The Jan 15 – Texans vs Baltimore Ravens game has the opportunity to be a extraordinary and interesting game from start to finish, or a serious letdown. The reason why: both squads have looked impressive at times this season and completely awful at others.

NFL odds

The Texans have a justification for their occasionally frustrating play, as the squad has been plagued by injuries all season. First, their all-pro wide receive Andre Johnson went down with a hamstring injury. As though this blow to their offense wasn’t considerable enough, they then lost their starting qb, Matt Schaub. Then they went on to lose their second chain qb, Matt Leingart, to injury. That put rookie T.J. Yates into the starting duty. Although Yates has competed admirably to date, it’s yet to be seen how he can fare vs the vicious Ravens’ defense. The Texans battle through these injuries to a 10-6 record, but stumbled into the playoffs because they lost their last 3 competitions of the season.

Sports betting

Although the Baltimore Ravens have looked extraordinary generally this season, they’ve come up short at mysterious times. After defeating Houston 29-14 earlier in the year, they lost their next game to woeful Jacksonville as they played some of the worst type of offensive football displayed by any squad this season. Then, after defeating Pittsburgh 23-20, they lost their subsequent game to Seattle. So, whilst it would look Baltimore has the healthier, more complete squad, that’s supposing the Baltimore who won those huge competitions this year turns up.

Oddsmakers are banking on that. Baltimore is a 7.5 favorite at home. While the Texans have a gritty defense themselves, the question is still as to if Houston’s rookie qb can perform well under the pressure of a divisional playoff game in a aggressive environment. As the Baltimore Ravens are more experienced and competing at home, they’ve got the upper hand.