Dallas News: Houston's got a problem come Sunday

http://www.cowboysplus.com/topstorync/stories/101306cpmosley.31fef90c.html

Many of you criticized the Texans when they passed over one of the most dynamic running backs in college football history to select defensive end Mario Williams in last year's draft.

But I call this thinking outside the box.

Because of an injury to Domanick Davis, the Texans are now rotating running backs Ron Dayne, Wali Lundy and Samkon Gado. How would you have ever made these guys happy with Reggie Bush around?

When last seen at Texas Stadium, Dayne was racing 55 yards to set up a winning overtime field goal for the Denver Broncos.

Bill Parcells called the Texans' offense "dangerous," and he said it with a straight face.

To the citizens of Houston, a victory over the Cowboys would mean everything.

Fans would flock to the city's most famous landmark, the Galleria.

They consider this a rivalry, although no one in Dallas has been notified.

No offense to Houstonians, but the Cowboys should win this game by three touchdowns and at least two Mike Vanderjagt extra points.

The Texans are giving up 435 total yards per game, which makes them the worst overall defense in the league. The defense is allowing 295.3 passing yards per game, which doesn't sound good either.

If Drew Bledsoe and Terrell Owens can't hook up against these guys, you have to wonder if it will ever happen.

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Typical Southern Oklahoma drivel. The guy could not hold a candle to some of the logic and biting sarcasm displayed by many of the members on this board.

I know they are a better team on paper and on the field, but we are easily a turnover, a TO flare up and a Cowboy crowd booing them in the 3rd quarter away from taking them down in my opinion.

Dayne usually has a good game against the Cowboys. I hope he still does.

Texans34Life said:

http://www.cowboysplus.com/topstorync/stories/101306cpmosley.31fef90c.html

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if they want to think there's no rivalry then let them. That'll mean there's only one team fired up to win. And its amazing what happens when the favourites get complacent.
Though I'm sure Parcells isn't going to fall into that trap.

I say we put bledsoe on the turf early and often and we got a shot.

mancunian said:

if they want to think there's no rivalry then let them. That'll mean there's only one team fired up to win. And its amazing what happens when the favourites get complacent.
Though I'm sure Parcells isn't going to fall into that trap.

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I don't think that is true. The team doesn't feel the same way that the fans do. I saw an interview with Andre Johnson and he said something like they just look at this like any other game. He said he knows that the fans want a win, but they will treat this game the same. I think we hype this up too much and want the players to feel our frustrations with Dallas. There really is no rivalry. Unfortunately, we are a new team that doesn't have a long history of hard fought games with any team. We look at Jacksonville & Dallas as bitter rivals, but no one sees us as one.

well theres a thing about rivals, unless you Knock another team out of the playoff hunt, or beat them in the wildcard round or something, there is no juice to the "rivalry" so in that respect we have no rivalries yet. but we do want to be the best texas footbal team, and we do play dallas for the governers cup. so dallas is prolly a budding rivalry at the least, you really have to beat someone in the endgame or the playoffs a few times or win or lose on some controversial play to really get the divisional rivalries going. IMHO

mancunian said:

Though I'm sure Parcells isn't going to fall into that trap.

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There's really nothing Tuna can do about it. The players are coming down from the most intense game of the NFL season, thus far. They know that the Giants are coming to town next Monday night. There's no sense of revenge, as only 4 or 5 Cowboys from 19-10 remain on the roster. They realize that one of the worst teams in the league is showing up to play in front of what is usually one of the deadest crowds in football. This is the trappiest (I couldn't think of a real word, it's early ) of all trap games.

Now, that doesn't mean the Texans will win on Sunday. This needs to be in their mind the most important game on their schedule. Because a win here will energize their fan base and give them confidence to play on the road. If the Texans play with their head and their heart, Irving will be the town with the problem.

keys to victory, stop the run, sack bledsoe, fewer turnovers.

Kaiser Toro said:

I know they are a better team on paper and on the field,

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Are they Really??

The passing yards we've given up came against Philly, Indy, & Washington.

They played Philly, and got about the same treatment. The Washington team they played was not the same Washington team we played, and they haven't seen Peyton yet.

That running Defense has stopped who?? Brian Westbrook?? That's the best running back they faced. & he ain't a running back.

Spears, Canty, Ware are all young players...... lots of potential, but honestly they haven't done anything yet.

AnthonyHenry, PatWatkins, RoyWilliams, are as much a liability in coverage as Sanders, CCBrown, & GlenEarl

BradieJames had a great year, last year, Kinda like Marlon Greenwood's....

I don't know what to say about Ayodele yet. & Ellis & Ware are pass rushers only.

Talentwise, I honestly think we are at the same level...... they may play better than our guys....... they may have been coached better than our guys, but they aren't more talented.

defensively I think they have a slight edge because of ellis and ware, I know they are all out pass rush guys, but how do you stop the texans? you put carr on the ground. so from that standpoint they are a little stronger vs us on defense. now if we blitz the way we did against miami? that should negate that advantage, but if we try to rush with the front 4 again it will be washington all over again.

I have this thought to offer to Kubes...

Ya know how we always get prodded over David being horizontal on the field? Being the Kroger boy of the NFL? Well, look at this...Bledsoe is well known for being stone bodied and not too keen on having rival defenders getting too close (he can't handle it). So...

Challenge our D boys to a sack contest. Prize? Well, you find what motivates them the most (money, women, real estate, etc) and offer it to the player who sacks Bledsoe more than Carr gets it. This will be a turning point, if we can get their QB before they can get at ours. I think this could work...

KEEP OUR QB CLEAN! NOT THEIRS!!

Oh yea, Blitz too please.

TK_Gamer said:

defensively I think they have a slight edge because of ellis and ware, I know they are all out pass rush guys, but how do you stop the texans? you put carr on the ground. so from that standpoint they are a little stronger vs us on defense. now if we blitz the way we did against miami? that should negate that advantage, but if we try to rush with the front 4 again it will be washington all over again.

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Umm yeah, defensively I wouldn't put a "slight" edge to Dallas, I'd give an enormous edge to the Cowboys. The Texans don't hold a candle to anything near the Cowboy's defense. Your simply out of your mind if you call the Dallas D slightly better than the Texans.

Texans- 32nd rank defense in the league
Cowboys- 9th


Ware and Canty have both began to hit their strides in a beefly D-line rotation of Marcus Spears, Jay Raitliff, and Jason Ferguson-- all of which have already had a sack.

Ellis has made the transition from DE to OLB seamlessly.. already at 3 sacks, and who saw his block on McNabb which forced the ball loose for DWare to take it to the house? Last year's most improved player-- Bradie James has done a solid job, FA pick-up Ayodelle leads the D with tackles.

Terence Newman and Anthony Henry are doing fine.. the safeties admittily have been the weak point.. Watkins has been playing like a rookie and Roy Williams has fallen to his old ways.

Let me say-- if Ladell Betts could have a career day against the Texan's D, (who had 32 yards vs. the Cowboys), Julius Jones will absolutely tear through the Texan's D-line.. he's off to his best start of his career (two 100 yarders, one 94), while counterpart Marion Barber leads the team with TDs.


If the Texan's D is 32nd, no they aren't as talented as the Cowboy's D Thunderkyss.. are you right in your head?

I am just hoping we pack the stadium like the Steelers fans did last year:

Our defense made Mark friggin' Brunnel look good. I have little confidence in their ability stop anyone other than a really bad Miami team at this point. Of course, I hope with all my heart that they prove me wrong.

TEXANS84 said:

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Did you notice Moulds' stats accross the bottom of the screen? Cool!

The only reason this is not a rivalry is because of NFL scheduling and the Texans and Cowboys are not in the same division. There should always be matchups between interstate teams if not every year, then every other.

Someone in Dallas cracking on Houston for its most famous landmark? LOL

HowBoutThemCowboys! said:

Umm yeah, defensively I wouldn't put a "slight" edge to Dallas, I'd give an enormous edge to the Cowboys. The Texans don't hold a candle to anything near the Cowboy's defense. Your simply out of your mind if you call the Dallas D slightly better than the Texans.

Texans- 32nd rank defense in the league
Cowboys- 9th


Ware and Canty have both began to hit their strides in a beefly D-line rotation of Marcus Spears, Jay Raitliff, and Jason Ferguson-- all of which have already had a sack.

Ellis has made the transition from DE to OLB seamlessly.. already at 3 sacks, and who saw his block on McNabb which forced the ball loose for DWare to take it to the house? Last year's most improved player-- Bradie James has done a solid job, FA pick-up Ayodelle leads the D with tackles.

Terence Newman and Anthony Henry are doing fine.. the safeties admittily have been the weak point.. Watkins has been playing like a rookie and Roy Williams has fallen to his old ways.

Let me say-- if Ladell Betts could have a career day against the Texan's D, (who had 32 yards vs. the Cowboys), Julius Jones will absolutely tear through the Texan's D-line.. he's off to his best start of his career (two 100 yarders, one 94), while counterpart Marion Barber leads the team with TDs.


If the Texan's D is 32nd, no they aren't as talented as the Cowboy's D Thunderkyss.. are you right in your head?

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Yeah, just conviently neglect the gamebreaker that is C-po is & how he changes the teams offensive capabilities when he is on the field & healthy. Of course you do know that he sat against you guys & came back healthy against us right? Also didn't the Redskins with a healthy Portis just help his team drop 36 on a vaunted Jacksonville defense that you guys lost against? You guys aren't as talented as you think on D. Philly ran thru you guys just like they ran thru us, Indy would do the same.

Having said that, I am worried about what JJ could do. Tuna is a ball control type of coach so he will be using the run alot, but if we can manage to curtail that somewhat then the ball is in our court b/c Bledsoe is terrible.

With division rival Philly in the rear-view mirror, and another division rival next week in the Giants, this would be a classic trap game for the Cowboys if only for one thing. They didn't win, they lost last week in Philly. Parcells didn't get to where he's at now without knowing how to bounce a team back from a big loss the week before.
I honestly doubt that the Cowboys have a clue who is on their schedule beyond this Sunday.

If the cowgirls believe, like that ***clown writer, that they will win by 3 touchdowns and two field goals, this is a huge trap game for them... please believe this, cowpatties... please!

And on the rivalry issue... If the Texans win this game, we will automatically become a major rivalry for the girls... no questions aked.

Here's to punking these chumps, and giving the gift of cowgirl silence to the entire NFL.... the entire world...

I think the Texans beat the spread and probably lose a close game. But to the posters (and you know who you are) that think either their d is "slightly" better than ours, or that our talent is roughly equal to theirs, that goes beyond spin to just flat-out falsehoods. We are not even in the same city talent wise on D, much less the same neighborhood. We couldn't find their zipcode without a map. Some of the comparison made are just frankly laughable. On offense, they have more talent and depth than us, and it's not even close. Instead of lying, why can't we just admit it, move on, and figure out how to close that chasm that exists between us and any other top half of the league team. It's embarrasing.

I think we win...........I dont know why, but I think we make a game out of it and come out on top.............In 5 years I have not felt this kind of calm feeling about a Texan game. What is funny my grandmother feels the same way, she said out of 5 years she has not felt this good about a game.

Texans win, I just got a good feeling about it, I think the Cowboys are good, but something baby, something about it. Get ready for a victory boys(Texan- boys that is).

HowBoutThemCowboys! said:

Texans- 32nd rank defense in the league
Cowboys- 9th

If the Texan's D is 32nd, no they aren't as talented as the Cowboy's D Thunderkyss.. are you right in your head?

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We'll see where we stand after 16 games.

Porky said:

I think the Texans beat the spread and probably lose a close game. But to the posters (and you know who you are) that think either their d is "slightly" better than ours, or that our talent is roughly equal to theirs, that goes beyond spin to just flat-out falsehoods. We are not even in the same city talent wise on D, much less the same neighborhood. We couldn't find their zipcode without a map. Some of the comparison made are just frankly laughable. On offense, they have more talent and depth than us, and it's not even close. Instead of lying, why can't we just admit it, move on, and figure out how to close that chasm that exists between us and any other top half of the league team. It's embarrasing.

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That's ridiculous..... if we're going to be using stats to back this up, they gave up 7 sacks, where we only gave up 5. TheirOline is made up of has been FAs from Detroit & Greenbay, & their RT is not any better than Weigart.

Glenn, TO, & Crayton, I can see how you can say they are close to our guys, but not better, not even close to being better.

Witten & Fasano..... nope, sorry, ain't buying it.

I'll give you the runningbacks, I think most here are tired of me talking about running backs, so I'll just give you them.

& QB..... one is about ten years older, but that's about it.

on D, I'm not saying our guys are as good as theirs, I'm saying they are as bad as ours. They all got sacks across the Defensive line, woooohooooo.... they ain't played no body, We'll rack up some sacks when we play Tennessee, & Jacksonville. Trust me.

Anthony Henry...... Lewis Sanders...... they look the same to me.
Newman..... Dunta...... I'll give them that one.

RoyWilliams is a beast against the run, but he covers about as well as Earl.

Watkins/Davis or CCBrown/Simmons..... don't matter what ails your offense, either of these pills will cure it for sure.

AaronGlenn/McCleon... yeah they got that one too.

GreenWood & Bradie James, they've got the same fat stats last year for the same reason...

MarcusSpear/TJ..... yeah, I'll take Spears.......

Ferguson..... Payne... I'll stick with Payne... not because he's better, but there's just no reason to change. You get the same thing out of both guys.

ChrisCanty.... now I like ChrisCanty.... Weaver as a tackle IMHO is better.

Babin & Ware, I'll bet my avatar against yours they have the same amount of sacks at the end of the year....

Ellis & Mario.... my guy is bigger & stronger.....

they are not as good as they think they are...... the Eagles proved that.

Who gives a damn about defensive rankings that measure yards? Really, do you think "well, we lost by 5, but we gave up 50 fewer yards then them"?. Point wise the Texans have given up 24, 43, 31 and 15 ( 28 a game). The Cowboys have given up 24, 10, 14, 38 (21 a game). We have each played against one very bad offensive team (Miami and the Titans) both played against the Skins, although they were missing Portis against you and we have both played Philly, where they were missing Stalworth and Westbrook was hurt against you, but they put up 38, the Jacksonville and Indy offenses arnt really comparable. Basically, the Dallas D has better talent and stats, but have given up a lot of points. The big thing here is turnovers. We have had very few of them while Dallas has been giving the ball away, what this means is that we have to have a very good game from the D, get some turnovers and protect the ball when we have it....simple!

Houston should play Dallas every year. Every football fan in Texas would be watching, the games would sell out in either Dallas or Houston, bragging rights for a year, etc...
An in-state rivalry would be a win-win for both teams. But it has to be regular season, not preseason games that no one cares about.
Once the Cowboys move to their new stadium, I think that they should do away with hosting the Thanksgiving Day game. They would no longer be in Texas Stadium, so a new tradition could be started. And that new tradition could be the Battle for Texas, rotated between Houston and Dallas each year on Thanksgiving Day. Then, with Texas and Texas A&M playing the next day, we could have a regular rivalry week in Texas. Wouldn't that be great?

the great thing is if we do win sun. it will prob. destroy the team for the rest of the year... TO will flip out attack the team, parcells will throw him on the bench for the whole season, then bledsoe will get yanked for sucking it up against the texans, romo comes in.. that won't equal much... and TO will continue to trash the team and distract them the rest of the year..its over....

its like the best domino effect ever!!!!!!! the beginning for the end!!! thats ofcourse if we win....go texans!!!

OrangeCountyTexansFan said:

Houston should play Dallas every year. Every football fan in Texas would be watching, the games would sell out in either Dallas or Houston, bragging rights for a year, etc...
An in-state rivalry would be a win-win for both teams. But it has to be regular season, not preseason games that no one cares about.
Once the Cowboys move to their new stadium, I think that they should do away with hosting the Thanksgiving Day game. They would no longer be in Texas Stadium, so a new tradition could be started. And that new tradition could be the Battle for Texas, rotated between Houston and Dallas each year on Thanksgiving Day. Then, with Texas and Texas A&M playing the next day, we could have a regular rivalry week in Texas. Wouldn't that be great?

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That really does sound great, but the NFL schedule is very formulaic, so i dont know if this would really work....

OrangeCountyTexansFan said:

And that new tradition could be the Battle for Texas, rotated between Houston and Dallas each year on Thanksgiving Day. Then, with Texas and Texas A&M playing the next day, we could have a regular rivalry week in Texas. Wouldn't that be great?

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NFL, are you there? DO you here this great idea?!?

TEXANS84 said:

I am just hoping we pack the stadium like the Steelers fans did last year:

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I was at that game.

they didnt think much about us the first time we ever played them either. BUT we all know who won that one. You over look something and it will always come back to bite you. And i feel the same will happen this game.

OH yeah Texans 27 Cowgirls 24

FILO_girl said:

I have this thought to offer to Kubes...

Ya know how we always get prodded over David being horizontal on the field? Being the Kroger boy of the NFL? Well, look at this...Bledsoe is well known for being stone bodied and not too keen on having rival defenders getting too close (he can't handle it). So...

Challenge our D boys to a sack contest. Prize? Well, you find what motivates them the most (money, women, real estate, etc) and offer it to the player who sacks Bledsoe more than Carr gets it. This will be a turning point, if we can get their QB before they can get at ours. I think this could work...

KEEP OUR QB CLEAN! NOT THEIRS!!

Oh yea, Blitz too please.

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Right ON!!!!!!! I second that, send the info to Kubes!!!!