The sands have almost all sifted to the bottom part of the hourglass, as training camp in the National Football League winds down. The Houston Texans have two joint practices and two games in the books, so the final chance to make a big impression and make the 53 man roster is Saturday afternoon at Ford Field in Detroit.
The Houston Texans’ backups’ backups will face off against the Detroit Lions’ backups’ backups on Saturday at noon Houston time, with about 10 to 12 spots on the 53 man roster still up for grabs, not to mention the 16 spots on the Texans’ practice squad, So let’s look at it through that prism — which position groups are the most competitive, and thus, most affected by Saturday’s game:
4. Tight end room
The locks to make the roster are Dalton Schultz and Cade Stover. After that, the Brevin Jordan torn ACL has thrown the back end of this position group into chaos. It was much cleaner when there were three locks to make the team. Now, it’s a competition between Irv Smith, Jr., who led the team in receiving against the Panthers last weekend, and Harrison Bryant, who the team acquired from Philadelphia in the John Metchie trade. The wild card is Jakob Johnson, who is a hybrid fullback-tight end type.
3. Linebacker room
The locks to make the team are Azeez Al-Shaair, Christian Harris, and Henry To’o To’o, with E.J. Speed a near lock. After that, you have Jake Hansen, whose tenure on the team dates back to Lovie Smith as head coach, special teams demon Nick Niemann, and second year man Jamal Hill, whose had a great camp. Special teams may be the deciding factor, which would be good news for Niemann, but in the end, I think they keep six linebackers.
2. Defensive line room
The locks to make the team are Will Anderson, Danielle Hunter, Darrell Taylor, Mario Edwards, Tim Settle, and Sheldon Rankins. Derek Barnett is probably a lock, too. He’s missed a ton of camp, but DeMeco Ryans has said before that veteran players missing time doesn’t affect the evaluation much, if at all. I’d add Foley Fatukasi to this paragraph with same analysis as Barnett’s. This leaves one or two spots open for ends like Dylan Horton and Solomon Byrd, and interior guys like Tommy Togiai. Denico Autry and Kirk Hinish spending camp on the PUP list is a fly in the ointment.
1. Emergency quarterback
This is a battle between Kedon Slovis and rookie Graham Mertz. On my radio show on SportsRadio 610 this week, GM Nick Caserio brought up Slovis’ name unprompted as a guy who the Texans were able to identify and pounce on when he was waived by another team. Add in the fact that Mertz has gotten shakier as camp has worn on, and I’d guess that Slovis gets brought back on the practice squad over Mertz, but I could see them keeping both.
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