{"id":3991,"date":"2016-10-14T20:16:54","date_gmt":"2016-10-15T00:16:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonprofootball.com\/?p=3991"},"modified":"2016-10-14T20:16:54","modified_gmt":"2016-10-15T00:16:54","slug":"sunday-night-football-preview","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/2016\/10\/14\/sunday-night-football-preview\/","title":{"rendered":"Sunday Night Football Preview"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2><strong>Sunday Night Football Preview<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p><strong>Houston Texans vs Indianapolis Colts<\/strong><br \/>\n<strong>NRG Stadium<\/strong><br \/>\n<strong>Houston, Texas<\/strong><br \/>\n<strong> 8:30 p.m. EST<\/strong><br \/>\nThe nation will be watching this Sunday, as the <strong>Houston Texans<\/strong> and <strong>Indianapolis Colts<\/strong> both look to right the ship. Without <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.pro-football-reference.com\/players\/W\/WattJ.00.htm?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">J.J. Watt<\/a><\/strong> for the remainder of the season, the rest of the Texans defense will have to step up. Look for <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.pro-football-reference.com\/players\/C\/ClowJa00.htm?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Jadeveon Clowney<\/a><\/strong>, the number-one pick from the 2014 <strong>NFL Draft<\/strong>, to fill the hole left by Watt. Through five weeks, Clowney leads the league in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.teamrankings.com\/nfl\/player-stat\/defense-tackles-for-loss\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">tackles for a loss<\/a>\u00a0and consistently ruins running plays for the opposing team. If Clowney can continue his dominance in the backfield, Colts quarterback <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.pro-football-reference.com\/players\/L\/LuckAn00.htm?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Andrew Luck<\/a><\/strong>\u00a0will have a hard time Sunday night.<\/p>\n<p>The Texans have always been a running team, but they have struggled mightily through their first five contests. In fact, they&#8217;ve been historically bad. <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.pro-football-reference.com\/players\/M\/MillLa01.htm?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Lamar Miller<\/a><\/strong>\u00a0was brought in to take their running game to the next level, but he had\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/billbarnwell\/status\/782979988601597953\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">more touches through four games without a touchdown than anybody in modern NFL history<\/a>. This must change, and soon. The Colts defense is currently <a href=\"http:\/\/www.espn.com\/nfl\/statistics\/team\/_\/stat\/total\/sort\/rushingYardsPerGame\/position\/defense\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">18th in the league for rushing yards allowed per game<\/a>, so there&#8217;s no better time than now.<\/p>\n<p>The Texans aren&#8217;t the only team in the AFC South who&#8217;ve gotten off to a rough start. The Indianapolis Colts were favorites to win the division, but they currently have a 2-3 record. The Colts have struggled on offense, and definitely miss the presence of wide receiver <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.pro-football-reference.com\/players\/M\/MoncDo00.htm?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Donte Moncrief<\/a><\/strong>. They&#8217;re 22nd in rushing <a href=\"http:\/\/www.espn.com\/nfl\/statistics\/team\/_\/stat\/rushing\/sort\/rushingYardsPerGame\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">yards per game<\/a>\u00a0and <a href=\"http:\/\/www.espn.com\/nfl\/statistics\/team\/_\/stat\/passing\/sort\/sacks\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">first in sacks allowed<\/a>. <a href=\"http:\/\/www.pro-football-reference.com\/players\/L\/LuckAn00.htm?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Andrew Luck<\/a> is a great quarterback, but he can&#8217;t carry this team on his own.<\/p>\n<p>Both teams have failed to live up to expectations thus far, but expect a good game for Sunday Night Football. The key for both teams will be getting their respective running backs going and taking pressure off their quarterbacks. From the outside, it looks like a disappointing match-up. However, divisional games are typically unpredictable and hard-fought. Whoever wins Sunday will be one step closer to winning the AFC South.<\/p>\n<p>Main Photo:<\/p>\n<div class=\"getty embed image\" style=\"background-color: #fff; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue',Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; color: #a7a7a7; font-size: 11px; width: 100%; max-width: 594px;\">\n<div style=\"padding: 0; margin: 0; text-align: left;\"><a style=\"color: #a7a7a7; text-decoration: none; font-weight: normal !important; border: none;\" href=\"http:\/\/www.gettyimages.com\/detail\/598599910\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Embed from Getty Images<\/a><\/div>\n<div style=\"overflow: hidden; height: 0; padding: 66.666667% 0 0 0; width: 100%;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"\/\/embed.gettyimages.com\/embed\/598599910?et=W6_AwxIxT4dF9Sf3pZd1bQ&amp;viewMoreLink=off&amp;sig=Dnc8RhCPZEj0wsNs-fx1p3EAvBM9LtVNI6OOOZLhOvo=&amp;caption=true\" width=\"594\" height=\"396\" frameborder=\"0\"><\/iframe><\/div>\n<p style=\"margin: 0;\">\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Houston Texans take on the Indianapolis Colts on Sunday Night Football as they look to further their lead in the division. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1683,"featured_media":4034,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[14,12],"tags":[61,114,56,40,456],"class_list":["post-3991","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-texans","category-colts","tag-football","tag-houston-texans","tag-indianapolis-colts","tag-nfl","tag-sunday-night-football"],"modified_by":"Ryan Smith","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3991","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1683"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3991"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3991\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4034"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3991"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3991"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3991"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}