For the rest of the division, doing a historic look at a great team from seasons past hasn't been hardâ€"1999 alone was a banner year for the Colts, Jaguars and Titans.
The Texans pose a different problem, however. They have a much shorter history than the other franchises in the division, their best season was last year and I've already covered last year extensively.
Instead of the best year, I'd like to look at the 2005 Texans, who were unarguably the worst of the Houston squads. What made them doubly disappointing was that they seemed poised for a breakthrough season, only to finish as the worst team in football.
Dom Capers is a great NFL coach, and has had success as a head coach, but for some reason things never worked out in Houston. In his final season, the Texans won just two games, under-performing their Pythagorean record by nearly two wins.
They were especially bad at NY/A, finishing 32nd on offense and 31st on defense. David Carr took 68 sacks, and averaged just 4.2 yards a drop back. His putrescence lead to one of the worst DVOA scores in the league, ranking just ahead of Kyle Orton and Alex Smith.
The 2005 Texans were equally bad at run and pass defense, finishing 30th in both and last overall.
They were not a terrible running team, but that was partially because they played from behind so frequently. Domanick Davis (now Williams) failed to top 1,000 yards on the season, and posted just the 23rd-best success rate in the game.
So, this is what 2005 was like.
While almost the entire roster turned over before Houston would go to success, Andre Johnson was around, but had the worst year of his career. All his numbers, including catch rate, were unusually terrible. Of course, by 2006 he was back to his old, dominant self.
In the end, there isn't much to analyze about these Texans. They lost eight games by at least two touchdowns. They won two games over teams that were a combined 11-21.
The complete implosion of both sides of the ball led to the Gary Kubiak era and the selection of Mario Williams first overall in the 2006 draft. They also added DeMeco Ryans, Eric Winston and Owen Daniels in the same draft, helping to form the foundation for the 2011 team.
The 2004 and 2006 Texans were both competitive teams. Neither was outstanding, but neither was terrible. The 2005 squad was simply a perfect storm of bad coaching, bad players, bad schemes and bad...well, everything.
Sometimes you don't need advanced stats to tell the story. The record says it all.
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