A Perfect Storm Brewing in Houston? Assessing the Houston Texans' playoff chances. The Houston Texans improved to 5-3 with yesterday's win against the hapless Buffalo Bills, their best start in franchise history. With a little luck, I don't think its far-fetched to think that the Houston Texans could miraculously end up in the AFC Championship Game. Here are a couple of reasons why. The Bengal Factor. Baltimore and Pittsburgh have owned Texans based on a very small sample size in recent memory. Two of the Texans worst losses last season came at the hands of these two foes. But guess what? Cincinnati not only currently holds the lead AFC North (by virtue of tie-breaker over Pittsburgh) but also has wins over the Steelers and Ravens and a 3-0 divisional record. What this means is that the Bengals (Yes, the Bengals) are in the driver's seat in the division as of right now. Don't think the Bengals Defense is good enough to be considered up there with Baltimore and Pittsburgh? Think again. They've actually allowed fewer points than both the Ravens and the Steelers. Natti's big test is their next 2 weeks. Their next two games are both against these division rivals (@ Pittsburgh coming off their bye week and then home vs Baltimore). Should they win one of these matchups, they hold a commanding 2-0 head to head record against either team, giving them a near stranglehold on at least the final AFC Wild Card spot. Should they lose both games, and fall to 5-4, there is still hope in Bengalville, because the scheduling gods will smile immensely on the striped ones, giving them a gift of a 3 week cake-walk... Sun 11/22 at Oakland 4:15 pm Sun 11/29 Cleveland 1:00 pm Sun 12/6 Detroit 1:00 pm After this, the Bengals even after two tough losses to division opponents, would be back to 8-4 in no time, and then finish up @ Minnesota, @ San Diego, home vs Kansas City, and finally a road matchup with the New York Jets (A game that might have huge implications for the AFC Wild Card Race). If the Bengals are 11-4 coming into the Jets game, and win... they will be 12-4 and take the division. For arguments sake, I will predict that the Bengals beat Baltimore @ home after losing to the Steelers next week. Should they go from there and only lose once (@ Minnesota?) they can would finish 12-4. Predicted Record: 12-4. Pittsburgh : Current Record - 5-2. 2nd Place in AFC North. Pittsburgh is 5-2, and needs to win 7 out of its final 9 games to win 12 games and take the AFC North based on my predicted results. Can they do it? They will play some cupcakes like Oakland, Kansas City, and Cleveland, but they also have to play Baltimore twice, @ Miami, @ Denver and and Green Bay. I'm going to predict they beat Cincinnati in Pittsburgh, then they split games with Baltimore, and lose 1 more game perhaps @ Denver or @ Miami. Predicted Record: 12-4 If Baltimore does indeed beat Pittsburgh once, then Pittsburgh loses 1 more game, they will finish 12-4 and be the wild card by virtue of tie-breaking procedure. Since Cincinnati will have finished 12-4 as well, but 5-1 within the division. Baltimore: Current Record 4-3. Baltimore ends up being the odd man out in this scenario. By losing to the Bengals and Steelers, they lose to Indy in Week 11 and finish 10-6, missing the playoffs (explained later) Now we look at some other scenarios. AFC EAST Lets take a look the AFC East. Starting with the current first place team. New England: Current Record: 5-2, first place AFC East. The Patriots may be 5-2 right now, but they are outscoring their opponents by a whopping 198-98 (thanks mostly to the Titans 59-0 shellacking). Still, they are the NFL's 3rd ranked scoring defense behind the other AFC Divisional Leaders (Indy and Denver). The Patriots have a pretty tough schedule over the next 5 games, but if they were to go 3-2 over their upcoming stretch against (Miami, @ IND, NYJ, @NO, @MIA), they'll be 8-4 heading into a final 4 games against Carolina, Buffalo, Jacksonville, and Houston. It is a good possibility that the Patriots will be 11-4 and the Texans will be 10-5 heading into that last home game, which mean the Patriots will be playing for homefield position and not resting any starters. Lets say the Patriots win that game. Predicted Record: 12-4 For the sake of argument, we'll assume the Jets and Dolphins will finish under 10-6, and Baltimore and Houston will end up tied at 10-6. Here is where things get interesting. Houston could lose their final game and have it work out better for them. If the Texans do indeed lose to the Patriots, the Patriots end up 13-3, the Texans end up 10-6, tied for the final Wild Card spot with the Ravens. However, if the Texans do finish 10-6 by taking care of business and splitting one with Indy, and end up losing only 1 other game within the conference (Indy), they will finish with a 8-4 conference record with losses coming to (NYJ, IND, NE, JAX). So if they Texans need to pick a game to have a bad showing against, it should be against Seattle or (snicker) the Rams. Baltimore, on the other hand would have a 7-5 conference record and will end up losing out on the final wild card spot. If not, and they both finish the season tied, we'll assume by some magical tie-breaker the Texans did beat out Baltimore for that final spot. Here is a look at my projected standings... AFC East New England 12-4 (4th seed) AFC North Cinci 12-4 (3rd seed) Pitt 12-4 (5th seed) AFC South Indy 13-3 (1st seed) Houston 10-6 (6th seed) AFC west Denver 12-4 (2nd seed) First Round Byes: Denver (Remember that Denver won head-to-head vs NE and CIN) and Indy Wildcard Week: Houston (6) @ Cincinnati (3) Pittsburgh (5) @ NE (4) Divisional Week Houston @ Indy NE @ DEN Should the Texans do what they did in week 6 and thump the Bengals in Cinci, and then pull off the upset @ Indy... Voila! AFC Championship Game: Houston @ NE/DEN So there you go.
WOW...that was alot of work...I'd just like to beat Indy Sunday lol. I actually think we will make the playoffs as the 6th seed but if we have to go to Pitt or NE 1st rd it could get ugly in the snow. Saying that if we would get Denver or Cincinnati then its on folks!
enjoyed reading the hypotheticals.. it's possible, but too many crazy things happen in the NFL for any of that to hold up... L @ Indy W vs Tenn W vs Indy (must win game for winning record) L @ Jax (our one remaining slip up game) W vs Seattle W @ StL L @ Miami L vs NE 9-7 season, just miss the playoffs. i think that's what gonna happen for the rest of the year, and we will miss the playoffs.. Denver, New England, Indy, Cinci win the divisions. baltimore and pittsburgh win wildcards. HOWEVER, if we can pull of a win @ miami, with a win vs the patriots standing in our way of a 11-5 record and possible playoff berth, we could get it done.
i hate the fact we've given ourselves no margin for error...the crappy thing about starting out so crappy each year. but we could buy some of that margin back with a win on the road at Indy. GO TEXANS!!!!!!
as long as you are aware that Baltimore and Pitt still play each other twice, and Cincy once more, while Bal. also plays Indy, CHI and @ GB. I could see Baltimore ending up 9-7 easily.
What I gathered: Moes is slowly ditching the Raiders and becoming a Texans fan. Married life has you bending already!
Did you have Owen Daniels out as a factor in all this? I hate to be the bearer of bad news... because I love my TEXANS... because I love my home teams, but... Spoiler I STILL KNOW WE'LL GO UNDEFEATED THE REST OF THE WAY... GO TEXANS !!!
Bengals winning both of those games was impressive. I'm going to have to say though, I think its looking more and more likely that San Diego will overtake Denver for the AFC West Division. This disrupts my divisional tie-breaker scenario quite a bit. Will have to cook something else up.
I think it's more and more likely that the teams that will be left in the end fighting for the 2 wild card spots will be Pittsburgh, New England, Houston, Denver, and Baltimore. As of right now, assuming we win both home divisional games, AND beat Jacksonville on the road (a lofty goal to set), that last game against New England could very well be for all the marbles.
New England will win the division. No wildcard needed. Barring a Cincinatti collapse, they should win that division. One of Den/SD will be fighting for a wildcard. So that leaves Houston, Pittsburgh, Den/SD, Baltimore vying for two spots. If Jacksonville beats us in three weeks and don't choke these next two games, they essentially take our spot. What we really need to hope for I think, is for Denver to continue it's freefall and lose to San Diego next week- they've got a fairly tough schedule after that minus games to KC(twice) and Oakland. If Denver wins next week, they and San Diego could both end up with 10+ wins, further complicating things. But let's say Denver does fall flat, that leaves us with Pittsburgh and Baltimore for the last two spots. I like our chances in that scenario.
If the Texans want to be serious contenders for the playoffs come December, they'll have to at least get two of the next three games (TENN, IND, @JAC). Do that, and we'll be at 7-5 with games left against Seattle, @St. Louis, @Miami, and New England. 3-1 over that last stretch of 4 games is what they should do, going 4-0 might be a tall order (depending on if that Pats game means anything to them...). I can see 10 wins (Tennessee, Jacksonville, Seattle, St. Louis, and Miami puts us there). Would love to steal a game against the Colts or the Pats to get us to 11.... If given a choice in the matter, I'd happily take a repeat of last year's 5-2 record over the final seven games. Going 10-6 and not making the playoffs would probably buy Kubiak and crew another year (and leave us further lamenting the earlier losses to the Jets, Jags, Cards, and Colts).
The Bengals, Colts, and Pats should win 12 games. Pittsburgh: outside of 2 games against Balt, the schedule is pretty light. could split with Balt and win 12. SD: @ Denver, who is struggling and could be without Orton. Other games are KC, CLE, WAS, TEN, CIN, DAL. Probably 11 wins, could get to 12. only 1 spot left after those 5. Balt could win 10, with losses left to PIT and IND. Worst case for the Texans would be they sweep PIT, and both Balt and PIT go 11-5.
