in NFL), 685 rushing yards (5th in NFL)
The Skinny: Even though the analytics may say otherwise, I'm actually higher on the Jags than I am the Colts. Not only does Jacksonville already have a win over Houston, but victories over the Texans, 49ers and Chiefs prove that the Jags are able to take their game to another level and defeat a trio of opponents that entered the season with Super Bowl aspirations.
A let-down versus the Seattle Seahawks this Sunday is very possible, but for now, I feel better about saying the Jaguars are for real than I do the Colts. First-year head coach Liam Coen has his team playing inspired football, and whether it's because they win the AFC South or as a result of grabbing one of three AFC Wild Card bids, I see Jacksonville playing into the postseason.