Houston Texans and Tennessee Titans Free Pick

[Qbins Missile Crisis]

NFL: TAKE IT OR LEAVE IT

The Oakland Raiders go into Kansas City and pull out a victory at Arrowhead Stadium. Who’d have thought that?

I did and if you didn’t listen to me when I told you the Raiders were money last Sunday against K.C., that’s too bad.

You don’t go 15-3-1 over the last 19 NFL regular season weeks without knowing a thing or two about the game and its teams. I wasn’t hoping for an upset; with the exception of Kansas City using three quarterbacks in that game, I knew what would happen. The Raiders brought their game and sealed the deal early.

This week, I’m putting my money on an early season divisional tilt in the AFC South and I’m not speaking of the Jacksonville Jaguars and Indianapolis Colts game either.

The matchup between the Houston Texans and Tennessee Titans is intriguing to me for several reasons. First, the Titans are the surprising leader of the division, albeit we’re only two games into the season. Second, the Houston Texans had an early bye week because of Hurricane Ike and enter this game well rested, but how focused are they with the distractions in their hometown?

Houston was supposed to be a rising team in the AFC but they hardly looked the part in Week 1 when they were blown out in Pittsburgh. Now, they start Week 3 with the bye already behind them with 15 straight weeks of football staring them in the face.

Not only that, but the Titans have owned the Texans since they entered the league, winning 10 of 12 games, including six straight. Tennessee won last year’s games by scores of 38-36 in Houston and 28-20 at home in Nashville.

Sportsbook.com members are painting a picture of doom and gloom for the Texans this week by buying up the Titans as five-point favorites. Early action shows that 87% of bettors are siding with Tennessee after two impressive wins but you shouldn’t count out Houston just yet.

Coach Gary Kubiak has had two weeks to go over all the areas his Texans struggled in during the Week 1 letdown in Pittsburgh. Houston couldn’t run the ball against Pittsburgh and had trouble stopping it too.

Rest assured, they’ve worked out the kinks from that loss and will be a much better team this week. It’s no secret that a young team can be a little shaky in the first week of the season and I’m betting on a much improved effort this week.

Rookie running back Steve Slaton has had an extra week of practice and should perform better in his second NFL game while quarterback Matt Schaub will connect with Andre Johnson and Kevin Walter to do something that the Bengals receiving duo couldn’t do last Sunday against Tennessee; score a receiving touchdown.

Houston’s defense will have a field day going after Kerry Collins. The former sack dummy of the NFL, sacked 180 times from 2000 to 2005, including a career high 39 times with the Raiders in 2005, was brought down just once last weekend by Cincinnati.

With Mario Williams on the defensive line, Houston will get after the passer and if they can shut down the run and force Collins to drop back, they will put the Tennessee quarterback on his back a number of times.

Yes, I’m taking the Texans as five-point underdogs this week. Take it or Leave it.