What could stop the Texans from breaking through in 2013?

The Houston Texans have long been considered the “yeah, but” team of the AFC, thanks in no small part to Chris Berman. Last year, they wrote their own playoff ticket only to fall flat once again. What’s holding the Texans back from having a breakthrough season this time around?

Simply put, nothing is holding them back, unless they find a way to hold themselves back again.

The Texans are one of the soundest teams in football. On offense, they have a potent aerial assault, and they still have one of the best running backs in the league. There’s no giant red flags on the offensive line. Basically, it’s a team that does a lot well on offense with very to complain about.

Defensively, the Texans are stout. There defensive line gets solid pressure, and as we saw last year, they (and by “they” I mean J.J. Watt) get their hands up to bat balls. If there’s a weakness on the team, it’s the backend of the Texans’ defense. Brian Cushing headlines a “meh” group of linebackers. Jonathan Joseph, Danieal Manning and Ed Reed are all solid players at this point in their careers, but the group lacks a shutdown-style player.

As an AFC roster, only the Broncos show more promise entering the season, and frankly, that’s mostly because they have a living legend at the quarterback position.

With such a solid roster through and through, only one team should be able to de-rail the Texans’ hopes of making a deep playoff push in 2013, and that squad is known as the Texans. As has been the story of the franchise, Houston is its own worst enemy. Historically, they’ve always found a way to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory, but they’ve made strides in recent years to overcome themselves. Now, it’s time for the next step, and for them, that’s nothing short of appearing in the AFC championship game. Anything less has to be considered a failure by one of the league’s best teams.

About Shane Clemons

Shane Clemons came from humble beginnings creating his own Jaguars blog before moving on to SBNation as a featured writer for the Jaguars. He then moved to Bloguin where he briefly covered the AFC South before taking over Bloguin's Jaguars blog. Since the inception of This Given Sunday, Shane has served as an editor for the site, doing his best not to mess up a good thing.

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