Who would be the Texans QB in your scenario? Personally, I don't see the Texans winning any more than five games this upcoming season no matter who's at QB. And I would exclude Watson as playing in the NFL this season.
I'm going to stick with the early plan and guess that Tyrod Taylor will be the Texans starter.
But my personal preference is for Mills to start against the Jags. And the Panthers. So I'd probably go ahead and have him start against the Browns. At this point I'd have a good evaluation of Mills level of play and would make a change if I felt it necessary. But this is just me. I expect the Texans to play Taylor.
I agree with the Texans not winning more than 5 games. My early guess is 3 -5.
But having said this, I'm beginning to see the possibility of the Texans having a potent rushing attack behind a much improved offensive line and RB Phillip Lindsay. In this scenario, I could see the Texans winning maybe 6 -8 games.
Also, listening to 610 this past week, I'm hearing two things about the defense. One is that the players were poorly coached last season and played out of position; and they really weren't playing up to potential.
Second, I'm hearing that the switch to a 4-3 really suits our personnel; and that Lovie Smith will get much more out of the players than last year. The Texans were at the bottom in turnovers last year and Lovie is known for aggressive defensive play creating turnovers.
And actually three things I've heard, the third being, there is no doubt that our defense will improve over last season. The question we fans would have is, how much?
So I'm beginning to see the possibility of much improved defensive play; and a strong, running offense. This combined improvement just might suggest we could be in for a surprising season. We do have an extremely tough schedule, but against the bottom tier teams ??? And Mills is the wild card in the deck.