2013 Texans Opponents

[HPF Bob]

One of the great things about the NFL is that you can quickly project next season's opponents by the end of the season.

We'll get home and homes with Tennessee, Jacksonville and Indianapolis. (six games).

We play the other AFC division winners: Denver, New England and Baltimore (three games).

We get the rest of the AFC West: Kansas City, San Diego and Oakland (three wins).

Then we get the NFC West as our interconference matchups: San Francisco, Seattle, St. Louis, Arizona.

Sort of a shame that we wind up facing the NFC West when they might actually be good for a change but I suppose that is offset by the not-too-scary AFC West plus our own division.

I read on a Broncos board that the Broncos will play at Reliant so a guess of our unofficial 2013 schedule might look like this:

Home
-------
Indianapolis
Jacksonville
Tennessee
Denver
Kansas City
New England
St. Louis
Arizona

Away
-------
Indianapolis
Jacksonville
Tennessee
San Diego
Oakland
Baltimore
San Francisco
Seattle

First blush, that looks like a 12-4 schedule and another AFC South crown.

[Nconroe]

quite a few trips westward next year.

Texans should be pretty darn good next year.

[Keith]

I think Bob's got the right opponents, just not the right home and away.

Home
Indianapolis
Jacksonville
Tennessee
Denver
Oakland
St. Louis
Seattle
New England

Away
Indianapolis
Jacksonville
Tennessee
Kansas City
San Diego
Arizona
San Francisco
Baltimore

I like this one better because I'd rather get Denver, NE, and Seattle all at our place rather than theirs where each is very tough at home. As road schedules go, this one isn't too bad.

fyi... looking ahead to 2014, there's a road trip to Dallas (er.... Arlington). Perhaps another Thanksgiving Day game is coming up...?

[HPF Bob]

Are the interconference matchups based on 1-thru-4 finish or where the teams played four years ago? Since the Texans hosted SF and SEA in 2009, I thought it stood to reason that we would have to travel to their place in 2013. Aren't season-ticket holders assured of seeing every NFL team at least once every eight years? I thought I'd heard that somewhere.

[Keith]

Wow, yeah, good point on the NFC rotation.

Conflicting info out there (looking at you, JohnnyRoadTrip.com), but yeah, Seattle was here and Arizona was there in 2009, so it would make sense for to be flipped in 2013. But even wikipedia has the Texans headed back to Arizona while the Seahawks play in Houston. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2013_Houston_Texans_season

Also, based on the rotation theory, KC is an away game and Oakland is a home game for the Texans. The reverse was the case in 2010 when the AFC South last played the AFC West.

[Keith]

Ah, found this:

*The NFL announced that in future years, teams will travel to either Kansas City and San Diego OR to Oakland and Denver when playing the entire AFC West, and to San Francisco and Arizona OR to Seattle and St. Louis when playing the entire NFC West. The actual matchups have not yet been announced, so AFC West and NFC West opponents are subject to change. The actual match-ups have not yet been announced, so AFC West and NFC West opponents are subject to change.

NFL owners voted Monday to modify the schedule to ease the burden of cross-country road trips.

Last year, the Patriots and the Jets had to make West Coast trips to play AFC West opponents and NFC West teams. The Patriots chose to remain on the West Coast twice last season -- for back-to-back games against San Francisco and San Diego in October and Seattle and Oakland in December -- to minimize the wear-and-tear the schedule presented.

The Jets, meanwhile, played at San Diego and then had to travel to Oakland three weeks later. In December, New York visited San Francisco, returned home to play Buffalo, then went back to the coast to play Seattle. The Jets were upset by the Raiders as part of a late-season swoon that prevented them from making the playoffs.

Under the new plan, teams wouldn't have to visit two West Coast teams, just one, along with a team closer to the Midwest. Specifically, Oakland will be paired with Denver, and San Diego will be paired with Denver. In the NFC, Arizona and San Francisco will be paired as will St. Louis and Seattle.

http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/news/story?id=4009230

Of course, shoddy reporting at the Worldwide, they made an error in this report, as shown in bold... that should be Kansas City there instead of Denver.