How will the Patriots try to beat the Texans
The NFL is a hard business. No team ever operates at full strength and that is especially true for teams when they get to week six of the NFL season. Both the Houston Texans and New England Patriots have players that will be out Sunday. Obviously, the team that adjusts the best to their missing players will be the team that ends up victorious on Sunday.
One of the things we do in this feature is look at the top five players according to Pro Football Focus. PFF scores of just one of many rating systems that rate individual players and overall teams with advanced metrics and video scouting. Their scores are set up like scouting scores with 20 being the lowest and 95 being the highest.
Usually, we don’t see scores under 70 because we are merely looking at the top five players according to PFF on each roster. The Patriots will be the first (and perhaps only) team where we have to break that rule. Players between 60 and 70 are anywhere from a rotational player to average starter. Players between 70 and 80 are anywhere from a solid starter to good starter. Players above 80 are usually Pro Bowl type performers. There are players with scores over 90, but none of them are playing in this game.
Patriots Top Five
RB Antonio Gibson— 76.9
DE Kelon White— 74.6
CB Marcus Jones— 73.6
CB Jonathan Jones— 71.1
TE Austin Hooper— 68.5
The Patriots best player according to PFF is safety Jabril Pepper. He was played on the NFL exempt list following an arrest last week. That is essentially the NFL’s way to suspend a player without suspending them. He gets paid his salary but he can’t play. The strength of the Patriots is clearly in their defense as we can see here. That was even more pronounced when Pepper was active.
Texans Top Five
QB C.J. Stroud— 78.9
DE Danielle Hunter— 77.2
WR Stefon Diggs— 76.5
CB Derek Stingley— 74.4
LB Azeez Al Shaair— 73.1
Nico Collins was not only the best player on the Texans, he was the top rated receiver in the NFL. He is leading the NFL in receiving yards and still could probably eclipse 1000 yards in receiving assuming he misses only four games. However, removing him makes the Texans seem more ordinary. It is vitally important that the Texans get their other injured weapons (Joe Mixon and Dameon Pierce) back so they can have a balanced attack. They are questionable as of this writing.
What will the Patriots offense do to the Texans?
The best thing you can do when you have less talent than the other team is find a way to shorten the game. You do that by having sustained drives where you knock minutes off the clock. That means a heavy dose of running the football. The Patriots decided to start Drake Maye for the first time at quarterback. If they are smart they will try to limit the number of times he has to make a play. The Texans can confuse him with multiple coverages, blitz packages, and stunts to force him into a mistake. The Pats want to limit that as much as possible which makes rushing success paramount for them.
What will the Patriots defense do to the Texans?
Facing the Texans without Pepper will be a harder task. The Patriots do have solid corners, so they can commit to stopping the run and making the Texans a one-dimensional football team. The Texans lead the NFL in passing yards, so it will be difficult, but teams have been able to apply pressure to C.J. Stroud and he has made more mistakes this year than he did by this point last year. Their best opportunity to win the game will be to get some short fields through turnovers. That comes by applying pressure onto Stroud.
What will the Texans offense do to the Pats?
It’s time to see Joe Mixon at least somewhat healthy again. He has been rumored to be back for three weeks now and we still don’t know if he will play. I am expecting that to be a game time decision. If the Texans can keep their defense honest with a semblance of a running game than the absence of Collins won’t hurt so much. Tank Dell and Diggs can still hurt you plenty and Dalton Schultz has not been a major part of the passing game yet. The key though is having enough success on the ground to keep them honest.
What will the Texans defense do to the Pats?
Maye is a wild card. He is athletic enough to burn you if you leave open some running lanes when you blitz. The defense is likely to use a very similar game plan as used with Josh Allen. You force him to stay in the pocket and make quick decisions with the football. A 9 for 30 performance seems far fetched for even a rookie, but a pick or two isn’t far fetched at all. If the defense can give the offense a short field or two then this could be the Texans’ first blowout of the season.