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Texans Lose Game and Players to Eagles and Turn Week 17 Relevant



So many times Week 17 of the NFL season is a non-relevant non-occurrence. Many teams have nothing to play for or have their playoff position decided and are playing to not lose their players.

The Texans were playing for a lot in Week 16 and will again in Week 17 albeit without as many players with Demaryius Thomas, Brian Peters and Kayvon Webster all done for the season. The loss to the Eagles puts even more emphasis on winning the last week against the Jags and finally clinching a division title that they have had a shot at for a number of weeks.

The only help the Texans have gotten the last few weeks in their pursuit of a playoff spot came Sunday when the Steelers lost against the Saints clinching the spot for the Texans. But that was it as the Colts and Titans continue to win.

The Texans played a close but no cigar game against the Eagles on Sunday losing 32-30 on a walk-off FG by Jake Elliott. Their defense which was the rock that most of their 9 game win streak was built upon has turned suspect lately as they allowed Nick Foles to throw for 471 yards and 4 TDs. He drove them down for the winning FG; a 60 yard drive in the last 2 minutes hitting two clutch 3rd and 10 throws to keep the drive moving along.

Thoughts on the game:

  • The Texans did hold the Eagles to only 57 yards on 22 carries
  • However, they only sacked Foles once in 50 drop backs but did pick him off once and forced two fumbles on the day
  • Deshaun Watson had to carry even more of a load this day than against the Jets, which hardly seemed possible. He threw for 339 yards and 2 TDs and ran for 49 yards and another 2 TDs.
  • The Texans rushing offense was scary (in a bad way again). Outside of Watson's heroics, Alfred Blue ran for 14 yards on 4 carries and D'Onta Foreman was a horrendous -1 yd on 7 carries.
  • The Curse of the Special Teams Player of the week hit Ka'imi Fairbairn as he missed an extra point.
  • Third down and especially fourth down conversions were the death of the Texans. The Eagles converted on 9/16 on 3rd down and 4/4 on 4th down. While the Texans were 3/10 on 3rd and 0/1 on 4th. This continued a bad trend from the Jets game.
  • And again like the Jets, the Eagles dominated the clock with about a 7 minute gap
  • Jadeveon Clowney was in on 8 tackles, a sack and a forced fumble that he recovered, while Zach Cunningham led the team by being in on 12 tackles
It was a tough loss, but Sunday is another day - a day they need to strangle the Jags.

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