A game by game look at the Texans schedule.
I tried a more comedic approach to this a few weeks ago. Most of you don’t read this column for the humor. If you do I apologize in advance. I must confess I don’t know exactly how the boys in Vegas do this, but I will give it my best guess. What I will do is take the Houston Texans projected wins and compare it directly with their opponents to see how many times they will be realistically expected to be favored.
Our formula will be simple. Each win will be worth two points and home field advantage will be worth a field goal. So, a home game against a team with say 8.5 expected wins would be a five point advantage for the Texans. Ideally, they should be favored in nine or ten games since they were picked to win 9.5 games. We will use DraftKings this time around.
Week One: Houston Texans (9.5) at Indianapolis Colts (8.5) = Colts by 1
Week Two: Chicago Bears (8.5) at Houston Texans (9.5) = Texans by 5
Week Three: Houston Texans (9.5) at Minnesota Vikings (6.5) = Texans by 3
Week Four: Jacksonville Jaguars (8.5) at Houston Texans (9.5) = Texans by 5
Week Five: Buffalo Bills (10.5) at Houston Texans (9.5) = Texans by 1
Week Six: Houston Texans (9.5) at New England Patriots (4.5) = Texans by 7
Week Seven: Houston Texans (9.5) at Green Bay Packers (9.5) = Packers by 3
Week Eight: Indianapolis Colts (8.5) at Houston Texans (9.5) = Texans by 5
Week Nine: Houston Texans (9.5) at New York Jets (9.5) = Jets by 3
Week Ten: Detroit Lions (10.5) at Houston Texans (9.5) = Texans by 1
Week Eleven: Houston Texans (9.5) at Dallas Cowboys (10.5) = Cowboys by 5
Week Twelve: Tennessee Titans (6.5) at Houston Texans (9.5) = Texans by 9
Week Thirteen: Houston Texans (9.5) at Jacksonville Jaguars (8.5) = Jaguars by 1
Week Fourteen: Bye
Week Fifteen: Miami Dolphins (9.5) at Houston Texans (9.5) = Texans by 3
Week Sixteen: Houston Texans (9.5) at Kansas City Chiefs (11.5) = Chiefs by 7
Week Seventeen: Baltimore Ravens (11.5) at Houston Texans (9.5) = Ravens by 1
Week Eighteen: Houston Texans (9.5) at Tennessee Titans (6.5) = Texans by 3
It has been pretty popular in the early going to complain about he Texans schedule and being a first place schedule, there is going to be plenty to concern ourselves with. However, if we take the DraftKings folks at face value we would see only five opponents with more projected wins than the Texans on their schedule. They have three home games and two road games out of those four. That means that they are projected to win two of those games due to the home field advantage.
The have three more contests where they have the same number of projected wins as their opponents. Two of those are on the road, so that is a bit of bad luck, but when you can have a projected 3-5 record in games with teams as good or better than you then you aren’t doing that bad.
They are projected to finish 7-2 in the games where they have more projected wins than their opponents. The only two losses come in the division where you have to play on the road in addition to being at home. So, none of the games outside of the division are expected to hurt the Texans and they have a few at NRG that give them a slight edge. Those good at the math skills see this pegs the Texans record at 10-7.
Possible Adjustments
The DK number likely will change between now and September. We should analyze why. On the positive side, we could see a random addition here and there between now and week one. In particular, let’s say that the team adds a veteran safety or scrapes up another defensive tackle along the way.
Justin Simmons is still out there and available. It’s hard to say whether the price will come down enough for the Texans to consider him. Who knows? You see a guy like him or Jamal Adams out there for awhile and you have to believe something is going on with them. Of course, the local buzz about J.J. Watt would certainly move that number some. Even a move to 10.5 could conceivably add a win to their projected total based on our methodology above.
Injuries
I pick on the Jets, but they are a perfect example. They lost Aaron Rodgers on the fourth play last year and that obviously torpedoed their expected win totals. Something similar could happen if any of their opponents lose their quarterback or another important player. it goes without saying that the same could happen on the Texans end as well.
This is all to say that the nerds in Vegas know what they are doing. Some peg the Texans at 10.5 wins (as we saw last time) while these folks say 9.5. As much as we want to put on the steel blue glasses, those numbers are probably appropriate given what we know now. Place your bets accordingly.