The 10-5 Houston Texans will kick off their home finale against the 8-7 Tennessee Titans at 3:25 p.m. CT on Sunday.
Being that their game takes place after the Kansas City Chiefs face the Los Angeles Chargers, the Texans may not be playing for anything on Sunday. If the Chiefs win, they will lock-in at the fourth-seed in the playoffs, slating them against the 10-5 Buffalo Bills.
If the Chiefs win, the Texans have little reason to play their star players and risk injury, other than withholding their rivals from the postseason. The Titans, however, don’t think Houston will be resting players, no matter the outcome of the Chiefs game.
“We do,” said Titans coach Mike Vrabel in a conference call on Tuesday on if they expect the Texans to play their full-roster. “That’s what we are fully expecting and that’s what we’ll get. You’ve only got 53 guys. It’s like you make a decision on seven guys that aren’t going to play and you make them inactive and you go into the game with 43 players and three specialists – 41 players, two quarterbacks, three specialists.”
The Texans aren’t particularly healthy nor injury-riddled. However, at the end of the season, it’s rare to find a player not bruised or beaten in some fashion. In their 23-20 win over the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in Week 16, quarterback Deshaun Watson and left tackle Laremy Tunsil sustained minor injuries.
However, at the end of the day, in Vrabel’s eyes, the Texans aren’t a college football team. They only have so many players to trot out, with 46 of the 53 making the active gameday roster.
“So you’ve got 41 guys that you’ve got to go out there and cover kicks and play offense and defense and all those things,” Vrabel concluded. “Again, it’s not like there’s a hundred guys over there on the sideline like with Ohio State or Alabama or somebody.”