Texans Officially Down Their Starting Center And Two Receivers
September 13th, 2025
Time to eat.
This offseason, the Texans augmented their receiving corps with a Dolphins castoff, Braxton Berrios, and by dealing a seventh-round pick to the Jaguars big-money Christian Kirk.
Neither will be available Monday night against the Bucs. Both are still nursing hamstring injuries and neither played in Week 1. Texans receiver Tank Dell hasn’t practiced or played since a serious knee injury in December.
That leaves Texans receiver Nico Collins as Houston’s only dangerous wide receiver target. He caught 3 balls on 5 targets in Week 1 against the Rams for a paltry 25 yards and no first downs.
Joe watched the game and the Rams barely blitzed. Instead, they opted to cover and Collins had a rough day. Joe later looked up the data and Los Angeles only blitzed Houston six times.
Also out for Houston is starting center Jake Andrews, who was carted off the Week 1 field with an ankle injury.
Replacing Andrews is the Texans 2024 starting center Jarrett Patterson. Andrews was cut by the Patriots after the 2025 NFL Draft and Houston picked him. Yeah, the Texans have offensive line issues, serious ones.
September 13th, 2025 at 6:35 pm
Honestly I’d rather play everyone when they’re full strength. Don’t want to hear excuses from chronic dissers when we beat people’s a$$es 💪🏼🏈
September 13th, 2025 at 7:04 pm
Me too. I don’t want us to get ahead of ourselves early in the season. Champions need to be humming at the end of the season. I do not expect that we will peak early on and then fall back. Let’s just enjoy the games one at a time for now. Certainly we can take stock at the end of each quarter of the season.
September 13th, 2025 at 7:08 pm
I’ll take a game against the walking wounded… we’re pretty banged up too.
September 13th, 2025 at 7:13 pm
Hopefully doesn’t happen, but we have all witnessed playing down to the level of our opponents. Take nothing for granted. Our Bucs should play well Monday.
Just win Baby!
September 13th, 2025 at 7:29 pm
We need to beat the brakes off them. CJ should have nowhere to throw and our Dline should feast on him. If that doesn’t happen then something is definitely wrong.
September 13th, 2025 at 7:30 pm
Good
September 13th, 2025 at 8:50 pm
Todd doesn’t know how to win going away. He keeps everything close so he can exhibit his genius.
September 13th, 2025 at 8:53 pm
I agree 100% with the previous 6 posts. Someone pinch me!
September 13th, 2025 at 9:36 pm
Bowles will blitz like a lunatic and Collin’s will have a HUGE day.
September 13th, 2025 at 9:42 pm
With the state of the Texans OL, this would be a really good game to test our ability to rush w/4.
Don’t get me wrong, I’ll take all the sack we can get, but we need to stress Stroud out all game long. No rhythm, no time to find rushing lanes, no extending plays with your legs, no explosives, no time but to panic.
I don’t see an injury riddled team as inferior, it’s just an easier meal to catch. We shouldn’t we hunt as hard as we would against a top notch OL? Butt kickings are equal opportunity.
September 13th, 2025 at 10:12 pm
Let’s see if Bowles is smart enough to follow the Rams successful game plan and minimize blitzing and focus on minimizing Nico’s impact. Sounds like a Belicheat approach. Eliminate their best player and force them to win by going to the scrubs.
September 13th, 2025 at 10:40 pm
Probably be a lowish scoring game. Or offense will play better but their defensive is pretty solid. If our defense can get some turnovers, we got this. If we score over 20… Bucs W.
September 14th, 2025 at 6:13 am
KABucs … I agree with you; probably a low scoring game. Houston’s defense is solid & held the Rams to 14 pts in that 1st game this season. Texans lost 14-9 but had a great opportunity to win it at the end when they had a 1st-and-10 at the Rams 25-yd line. With 1:51 left in the game, Stroud passed short to his RB (Ogunbowale) who caught it then fumbled & the Rams recovered. The rest was history.
Admittedly the Texans have injury issues right now, but they still produced some respectable stats last game. Averaged 4.1 YPC in the run game (27 runs for 114 yds) and Stroud went 19-of-27 (70.4%) for 188 passing yds with 0 TDs, 1 INT & 3 sacks. He also ran 5 times for 32 yds, picking up 3 first downs in the process.
Houston had a bad game in 3 particular areas:
1 – Texans had 2 turnovers (1 fumble, 1 INT). The INT wasn’t costly (Rams punted), but the fumble at the end-of-game surely was.
2 – Texans had 11 penalties for 80 yards. Several proved to be costly in stalling drives.
3 – Texans were only 2-for-9 on 3rd down conversions, but were 1-for-1 on a 4th down conversion (resulted in a FG).
4 – Texans defense allowed Stafford to go 5-of-6 deep for 128 yds. Rams had 2 deep completions on 1 drive in 2nd qtr on which they scored a TD, then a drive in the 3rd qtr on which they had a deep completion then followed with a short pass TD. So 3 of Stafford’s 5 deep completions were part of th Rams 2 TDs.
Could be some nice opportunities Monday night for both Mike Evans & Egbuka.
September 14th, 2025 at 6:42 am
GoneGator Says:
“Honestly I’d rather play everyone when they’re full strength.”
I usually feel the same…except for the first 3 games of the season. I’ll take those wins however we can get them.
Give us a little cushion while the players settle in for the long haul.
September 14th, 2025 at 7:36 am
21-10 Bucs win!