(SportsRadio 610) - Five games into their seasons, the Texans and Raiders have established offensive identities that won’t change coming off bye weeks and entering Sunday’s game at Las Vegas.
With offensive coordinator Pep Hamilton and first-year coach Josh McDaniels calling plays, the Texans and Raiders have become run-first teams that are built around running backs Dameon Pierce and Josh Jacobs.
Quarterbacks Davis Mills and Derek Carr will figure prominently in which team wins, of course, but it’s no secret what Hamilton and McDaniels are planning with their running games.
Both teams are looking for their second victory, and the team that gets it probably will have the advantage in rushing and stopping the run – something the Raiders do well and the Texans don’t, even though they improved in their last two games.
It took Hamilton and McDaniels three games to determine Pierce and Jacobs should carry the workloads, and both have responded in impressive fashion to help the Texans rank 22nd in rushing with 99 yards a game and the Raiders 14th with 121.4.
Running behind an improved offensive line led by left tackle Laremy Tunsil, Pierce has helped elevate the running game to a level the Texans haven’t experienced since 2019 when Carlos Hyde surpassed 1,000 yards for a team that won the AFC South for the last time.
Through five games last season, the Texans averaged 79.8 yards, including 3.1 a carry. Pierce has 86 carries for 412 yards and a 4.3 average with three touchdowns.
In his first three games, Pierce carried 46 times for 182 yards, averaging 60.6 yards a game. In his last two games, he has 40 carries for 220 yards, averaging 115.
Pierce and the Jets’ Breece Hall are the two-best rookie backs at this stage of the season. Hamilton was asked this week how he thinks Pierce is handling his success?
“We feel like it’s important that you learn how to manage success,” he said. “Ultimately, managing success is sometimes tougher than reacting to adversity – just having a reset button and being able to come in each day with the mindset of improving.”
Imagine where Pierce and the offense might be if Hamilton had not given Rex Burkhead 14 carries to Pierce’s 12 in the first-game tie with Indianapolis.
Jacobs’ improvement has been even more pronounced than what Pierce has done. The Raiders have lost by five, six, two and one point, with their only victory over the
Broncos.
In their first three games, the Raiders averaged 80 yards rushing. In their last two, that average has skyrocketed to 183.5.
Jacobs, who’s in the last year of his contract and didn’t have his fifth-year option picked up, averaged 64 yards rushing in their first three games and 149 in the last two. He got more carries in the last two games (49) than the first three (42).
Pierce and Jacobs don’t have solid backups who can come off the bench and do reasonable impersonations of them.
Burkhead has 24 carries for 64 yards, a 3.2 average.
The Raiders’ Brandon Bolden has seven carries for 29 yards. Carr is their second-leading rusher with 69 yards on 11 carries.
Coach Lovie Smith has been asked recently about the possibility of giving Dare Ogunbowale some carries instead of Burkhead, whose longest run is 9 yards.
“How many reps did (Pierce) get last time -- 26?” he said about Pierce’s 99-yard performance in the victory at Jacksonville. “I think your starting tailback can handle 26 plays. Most lead running backs can handle that. As I see it, if you’re a running team, your lead tailback needs to have over 20 carries in an ideal world. When he was getting 10, we said it wasn’t enough. Is that (26) too much? No.”
It’s less about Pierce’s workload and more about Burkhead getting carries. Surely, Ogunbowale could average the 3.2 yards Burkhead is averaging.
As a runner and receiver, Pierce averages 20 touches a game. In his last three games, he’s averaged 24.
“I’m going to start with our lead tailback getting that amount,” Smith said. “From there, we’ll see how it goes. Is there a need to have someone else spell your lead running back? No, I don’t think so. I don’t think the league is that way. There’s some third-down situations that (are) maybe like that.”
When it comes to the other side of the ball, Smith’s defense will have to contain Jacobs.
The Texans are 30th against the run (164.8 yards). They allowed 202.3 in the first three games and 108.5 in the last two. The Raiders will be a good test to see if they can improve the run defense for a third consecutive game.
The Raiders play outstanding run defense. They’re tied for fifth with a 103.2-yard average.
Even though the Texans are 31st in defense (414.2), they give up 19.9 points a game compared to 26.6 last season. One reason for that improvement has been their red zone defense. They’re fourth in the NFL, allowing opponents to score at a 38.9-percent rate.
And the opposing passer rating against the Texans is 73.3 compared to the Raiders’ 106.7. The Texans are fourth behind the Eagles, Bills and Bengals. Last season, they were 21st (94.1). What makes that improvement so remarkable is they have four new starters in the secondary and a pass rush that’s produced one sack in the last two games.
First and foremost, though, the Texans’ game plan will be to have a consistently productive running game and a stingy run defense. It’s going to be fun to see how Pierce and Jacobs perform against that strategy.
John McClain can be heard Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday on Sports Radio 610 and Monday and Thursday on Texans Radio. He does three weekly Houtopia Podcasts for SportsRadio610.com. He also can be read four times a week on GallerySports.com.