If I was the Texans I'd seek out Mallett's agent during the half and start trying to work out a deal with him. Maybe it is ony for one half, but he's already played in this one half beyond any bodies expectations, certainly beyond O'Briens or he would have been starting for us back in September.

Halftime stats:

Passing: Mallet 10/16, 133 yards, 2 TD's, 1 INT

Rushing: Blue 16/80, Grimes 6/21

Receiving: AJ 5/52, Graham 2/34, Hopkins 1/41

Tackles: Bouye/Cushing 4 each, Watt/Dent 3 each, many with 2

Total yards: Texans 242, Browns 211

1st downs: Texans 16, Browns 13

3rd down efficiency: Texans 6/10, Browns 2/7

Red zone: Texans 1/1, Browns 0/2

Penalties: Texans 2/30, Browns 4/22

Time of possession: Texans 15:44, Browns 14:16

Turnovers: Texans 1, Browns 1

Early, but seems we may have a quarterback. exciting to watch this develop.

2nd half kickoff goes out of the end zone. Browns will have the ball at their 20.

---------------------------------

Crowell scoots for 9.

Crowell gets 1 and the 1st down.

Ohh man, Crick almost INT's the screen pass but inc.

Flea flicker play goes inc.

Deep pass to Gabriel sails inc. Browns will have to punt.

K Martin brings the punt back to the Texan 28. Texan's ball.

Pass to Martin goes for 6.

Pass to Johnson gets 5 and the 1st down.

Blue for 3.

Blue for 6 but flags are down.....hands to the face on the Browns.... 5 yards and an auto 1st down. Ball at the Brown 46.

Blue for no gain.

Blue sweeps right for about 12 and a 1st down.

Grimes for 4 tough yards.

Grimes for 4 more. 3rd and 2 coming up.

Pass to Graham is inc but flag is down. Holding on the Texans.... 10 yards. Makes it 3rd and 12 coming up.

Quick screen to D Johnson goes for no gain.... Texans to go for the 52 yard FG...

Bullock's FG is just off to the right, no good.

Score remains:

Texans 14, Browns 7

9:16 left in the 3rd qtr.

Some of these ad's by Southwest Airlines and State Farm Insurance are pretty good today.

Next year we get a new K. Also a horrible call on that 3rd down play.

Browns takeover at their 42.

Pass to Crowell gets 11 and a 1st down.

Crowell TFL'ed by Watt and Dent for a loss of 2.

Pass over the middle is broken up by Bouye, inc. 3rd and 12 coming up.

Pass to Gabriel is off the mark, inc. Browns will punt.

K Martin fair catches at the Texan 12. 7:56 left in the 3rd qtr.

Why not? Extending quarterbacks on a wildly premature basis is a Texans trademark.

Hey, is it my imagination, but OL looks pretty physical in charge today.

Pass to Hopkins goes for about 15.

Blue for 8. Ball at the Texan 35.

Blue, nice runnin', gets 11.

Blue for 4.

Pass to Hop gets 7 and a 1st down at the Brown 44.

Grimes gets loose for 12.

Grimes sweeps right for 5. 2nd and 5 coming up. A Brown (Winn) is injured on the play. Injury timeout. Ball at the Brown 28.

-----------------------------------------

On 2nd and 5, deep pass to Hopkins is out of bounds, inc. 3rd and 5 coming up. Another Brown DL injured on the play..

Short pass to AJ broken up, inc. Texans will go for the FG.

Bullock's 46-yarder is good.

Texans 17, Browns 7

5:16 left in the 3rd qtr.

Mallet looks OK but Keenum looked OK at first, too.... I think they gotta go with him the rest of the year because I think he's the best we got.......

The ensuing kickoff is brought back and fumbled! Texans recover but the play is under review....

Refs rule the elbow was down and the Browns will have the ball at their 23.

----------------------------------

West gets caught for a loss of 2.

Pass to Austin gets 12 and a 1st down.

Tate is TFL'ed by Watt for a loss of 6. 3:33 left in the 3rd qtr.

Hoyer's pass over the middle is broken up, inc. 3rd and 16 coming up.

Hoyer is pressured and throws inc. Browns will have to punt.

K Martin brings the punt back to the Texan 26. Texan's ball.

Keenum had no answer to a blitz. Mallett seems to with his pre-snap reads and quick release. In other words, he looks like an NFL quarterback.

Small sample size.

Negative. Let's see how he does after teams get film on him. So far, I'm definitely impressed with his command of the O. Knew about the arm, but he appears to be actually controlling things.

Quick pass to AJ gets 6.

Blue gets caught for a loss of 4. 3rd and 8 coming up.

Mallet's pass almost picked off but inc. Texans will have to punt.

Browns return the punt to their 43 yard line. Brown's ball.

Hoyer trips dropping back and is downed for a loss of 8.

Hoyer is pressured and throws it away, inc. Flags are down.....ineligible downfield on the Browns, -5. Texans decline and make it 3rd and 17.

Man, Hoyer almost sacked by Watt, throws downfield, ball pops up in the air and nobody home to catch it. Browns have to punt.

Ball sails over the punter's head and he runs around and gets off a punt. Punt goes out of bounds at the Texan 43. Texan's ball.

Well, nice 4th down play, Mallett to AJ. and then a bad loss by Blue, ok, FG. let's keep up the defense.

Blue for 1.

End of the 3rd qtr.

----------------------------------------

On 2nd and 9, pass to D Johnson gets about 8.

Blue gets 2 or 3 and the 1st down.

Blue for 6.

Blue for maybe 1. 3rd and 3 coming up.

Pass to D Johnson is dropped, inc. Texans look to be going for it on 4th and 3.....

Pass to AJ gets 10 and the 1st down!

Blue caught for a loss of 2.

Short pass to Hopkins goes for 17.

Blue for no gain or loss of 1. 11:08 left in the game.

Blue caught for big loss on the sweep left.... Makes it 3rd and 20.

Swing pass to D Johnson goes for 4. Texans will go for the FG.

Bullock's 37-yarder is good.

Texans 20, Browns 7

9:47 left in the game.

whew, now Cleveland shooting themselves in the foot with that holding, on KR for TD.

another whew, held on 4th down. Texans ball around 7 min to go.

And what was that with Tate and Greco trying a cut block?

That was one of the few times the penalty actually affected the play.

Browns take the ensuing kickoff back for a TD but flags are everywhere.... holding on Browns brings it back. Browns will have the ball at their 10 yard line.

-------------------------------------

9:33 left in the game.

Crowell for 2.

Hoyer's pass goes inc.... take a big shot from Cushing.... 3rd and 8 coming up.

Pass to Gabriel gets 8 and the 1st down.

Pass to Gabriel over the middle goes for 35.

Pass to Hawkins gets 22. Ball at the Texan 23.

Crowell rushes for 1. 7:16 left in the game.

Flair pass to Agnew is off the mark, inc. 3rd and 9 coming up.

Hoyer's pass to Gabriel off the mark, inc. Browns going for it on 4th and 9.

Pass over the middle to Austin is dropped but flag is down.....chop block on the Browns is declined. Texans takeover on downs. Texan's ball.

6:58 left in the game.

Texans ball at their 37 yard line.

Blue for 2.

Blue for 7. 3rd and 1 coming up.

Blue for no gain. Texans will have to punt with about 5 1/2 minutes left in the game.

Lechler's punt is fair caught at the Brown 26. Brown's ball.

Pass to Hawkins goes for 25.

Pass to Gabriel gets 12. 4:20 left in the game.

Pass to Gabriel off the mark, inc. 2nd and 10 coming up.

Hoyer pressured, throws it away, inc. 3rd and 10 coming up.

Pass is tipped by Austin right into the hands of Mohamed! Texan's ball!

Nice to see Mohammed get the pick.

Blue gets loose for big gainer and also draws the late hit out of bounds penalty. 21 yard run, 15 yard penalty.

Grimes for 3. 3:25 left in the game.

Grimes for 3 or 4. Browns start using timeouts.... 3:06 left in the game.

Blue sweeps right for the 1st down... flags are down....holding on Newton. Makes it 3rd and 8.

Grimes goes left for about 3. Bullock on for the FG on 4th and 6.

Bullock's 50-yarder is good.

Texans 23, Browns 7

2:47 left in the game.

and nice 50 yd FG by Bullock, 23-7 with little over two minutes to go.

Browns bring the ensuing kickoff back to their 22. Brown's ball.

---------------------------------

Pass to Austin gets 7.

Pass to Hawkins gets about 7 for a 1st down.

Pass to ? goes for 11.

2 minute warning.

-----------------------------------

Flags presnap. Offsides Mercilus. Makes it 1st and 5 at the Texan 48.

Pass to Hawkins sails inc.

Pass to Crowell goes to the Texan 29 yard line.

Hoyer's pass sails inc down the sideline.

Short pass to Crowell broken up, inc. Brings up 3rd and 10

Pass to Benjamin is caught but out of bounds, inc. Browns going for it on 4th and 10.

Hoyer's pass sails inc. Texans takeover on downs with 1:10 left in the game.

Texans kneeling it out.

Final score:

Texans 23, Browns 7

-----------------------------

Nice win. The boys really needed this one....

Just when Browns fans thought it was safe to come out of hiding. The lowly Texans come in and bulldoze them behind a rookie RB and QB making his first NFL start.

Some tweet (was it the Chron?) said Texans might pursue Hoyer in free agency. After today? Don't bother. Hoyer is probably better than he was today and Mallett probably worse but Mallett looked by far like the better QB.

Imagine waiting three years for your first NFL start and your first TD goes to a defensive tackle! Nice touch on that throw though. Really put it in a great spot for the (ahem) receiver to catch it.

Ed Houchuli is one of the better refs although I wonder if the lack of PI/def. holding/illegal contact calls was that Jackson and Swearinger weren't back there so the refs couldn't figure out who to call it on. I'm so used to looking for flags on third down, I had to adjust my tv set.

What a draft pick Blue turned out to be. Nice work, somebody.

Say, did you know TEs were still able to catch passes in this league? It seemed like forever for the Texans. Nice TD, Gilbert Grape. Oh, and nice pick, Mr. ref.

Didn't Rogers wait behind Favre for 3 years before his first start ?

Yep, something like that..... Going back, I know Steve McNair also saw limited snaps his first couple of years. I'm sure there's others....

What I liked today about Mallet was he had the ball out quick..... I don't think there were many pass plays that lasted longer than 3 seconds - really pleased with that. Quick, decisive - that will beat the blitz every day..... He's still a raw guy and needs to build chemistry with the receivers but he showed he understands the offense.....

Come what may, at least the rest of the season will be a lot more interesting to follow.... Just maybe we can give the Colts/Ravens/Bengals of the league (as well as the Titans/Jags) a real competition in the coming weeks....

Mallett looked very good today. I am guessing that when teams have film they will take away some of what he does. Either way it is very promising and was a joy to watch a Texans QB throw it like that.

But today confirmed O'Brien as an offensive mind for me more than anything. With the threat of the deep ball established early, he made everything work off of that. Really impressive and it makes me believe we have a big time NFL Head Coach.

Hoyer is terrible. He's a gamer and he fits what they do offensively since he can push it down field off of play action. But he is about as inaccurate as an NFL QB can be. %58 on the season and %58 in his career. That is what he is. Prop him up with a RB and he can be mediocre, but I'd walk away from the season if we employ that guy next year.

Plus it was awesome watching our OL just kick the Browns around. That is about as physical a beat down as you see in pro football.

BTW, I noticed Watt wasn't on the punt return team in the second half. I guess someone decided it was better to let him rest.

That Browns punter had a really rough day. And, even worse, he's in Cleveland. As Bum Phillips used to say "The best thing about playing in Cleveland is that, when it's over, we get to go home to Texas."

We won the turnover battle again today as well, another reason we won quite as easily as we did.

Early line has the Texans as a 1 to 2.5 pt favorite over the Bengals next Sunday...

I'm excited after that convincing win yesterday in Cleveland, easily the best game we've played since 2012, and I'm not surprised we are slightly favored at home vs Cinci this weekend.
I'm even thinking we might have a chance at Indy after watching the Pats eviscerate the Colts at the los last night in Indy, on both sides of the ball. We are just a game behind Indy, the POs are a long-shot but the season isn't over for us just yet.

Just like the Good Romo/Bad Romo meme, do we see Good Dalton/Bad Dalton next Sunday. I know if this were the playoffs who I'd like.

BTW, Texans now just a game behind the Colts (Game-1/2 if you count tiebreakers).

I'm tempering my enthusiasm as we've been down this false hope road before. I was happy to see Mallett's command of the O. It's obvious that the game plan was to put him in good situations and having the OL play it's best game of the season did just that. Good OL play let Blue have a career day and hopefully that will motivate Foster even more. Interested to see games 3 and 4 after teams get film on him. But damn, dude has a cannon.

Need to steal a game, preferably 2 from the Colts, Bungles, or Ravens and good possibility of a 10 win season and primed for the last wildcard. Since we've never won in Indy, tough to count on that one, but they did lose Bradshaw to a broken ankle. Need solid games vs Ratbirds and Bungles and the bad side of those QBs to show up.