NFL Betting Preview: Houston Texans at Oakland Raiders

Added on Oct 02, 2010 by Jack Thurman in

NFL

The Houston Texans hit the road trying to bounce back from their loss to the Dallas Cowboys with a game against the Raiders at Oakland. Oakland came close at Arizona last weekend but were eventually undone by three Sebastian Janikowski missed field goals in a one point loss to the Cardinals.

Houston Texans at Oakland Raiders
October 3, 2010 1:05 PM Pacific

The Texans have been a ‘trendy’ pick all season long and they enhanced that cachet with an opening day win over the Indianapolis Colts. Houston definitely has some nice young talent but we’re not convinced that this is a team that’s ready to win consistently now. In other words, they may still be ‘ a year or two away’. Since their win over Indy they’ve played a listless game at Washington where they needed OT to escape with the win and were dismantled by Dallas. The Redskins game may have some applicability here, as it doesn’t suggest a team that has yet learned how to ‘bounce back’ quickly after a big game.

Houston also enters this game with several key contributors banged up and questionable to play. Offensive tackle Duane Brown is definitely out due to a four game suspension, and he’s one of those essential contributors that might not be on the radar of the ‘public’. Mario Williams, Andre Johnson and Owen Daniels are all questionable. It’s also a potential lookahead spot for Houston with a game against the NY Giants on deck. Oakland officially named Bruce Gradkowski their starting quarterback this week and the team responded to him when he took over for Jamarcus Russell last year. Raiders are a better team than they’re getting credit for, and we don’t expect Janikowski to miss his field goals this weekend. Oakland pulls the outright upset.

Oakland Raiders +3 over Houston Texans