There’s a lot of belief in the Texans based on two factors: Patrick Mahomes’ high-ankle sprain and Houston’s domination of Miami last week. Not being acknowledged is that Tua Tagovailoa has an even worse OL than Mahomes and played (by far) his worst game of the season. This Texans team lost to the Titans and barely beat the Jaguars the prior two weeks. The Chiefs have been a terrible cover team, but Mahomes is learning to diversify his targets with Hollywood Brown adding another playmaking element this week at home. Kansas City needs to clinch the No. 1 seed, and with two tougher games ahead – both games KC could legitimately lose outright – this home spot is a massive opportunity to get it done.

Stroud has mobility that we often forget about. He has 3+ rushes in 11/14 games this season, and has cleared this rush yards line in 8/14. The Chiefs have surrendered 10+ rush yards to 4 of the last 5 QB’s they have faced (with the Raiders Aidan O’Connell being the exception). Stroud went under this rush yards mark the last two weeks, but his rush attempts went up. With Chiefs DC Steve Spagnuolo dialing up his creative blitz attack, I expect we’ll get a few opportunities for Stroud to take off.

The Texans have been fantastic early in games, sporting an NFL-best 12-2 ATS record in the first half. CJ Stroud and Texans head coach Demeco Ryans are 24-7 ATS in 1H together. It is late in games where Houston has a problem, with a disastrous 3-11 ATS record in the second half this season. Patrick Mahomes will be playing through an ankle injury, and should be under duress against a Texans defense that has the NFL’s 3rd best QB pressure rate. KC will also be without LT D.J Humphries. I like Houston’s defense to win them the first half. I’ll take my out there, before KC can burn me with their signature late game voodoo magic.

Mixon is their workhorse, the offense is scared of its own shadow and the OC doesn't want to do much other than run the ball. Mixon has 20+ carries in 5 of 6 road games and he averages 22 carries per road game. The Texans tackles are terrible and this field might not be in great shape and I expect Houston to be very conservative with not much to ply for here. Best wat to keep CJ Stroud healthy is to have him hand the ball off to their workhorse.

Patrick Mahomes is on track to start and Hollywood Brown is set to return, but it's fair to wonder how effective this offense will be against an elite Houston defense. The Texans rank third in EPA per play allowed, thanks to a fierce pass rush and a secondary led by reigning AFC Defensive Player of the Week in CB Derek Stingley Jr. Surprisingly, K.C. has allowed 5.0 yards per carry over the past three games, so perhaps Joe Mixon can have some success and take some pressure off of C.J. Stroud.

The market is trending toward Patrick Mahomes playing following two full practices, but taking the Texans at this number makes a lot of sense. The lookahead line for this game was Chiefs -4 with a fully healthy Mahomes, and the Chiefs offense didn't impress in the easy win over Cleveland. The Texans had their own offensive issues against Miami, but I have more confidence in them with the QB we know is healthy. If Mahomes misses this game, we have a fantastic number, and even if he plays, I can see the Chiefs struggling to win by more than three.

The Texans offense has grown quite conservative from what it was a year ago, especially when on the road. And now on the road, in the cold, against a lagging pass defense, and with terrible tackle play ... I see a lot of screen passes to Mixon, the engine of their offense. He has 26 targets in the last 5 games and is over this total in 7 of 10 games this season. He has 6 targets in 3 straight games.

The forecast doesnt call for wind issues and the Chiefs pass D is pretty terrible these days and the pass rush pretty tepid on the outside (where Texans OTs stink). Chiefs have allowed a completion of this length in 11 of 14 games and one of 26 in another. Collins is the only real deep guy in this offense and he is over this in 7 of 9 games. KC has allowed 16 completions of 25+ the last 6 weeks, second-most in the NFL.

Patrick Mahomes is hobbled and this game doesn’t mean that much and Andy Reid will play it conservative with a bad OL. If Mahomes does play, he is under in 12 of his last 16 home starts. He is under in the last 5 homes games in which the total was under 45. CJ Stroud is under in 4 of his last 6 road games. Neither of these teams score much at all in the second half of games. Texans always force feed Joe Mixon 20+ times on the road. Neither team plays with pace. Texans could only manage 20 at home out of a bye last week and only put up 23 on the broken Jags before their bye. I’m not buying their offense.