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Texans v. Ravens preview

drewmar74

disgruntled
From Fox Sports:

The emergence of rookie quarterback Joe Flacco has helped the Baltimore Ravens string together three straight victories. The Houston Texans had their own three-game streak going before losing their starting quarterback to an injury in last week's loss.

In the makeup of a Week 2 game that was postponed because of Hurricane Ike, Flacco looks to continue his strong play on Sunday when the Ravens visit the Texans, who will be without Matt Schaub.

Baltimore (5-3) lost three in a row from Sept. 29-Oct. 12 to take the shine off its 2-0 start. The Ravens, though, have rebounded by winning three straight by a combined 93-50 score.

Flacco has keyed the win streak, going 46-for-76 for 620 yards, four touchdowns and no interceptions to post a 104.1 passer rating.

"Your confidence is always growing," Flacco told the Ravens' official Web site. "You get more and more experience each week. We are in the hunt, but we need to just stack up wins. That is our main focus right now."

Flacco was named the AFC's offensive player of the week after going 17-for-29 for a season-high 248 yards and two TDs as Baltimore overcame a 14-point, third-quarter deficit to beat Cleveland 37-27 last Sunday. In his third career start, fellow rookie Ray Rice ran 21 times for a season-high 154 yards.

Thrust into starting roles in their first NFL seasons, Flacco and Rice have risen to the challenge.

"When they get drafted by the Baltimore Ravens, we expect them to play like that," first-year coach John Harbaugh said. "Are we surprised? No."

While the Ravens are rolling thanks to Flacco's success, the Texans (3-5) are sweating the loss of Schaub, who left last Sunday's 28-21 defeat to Minnesota after the first half because of a knee problem.

The injury to his medial collateral ligament, which had Schaub on crutches this week, is expected to keep him sidelined for at least two weeks and possibly up to a month.

"It's very frustrating," Texans coach Gary Kubiak said. "I know it is for him. He's worked extremely hard to lead this football team and was playing as good as anybody I've been around in the last few weeks ... it's just sad because he was making a ton of progress."

In Schaub's absence, the Texans will turn to Sage Rosenfels, who was 4-1 as a starter last season when Schaub was out with various injuries. Things didn't go so well in his only start this season Oct. 5, when his two fumbles allowed Indianapolis to erase a 17-point fourth-quarter deficit and steal a 31-27 win.

The career backup's teammates remain confident in him despite that performance.

"We haven't lost faith at all," receiver Kevin Walter said. "He played a great game against Indy, except the last three minutes we didn't execute and we turned the ball over. He played a great game and we know he's capable of playing great games. We're going to rally around him."

Rosenfels was better after replacing Schaub last Sunday, going 21-for-29 and throwing for both of Houston's offensive scores. He still endured some struggles, though, throwing an interception in the end zone in the third quarter and taking two sacks on Houston's last drive.

He knows he'll be in for a challenge this week against Baltimore, which ranks fourth in passing defense (182.1 yards allowed per game) and second in total defense (246.4).

"This defense isn't going to give you any easy ones so I've got to go out there and play basically perfect football," Rosenfels said. "I can't turn the ball over and I've got to hit guys when they're open and when nothing's open I've got to throw it away and move on because mistakes have been killing us."

That vaunted Ravens defense gave up its second-highest point total of the season last week, but veteran linebacker Ray Lewis helped lead the Baltimore comeback.


....

A starting linebacker for the Texans, meanwhile, was lost for the season Wednesday when Zac Diles broke his leg in practice. Diles, who leads the team with 66 tackles, will be replaced by Kevin Bentley.

Houston has lost its previous two games against Baltimore by a combined five points. The teams last met Dec. 4, 2005, when Matt Stover made a 38-yard field goal with six seconds remaining to give the Ravens a 16-15 home victory.


http://msn.foxsports.com/nfl/preview?gameId=20081109034
 

HOU-TEX

Ah, Football!
Our Oline vs. their front seven = Lose

Our front seven vs. their Oline = Lose

It appears to be a lose lose situation to me. :gun:
 

Texecutioner

Hall of Fame
We've got to get loud as the game folks!

We can beat the Ravens. They aren't that good. I think Rosencopter can make enough plays if the O line will block for him well enough. Their secondary is all banged up, so AJ, Walter, and Daniels should be able to make plays. I don't know how well we'll be able to run the ball, but I'd like to keep getting screen passes to Slaton where he can get in space.

The D has got to step up this week! We're playing a rookie and they don't have good WR's. :d:

We've got to make Reliant a ROWDY ENVIRONMENT Sunday folks!

Who's with me? :fans:
 

Silver Oak

All Pro
We've got to get loud as the game folks!

We can beat the Ravens. They aren't that good. I think Rosencopter can make enough plays if the O line will block for him well enough. Their secondary is all banged up, so AJ, Walter, and Daniels should be able to make plays. I don't know how well we'll be able to run the ball, but I'd like to keep getting screen passes to Slaton where he can get in space.

The D has got to step up this week! We're playing a rookie and they don't have good WR's. :d:

We've got to make Reliant a ROWDY ENVIRONMENT Sunday folks!

Who's with me? :fans:
maybe I'll be more excited come Sunday, but I'm still hurting over how poorly we looked against the Vikes last week. The score does not accurately portray the difference in how badly we were outmatched.

I'm usually the optimist, but this week I think I'll just drink beer, watch the game quietly, and binocularize the cheerleaders.
 

beerlover

Hall of Fame
Flacco was aquired by the Ravens with the 18th pick, yes that was the Houston Texans pick traded to the Ravens in exchange for the 26th (Duane Brown) 89th (Steve Slaton) & 173rd (Dominique Barber). seems like a win-win deal now but if Flacco becomes the elite NFL QB he looks like the Ravens did very well indeed & big reason for their success.
 

cowbellm00

100% Houstonian
ROSENCOPTER!!! LMFAO! i love it. hadn't heard that one yet.

but you're right dude... he actually played well while he was in. last year he played so well we thought there might be a "QB controversy". i mean c'mon, he had the Colts ( before we knew they weren't the same this year as years past) down 27-10 late in the 4th before his huge brain fart. So here's his chance to redeem himself.

oh, and if our D can hold them to under 30 points, we might stand a chance. same story last week. offence played great, but D gave up 30 pts again, and we lose.



We've got to get loud as the game folks!

We can beat the Ravens. They aren't that good. I think Rosencopter can make enough plays if the O line will block for him well enough. Their secondary is all banged up, so AJ, Walter, and Daniels should be able to make plays. I don't know how well we'll be able to run the ball, but I'd like to keep getting screen passes to Slaton where he can get in space.

The D has got to step up this week! We're playing a rookie and they don't have good WR's. :d:

We've got to make Reliant a ROWDY ENVIRONMENT Sunday folks!

Who's with me? :fans:
 

TheRealJoker

Hall of Fame
ROSENCOPTER!!! LMFAO! i love it. hadn't heard that one yet.

but you're right dude... he actually played well while he was in. last year he played so well we thought there might be a "QB controversy". i mean c'mon, he had the Colts ( before we knew they weren't the same this year as years past) down 27-10 late in the 4th before his huge brain fart. So here's his chance to redeem himself.

oh, and if our D can hold them to under 30 points, we might stand a chance. same story last week. offence played great, but D gave up 30 pts again, and we lose.[/QUOTE]

I'm the first one to blame the defense but the major reason we lost last week was our offense. Particularly the 2 turnovers in the redzone and the fact they only scored 14 points. The Vikings forced 3 turnovers and were harassing whoever we lined up behind center all day.

Our defense contained Adrian Peterson for all but 3 runs (in the 4th qtr after the D was deflated from the latest redzone turnover) and allowed a couple of big plays in the passing game. They by no means played a great game but they played well enough to win had our offense not turned the ball over.
 

texanhead08

All Pro
We have been a pretty good home team the past couple years, but I am not sure about our offense against that defense. We have to hold onto the ball turnovers will make this a blowout.
 

TheRealJoker

Hall of Fame
As for this game its a similar matchup as the Vikings game. Tough defense you pretty much cant run on but is suspect in the passing game if the OL gives the QB time to throw. Offense isn't a juggernaut but has the talent to make big plays and take advantage of defensive mistakes if we let them.

We're gonna need to use a lot of screen passes as our running game to keep the pass rush at bay. We did it last week with Slaton but not nearly enough. We need to work some trick plays as well, gotta use misdirection against these guys. Going head up against this D will leave us bruised and battered just like last week's game.

The difference is we're at home and we have Kris Brown.

Brown boots the GW FG as time expires :texflag:
 

ChampionTexan

Hall of Fame
Maybe I'm looking thru Texan-colored glasses, but to me with the Ravens D and our O (even with Sage), it's strength vs. strength, and I give us the edge simply because we're at home.

We're a different team at home, and even though you can criticize Sage and the way he lost the Indy game, the fact of the matter is we looked as good as we've ever looked for 56 minutes of that game, and we're 3-0 at home beyond that. In many ways, I see some similarities to last years Tampa Bay game, where we'd come off of a couple of bad road losses, and nobody was expecting much, yet we took care of business at home against a playoff team. Granted, the Buccaneers weren't an elite team, but neither are the Ravens.

The Ravens haven't beaten anybody with above a .500 record this year, and I guess since I'm taking the approach I'm not going to give the Texans the benefit of the doubt on the road until they give me a reason to, I am going to give them that same benefit at home until they give me a reason not too.

As disappointing as last week's loss was in many different ways, we've also still won 3 out of our last 4, and I think the curse of overreacting to both the good things and the bad things has caused many on this board to underrate us.
 

imatexan

All Pro
We've got to get loud as the game folks!

We can beat the Ravens. They aren't that good. I think Rosencopter can make enough plays if the O line will block for him well enough. Their secondary is all banged up, so AJ, Walter, and Daniels should be able to make plays. I don't know how well we'll be able to run the ball, but I'd like to keep getting screen passes to Slaton where he can get in space.

The D has got to step up this week! We're playing a rookie and they don't have good WR's. :d:

We've got to make Reliant a ROWDY ENVIRONMENT Sunday folks!

Who's with me? :fans:

Me!!!!!!!!!!! Im Pumped!:fans:
 
C

Ckw

Guest
We've got to get loud as the game folks!

We can beat the Ravens. They aren't that good. I think Rosencopter can make enough plays if the O line will block for him well enough. Their secondary is all banged up, so AJ, Walter, and Daniels should be able to make plays. I don't know how well we'll be able to run the ball, but I'd like to keep getting screen passes to Slaton where he can get in space.

The D has got to step up this week! We're playing a rookie and they don't have good WR's. :d:

We've got to make Reliant a ROWDY ENVIRONMENT Sunday folks!

Who's with me? :fans:
I'm with you. I will be yelling and cheering like crazy! :fans:
 

Norg

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
Iam with u man ill be trying to cheer the crowd into a frenzy :d::d::d:


Lets get a wave GOING !!!!!!!!!!!!!!
 

buddyboy

Rookie
We've got to get loud as the game folks!

We can beat the Ravens. They aren't that good. I think Rosencopter can make enough plays if the O line will block for him well enough. Their secondary is all banged up, so AJ, Walter, and Daniels should be able to make plays. I don't know how well we'll be able to run the ball, but I'd like to keep getting screen passes to Slaton where he can get in space.

The D has got to step up this week! We're playing a rookie and they don't have good WR's. :d:

We've got to make Reliant a ROWDY ENVIRONMENT Sunday folks!

Who's with me? :fans:
Heyyyy, no bold! Made me double take there Texecutioner! I for one, appreciate it, even if it's only a temporary change.
 
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