Houston Texans

Inaugural season: 2002

Home field: NGR Stadium, Houston, Texas

Owner: Janice and Cal McNair

Team colors: Dark blue, red, and white

Overview

The Houston Texans are a National Football League (NFL) franchise that plays in the South division of the American Football Conference (AFC). The Texans are among the youngest teams in the NFL, having only been in existence since 2002. The city of Houston was awarded an expansion team after their previous professional team, the Houston Oilers, moved to Tennessee and became the Titans. In their brief history, the Texans have logged an overall regular season record of 121–151, and made five postseason appearances with a cumulative record of 3–5 as of the end of the 2018 season. Despite some postseason success, as of 2018, they remained the only NFL franchise to have never appeared in a conference championship game.

The Texans play in NRG Stadium, which seats 72,220 people. Despite their limited record of on-the-field success, they nonetheless remain as one of the best drawing teams in the NFL. In 2018, they averaged 71,804 people per game or 99.7 capacity of NRG Stadium. This continued loyalty to the team in combination with Houston’s large television market has led Forbes magazine to value the team at $2.8 billion in 2019. This placed the Texans as the twenty-second most valuable professional sports in the world and the ninth highest in the NFL.

History

The Houston Texans were born from Houston’s disappointment after losing the city’s previous NFL franchise in 1997. Shortly before the announcement that the Oilers would be moving to Nashville, billionaire Houstonian Bob McNair had sought to bring a National Hockey League (NHL) team to Houston—the only major league sport missing from the city’s roster of teams. Only two weeks after the city was passed over by the NHL, the Oilers publicly announced they were leaving. Despite this setback, McNair knew that the NFL was considering expanding from thirty to thirty-two teams. Cleveland, which had just lost its franchise to Baltimore, was favored to receive one of the teams, but the second was believed to be wide open. McNair worked with the city of Houston to build an NFL-ready football stadium.

In 1998, Cleveland was awarded the thirty-first franchise, with Toronto, Los Angeles, and Houston rated as the next best candidates. On March 16, 1999, Los Angeles was awarded the final expansion franchise; however, their bid was contingent on the construction of a new stadium and the organization of its investors into a single group. As the months dragged on, it became clear that Los Angeles was not going to be able to fulfill either aspect of the NFL’s obligations for receiving a franchise. On October 9, 1999, the franchise was instead awarded to McNair and Houston for $700 million.

After a series of focus groups and intense study, the new Houston franchise was named the Texans, the sixth such professional football team to use the moniker, and the first since the 1990–1993 Arena Football League Dallas Texans. McNair’s other choices were the Apollos and the Stallions. Dom Capers, the defensive coordinator for the Jacksonville Jaguars, was chosen as the Texans’ first coach. The team was put together from a combination of free agency, the 2002 NFL Draft, and a special expansion draft held in February of 2002. This draft was composed of active players that had not been protected by their previous teams. In the expansion draft, Houston selected four former Pro Bowlers: Tony Boselli and Gary Walker of the Jacksonville Jaguars, Aaron Glenn of the New York Jets, and Jermaine Lewis of the Baltimore Ravens. In the NFL Draft, they chose quarterback David Carr from Fresno State University with the first overall pick.

In their first game, the Texans were paired with intrastate rival Dallas Cowboys. The Texans won 19–10, becoming the first expansion team to win its inaugural game since 1961. However, the remainder of the season more accurately reflected the limited expectations for an expansion team, and the Texans finished 4–12. Under Capers, Houston went 18–46 over four seasons, and he was fired after a 2–14 campaign in 2005. He was replaced with Gary Kubiak, the offensive coordinator for the Denver Broncos. Kubiak started 37–43 during the first five seasons of his tenure, but Texans management elected for patience. The team allowed Kubiak and new defensive coordinator Wade Phillips to continue the rebuilding project. Despite experiencing several key injuries, the Texans displayed a new defensive scheme that pushed them to their first-ever playoff appearance in 2011. They advanced to the divisional playoffs with a 31–10 playoff win over the Cincinnati Bengals before losing to the Baltimore Ravens 20–13. The Texans advanced to the playoffs the next season with a 12–4 record, again recording a playoff win over Cincinnati before losing 41–28 at the New England Patriots.

Despite this incremental success, the Texans bottomed out in 2013, and Kubiak was fired with three games left in a 2–14 campaign. He was replaced with Bill O’Brien, the head coach of Penn State University. Entering the season with a fourteen-game losing streak, the Texans started the season with a win over the Washington Redskins on the way to 9–7 season. During the course of the next four seasons, O’Brien coached the Texans to an AFC South Division title and three playoff berths. Despite this new return to respectability, the Texans were only able to muster a single playoff win, 27–14, over the Oakland Raiders—their first playoff win over a team other than Cincinnati. In 2018, they were again tops in the AFC South and garnered their second-best ever record at 11–5, including a 19–16 overtime victory over their heated rivals Dallas in Week 5. However, their playoff difficulties continued in a season-ending 21–7 loss to the Indianapolis Colts. In November of 2018, owner Bob McNair died, leaving the team to his wife, Janice, and son, Cal.

Notable players

As a young franchise, the Houston Texans have not had any longtime franchise members elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame. Only safety Ed Reed, who played a single season in 2013 with Houston, was named to the hall of fame for his career work with the Ravens. As with other NFL teams, the Texans have their own team equivalent to the hall of fame called the Texans Ring of Honor. As of 2019, only one player had been inducted—wide receiver Andre Johnson (2003–2014). Johnson is the team’s all-time receiving leader with 13,955 yards over his twelve season career. He will likely become the first longtime Texan player to make the hall of fame.

Perhaps the best-known Texan is defensive end J.J. Watt, a three-time Defensive Player of the Year award winner. Drafted by the Texans in the first round of the 2011 draft, he has played his entire career with the Texans as of 2019. Watt is a five-time Pro Bowl selection, and was named Walter Payton NFL Man of the Year in 2017. Overall, Texan players have been selected for the Pro Bowl thirty-seven times, with Andre Johnson’s seven selections a franchise-high. Other players with multiple selections to the Pro Bowl include running back Arian Foster (2009–2015), the team’s all-time leading rusher; offensive tackle Duane Brown (2008–2017); and six other players. Two Texans have been honored as Rookie of the Year: linebackers DeMeco Ryans (2006–2011) in 2006, and Brian Cushing (2009–2017) in 2009.

Other key players for the Texans on the defensive side of the ball include defensive end Mario Williams (2006–2011), who had accumulated 192 tackles and 53 sacks in his career with the Texans; cornerbacks Dunta Robinson (2004–2009), Kareem Jackson (2010–2018), and Johnathan Joseph (2011–present); and linebackers Connor Barwin (2009–2012) and Jadeveon Clowney (2014–present), who was the first overall pick in the 2014 NFL Draft.

Notable players on the offensive side of the ball include tight end Owen Daniels (2006–2013), who was selected to two Pro Bowls in his career; quarterback Matt Schaub (2007–2013), who stands as the team’s all-time leading passer as of 2018; center Chris Myers (2008–2014), a two-time Pro Bowl selection; offensive tackle Eric Winston (2006–2011), who started every game for the Texans between 2007 and 2011; and kicker Kris Brown (2002–2009). Wide receiver DeAndre Hopkins (2013–present) was arguably the NFL’s best wide receiver of the late 2010s and had tallied 7,675 yards and 48 touchdowns in his first six seasons with the Texans. Quarterback Deshaun Watson, who was selected in the 2017 NFL Draft, has quickly risen to become a team leader and one of the NFL’s top young players. He made his first Pro Bowl in 2018.

Bibliography

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“Houston Texans Team History.” Pro Football Hall of Fame, www.profootballhof.com/teams/houston-texans/team-history/. Accessed 30 July 2019.

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Tucker, Anne Wilkes, Mickey Herskowitz, and Robert Clark. First Down, Houston: The Birth of an NFL Franchise. Museum of Fine Arts, 2003.