2011 Offseason: Houston Texans

I hesitate to say the Texans will be contending for the AFC South next year because I said it before this past season began. Then they fell apart. But the Texans will look really good on paper next season; the question is whether they can execute.

With Wade Phillips in house, Houston should have a much better defense next season, not that it could be much worse. In terms of offense, however, there were only a handful of times when I really wasn’t impressed this season. Unfortunately, those few times the offense wasn’t looking particularly sharp seemed to be the times when the defense suffered its worst collapses.

Arian Foster made me eat my early-season words by having an outstanding year and proving that he is past his issues of fumbling in key situations. Matt Schaub didn’t look as sharp as he did in 2009, but he had a very good season anyway. Andre Johnson still looks like a great receiver, minus his little meltdown against the Titans, something I don’t expect to ever see again from him.

Long story short, this team has a lot to be excited about. The only issue I have is on the defense. As I said, adding Wade Phillips to the coaching staff should help the defense, but they will be moving from a 4-3 set to a 3-4. Teams have done it before and had success with it, but rarely right away. The Redskins had a consistently good defense for several years before becoming one of the worst this past season after switching to a 3-4 defensive scheme.

If the Texans want to make the switch and not suffer any early setbacks from it, they need to get some new players for their front seven. They have some good players for the set in house, but not enough depth at linebacker. They could also use a bigger guy to put right on the line who can really push around some offensive linemen and let the linebackers through.

The Texans secondary is also a concern but you can only do so much in one offseason, especially when there isn’t a CBA in place yet. The Texans may need to ‘settle’ for slightly sub-par in 2011 and then fix a couple other places for a real run in 2012. The key thing is to make sure that what they do get done this offseason is truly effective. If they can do that, a postseason berth is well within reach for Houston.