Bad news, people. The Texans will have their roof open tomorrow night, so as a dome team, we will surely fall apart, right? I'm joking, of course. The only thing that can stop our Lions on their path to the Super Bowl is an asteroid from outer space causing an extinction-level event. But our eyes should be on our primetime matchup tomorrow night, in Houston against the Texans.
Ironically, for a team playing one whose logo is a bull, we'll be the ones seeing red as they'll be wearing their alternate unis. We'll be in the marshmallows, making for a beautiful matchup, in my humble opinion. However, it won't just be the uniform I'll be watching out for tomorrow, as you all well know...
Weakened Protection: Both sides will be depleted on their offensive lines this week. They are planning a shuffle to address their weakness at LG by moving starting C Juice Scruggs there and bringing in Jarrett Patterson at C after his recovery from a concussion. Meanwhile, we will unfortunately be missing LT Taylor Decker after he suffered an unspecified shoulder injury in Thursday's practice.
Looking at the Texans' side of things first, this could be a serious upgrade for them. Both starting LGs so far this season have graded out extremely poorly, with neither posting a pass protection grade above 41 on the season (with Kendrick grading at 4.3 on the season in pass pro). Scruggs has a 67.0 grade in pass pro so far this season, which is a stark upgrade on both of the Greens. His pass-pro efficiency is also markedly better, with his 97.7% at least 2% better than either of the Greens'. Patterson has a 69.8 pass-pro grade from PFF, with a 97.8% pass-pro efficiency, so the Texans aren't just shifting the issue to a different position.
However, while this in theory will be an improvement for Houston, as Patterson is also grading out better than either Green in run blocking, it might take the players a few series to get used to their new positions, giving our interior defensive line a chance to take advantage and get some early pressure on Stroud. All of our interior pieces have pass-rush grades above the 60.0 PFF baseline, with both starters achieving marks over 70 (Reader with a 70.4, McNeill with a 77.6). Therefore, one could expect some interior pressure tomorrow night. However, none of our four iDLs have graded above 64.4 in run defence, but none have graded below 59.1, suggesting that the Texans could get some push between the tackles if they choose to run some gap or inside zone concepts.
On our side of things, Decker being out will hurt as there is no clear answer as to what we will do to fix the hole at LT. A commonly suggested answer is to move Sewell to LT and put Skipper in at RT, but this would mean arguably downgrading at two positions (Penei has historically been worse at LT than his usual RT spot) and Skipper has not played any snaps at RT so far this season, having played 6 at LT and 35 as an "inline TE" in 6 OL packages. However, on his 6 pass-blocking snaps, Skip has graded out better than Decker (78.4 versus 70.4) and has a better pass-blocking efficiency (100% vs. 95.2%). The weakness in playing Skip will be in run blocking, where he is graded as below-average by PFF with a 46.3 mark this season. Therefore, perhaps in a shock to most, I would start Skip at LT and keep Penei at RT.
This bears out when one looks at the Texans' defensive line. The league leader in pressures Danielle Hunter has lined up over the RT on 69.2% of his snaps, spending 29.3% of his snaps over the LT. With the other start at edge, Will Anderson Jr., ruled out with an ankle injury, keeping Sewell at RT to neutralise the strength of the opposition is a good idea, leaving Skipper to face backup Derek Barnett. Barnett is nursing calf and shoulder injuries, though his level of participation at practice did increase from a DNP to an FP as the week went on. He also is a big downgrade on Anderson, sporting a run defence grade 20 points lower (56.7), a pass-rushing grade 11 points lower (56.0) and a sixth of the pressures Anderson generated (6) on just under half the amount of snaps (106). While Skipper is not a perfect replacement for Decker, he is good enough to get in Barnett's way and keep Goff's blindside relatively clean.
Catchers: With it looking likely that former Wolverine Nico Collins will not be activated from IR, and with Stefon Diggs out for the season, Stroud will be short of guys to catch the ball on the outside.
He will reportedly have Tank Dell available, despite being ruled questionable yesterday with a back injury, presumably by putting the team on his back like Greg Jennings. Dell has caught 63.8% of his targets on an ADOT of 11.4 yards, taking them for 11.8 yards per reception, 2.13 first downs a game and 0.25 touchdowns a game, a 48.9% success rate, 3.8 yards after the catch per reception, 1.33 yards per route ran, a 6.3% drop rate and a 66.7% contested catch rate, and a 70.1 receiving grade. Dell spends roughly a quarter of his snaps in the slot and spends just over half of his outside snaps on the right-hand side of the formation. Given how we usually line up, this means he is most likely to line up against Davis. Davis has allowed a 63.0% completion rate in his coverage for 12.1 yards per reception and 0.25 touchdowns per game, being targetted every 5.8 coverage snaps. He has also posted a 17% forced incompletion rate, having registered 5 PBUs and a dropped interception per PFF, earning him a 64.6 coverage grade.
This will mean we will see rookie-on-rookie action on the other side of the field as former Cyclone Xavier Hutchinson will then line up against Arnold. He has caught 45.5% of his targets for 12.8 yards a catch, 0.47 yards per route run, 0.33 first downs a game, a 23.1% success rate, 4.2 yards after the catch per reception, no drops and a 50% contested catch rate, with an ADOT of 14.1 yards and a 55.5 receiving grade. Hutchinson has spent 55.5% of his snaps on the outside on the left of the formation, spending 37% of his snaps in the slot. As mentioned above, he will likely face Arnold in coverage. Arnold has a 51.8 coverage grade on the season, having allowed a 66.7% completion rate for 11.3 yards per catch and 0.25 touchdowns a game, while also posting a 10% forced incompletion rate (4 PBUs on the season) and a target every 6.3 snaps.
If Stroud gets time to pass, he could do some damage on the outside given the almost net-neutral nature of these matchups, but it also could spell disaster if he has to hurry his throws, giving the corners a chance to log their first interception of the season.
Stop the Flow: The Texans are expected to elevate iDL Tommy Toigai from their practice squad for tomorrow's matchup, suggesting that starter Foley Fatukasi who is questionable after not practising all week will not be going. Furthermore, LB 3 Jake Hansen is questionable with an ankle injury after posting an LP on Wednesday followed by back-to-back DNPs. This could severely hurt the Texans' run defence, as Fatukasi has played the second-most run defence snaps of any of the "spine" of their team (iDL and LBs), and Hansen has the second-best run defence grade of this group (77.9).
The other starter on the interior of the Texans' defensive line is Tim Settle, who has posted a 40.6 run defence grade on the season, which is better than only Fatukasi (36.4) and practice squad call-up Rashad Weaver (35.9). He has missed 15.4% of his tackles, while also posting a 7.4% run-stop rate (7 on 96 run defence snaps), conceding two penalties. His tackles come 1.6 yards beyond the line of scrimmage. At linebacker, Hansen is a backup behind Azeez Al-Shaair and Henry To'oTo'o. The latter has played the most run defence snaps of any of their linebackers with 154 such snaps. He has posted a 69.0 run defence grade on the season, with a 24.4% missed tackle rate (11/45) and a 9.3% run-stop rate (14 on the season), with an average depth of tackle of 2.4 yards. Al-Shaair has the best run defence grade of the linebackers with 79.1. He has only missed 1 tackle so far this season (3.3% missed tackle rate) with an average depth of 2.4 yards and a 13.2% run-stop rate (16 such tackles so far this season).
However, despite how good their linebackers are, our running backs are even better. Both of our running backs have rushing grades above 80, are top-8 in the league in rushing success rate, top 16 in forced missed tackles and yards after contact per carry, and top 32 in yards per carry. That, combined with a weakened defensive line for the Texans, could spell trouble for Houston, especially if we get a lead and gain control of the game script.
Hot Take: The Texans miss more than double the number of tackles that our Lions do, as Gibbs and Monty bring the pain on the ground against Houston.
Score Prediction: The Texans are a great team, but our win last week showed we can win in almost any circumstances. While there are a lot of matchups that seem even, that makes the ones that aren't even more important. In the trenches, especially on the interiors of each line, the advantage lies with our Lions and so I see us winning, especially with how poor the Texans' offence is in second halves this season (9.1 points, 25th in the league).
Houston Texans 21, Detroit Lions 34
How do you see the game going? Will our Lions continue their charge towards the Super Bowl, or will we be seeing red in more than just the Texans' uniform as they hand us a second loss of the season?
Follow us
Twitter: www.twitter.com/rotl_uk
Instagram: www.instagram.com/rotl.uk
Podcast Links: linktr.ee/roarofthelionsuk
Follow me
Twitter: www.twitter.com/sodenad
Instagram: www.instagram.com/ash.soden
look forward to your conclusions on these players/positions after the game today, ty
Thanks Ash, RE TE's - Just to reiterate what Riz said ,& its worth noting what the Lions want their TE3 /4 to do, and how many game reps they'll actually get . Parker Hesse has been taking most Reps in camp primairly as blocker ( & FB ). Mitchel hasn't performed BUT, can Block & has some ST value,& was a draft pick. Zylstra is the best receiver -,but can't block - heresey on this team. So.........bearing in what Campbell said about the WR room ie its about the best players , irrespective of position......how about.......Mitchel as TE4 , & Zylstra ( TE5 ) taking the place of of WR5 ?
Ash, thank you so much for doing these. You and the rest of the ROTL UK gang are fantastic!
Greetings, I was glad to listen to your interesting interview. The season went really well. I liked the quality of your broadcast, which application did you use for this? Is it on this list? I just want to do live broadcasts