Aaron Wilson Talks Key Takeaways For Texans Against Broncos This Sunday

Aaron Wilson briefly speaks on the keys the Texans must adhere to as they take on the Denver Broncos coming off a five game win streak. Keys on CJ Stroud, offense, defense, and special teams.

Episode Transcript

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The Sean Salisbury Show continues on yourRoku. Listen to Sports Talk seven ninety
on any device with our free iHeartRadioapps. All right, now, we're

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gonna talk Texans and Broncos matchup thisSunday. Let's welcome in NFL insider Aaron
Wilson. Yes, indeed Aaron Wilsonon Twitter at Aaron Wilson and you get
blogs from here. You see himon TV, covers the league and covers
the Texans as well as anybody around. Joins us for his weekly hit.
Thanks for adjusting your time, Aaron. Let's start here. If we were

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to have Demiko Ryans go up onthe board and put priority number one defensively
this week, what is it?One thing? Limit the explosive plays,
giving up too many big plays ondefense, and that would be priority number
one. All right. So onthe other side of it, is Russ

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Wilson playing good enough to hitch youwith the explosive They won five in a
row, he's got twenty touchdowns,four picks. But is he playing well
enough eye test wise to assume he'sgoing to close those big plays out.
He can't make the plays. It'sjust a matter of they affect the pocket
enough to I think they have abetter chance than they had last week where

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Trevor owrins cup of football out soquickly. But they have to hit Russell
Wilson. They just have to containhim. He's the runner that can scramble
and he likes to do that.Sometimes he's nothing as much as he used
to, but he's still capable.He's got the legs. He lost about
fifteen pounds from last season. Helooks good. And you know, the

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Texans, this is the first timethey're gonna have a healthy secondary with all
the guys that are projected to startat the end of the season, including
team captain Jimmy Ward back at safetylining up next to tail and Petrie,
and of course she has stopped DerekStingland Junior and Steven Nelson out there.
So this is improved, you know, health development for the Texans, and

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they've got to take advantage of that. They've got to play better. They
gotta play cohesively, and they gotto communicate better. That's been one of
the issues that they've had with thebig plays. It's not just oh they
can't match up, No, that'snot it. I mean they had some
issues at Nickel. They had somepass interference penalties, but yeah, they're
capable of doing it, and theyhave wide receivers and Jerry Judy Cortland said

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that you have to respect especially gudspeed and sudden size. So it's not
an easy matchup. It's a differentkind of matchup than last week against the
Jaguars. The broad of Aaron Wilsonjoins us for his weekly visit here on
Sports Talk seven ninety. Sean Salisburyschew the much Already people are going to
see what happened with the big playswith Lawrence four plays, those those explosives

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that we talk about the chunk playsand say, man, what's wrong with
the secondary? And I get it, But they also didn't hit him much
and didn't drag him to the ground. So doesn't it work hand in hand?
I mean no pass rush or nopressure, an average quarterback is going
to beat you. So does thatshift the narrative this week that you become
a better secondary with more pressure upfront? How are they going to design
pressure against Russ Wilson? So thosebig plays aren't allowed to happen like they

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did last week? Right, lookat baby go hand in hand and last
week. The defensive line and thefront seven in general, they didn't hold
up there into the bargain. Theynever sacked Trevor Lawrence, step drop or
what you know. They stuff toget there somehow. They've got to disrupt.
They've got to knock down fantastic atleast something. Billy hit him twice.

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So since you're playing with no rushand that's why he threw up a
tent or sixty pot yurds the holdinto line, they got to get home.
Somebody's got to make a play,and I think they can. Against
Denver for whatever reason, A lotof it had to do with Lawrence,
just his internal clock. They didn'thave any rush against him, and it

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wasn't like that the first game.They hit him a lot. I think
that was a big difference in thisfootball game. And as far as how
do you change it, I meana lot of it is just these guys
are not going to transform themselves inone week. They're gonna have the same
moves. It's just a different effort. It's a different energy, and you
had to learn something from what didn'twork the week before. So they're capable

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guys, like sounds thin. Gernardwho's gonna be a free agent of excellent
passers. You have seven sacks.He's certainly capable of getting there. Yep,
Collins, and so is will AndersonJunior. He's got to finish though,
and then there's their iffy on whetherSheldon Rankins is gonna play. He's
been working on the side. Hedidn't practice yesterday again, but he's getting

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better. He's get a little closerand we'll see if he's out there later
this morning if he returns to practice. Meanwhile, Tank Dell is looking good
to go, should practice again today. Had a minor tap injury. A
lot of consure that Dalton Schultz willmiss this game with a hamstring, and
that's their biggest injury question right now, is Schultz. So they have to

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go with Brevin Jordan and combination EricSalbert and possibly promote Dalton Keems. So
they've got a few injuries they're stilldealing with, but they're healthier than they
were last week, all right.Aaron Wilson joins us here eron let me
let me get I'm impressed with BobbySloan. Let me get to last week
just for one second again about theplay selection and was it CJ. Was

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it, Bobby? Was this thefirst read? And I would put the
ball in the hands of my quarterbackas well on third down, fourth out.
I think he's proven so far thathe'll make good, judicious decisions.
But let me take you back tothe fourth and one fade route to the
tight end? Was that the firstread? And I don't mind the throat.
I don't mind throwing it. Idon't like the low percentage of a
tight end running es for the fourthand one win. To me, that's

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a first or second down call.Why make that call? And how they
feel about it? Yeah, hesaid. We asked him about it,
probably slowly came sometimes in the pasthe said, you know, I would
have done this different that differently.This time he did not. He said,
I'm putting in the hands of ourquarterback, who's, as you know,

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having a record setting year. He'son pace for five thousand yards,
and everything was in his hands.He was the running game, he's ross
of the passing game. They abandonedthe run. They had eleven touches for
the backs for them Singletary and DamyPrice combined. I thought they should have
ran it. Everybody thinks that,of course, in RETROSPECTORIY, he did
the second guess very hard to callthe plays, but I thought they were

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low percentage. Why not run itat least once, you know, on
the third down, and then ifyou want to throw it on fourth go
ahead. But yeah, that tome was strange since you don't think you
can get a yard, and there'seven shorter passing plays you can try,
which basically like an extended handoff totry to get that yard. Absolutely,

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you know, but again this isn'tlike moment of true if he has to
say this or that. I mean, everybody can handle this press conference time
and they want that's his opinion.I think he just shoots it straight up
there. He's great with the pressconferences. I just don't think anyone agrees
with him. So yeah, hecan think definitely, they didn't make the
play, and now it's over andthey didn't make the kick, and now

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they're going back with the same kicker, Matt Avandola. They tried out a
couple kickers, Brett may Or TaylorRoslino mayhor Is Amandola's gonna be elevated on
Saturday. They may get Kayami Fairburnnext week back from the string quadriceps.
Obviously they need him. They needAmandola to get them through this last game.
That's the thing. That's six pointsright there, fifty yard and the

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fifty eight yard and they got toget him closer. There's no way they
should be kicking. So they're bringingout bringing Amadola back to kick again this
weekend after after trying people out,thought he was going to be out,
brought him back. He's back undercontract. He practiced Wednesday, Thursday,
he'll practice against today and they walkthrough tomorrow. He's on the practice squad

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back after they cut him from thefifty three procedurally and so now he'll go
up tomorrow. They'll elevate him officially. They don't usually do it on Fridays.
They'll do it tomorrow and then hewill kick for them and this could
be his last week here, asFairburn is ready to go to look for
a kicking change in the next week. But this is a huge game.

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I mean, there's so many playoffstakes for this one. They really need
this game. And they're facing aBroncos and that's red hot on a five
game winning straight. So this looktough. Oh yeah, tough matchup,
and I think Amandola can make thekicks, shorter kicks, but he is
three for six. He's missed hislast three kicks since going three for three
and winning the game in Cincinnati.So they got to you know, special

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teams. It's part of it too. They've got to pull up into the
bargain. And then we look atoffense defense. You know, since we've
discussed I think it's going to takeall three elements to beat a very good
Broncos team that's so well coached bySean Payton, who should probably be in
the Coach of the Year conversation forleaving him on this resurgent thing if they

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want up making the playoffs, whichthey could, and he's got to be
in that conversation just like Anika Ryansbecause they're both doing a great job.
Yep. Thirty seconds, my man. What we talk about all the great
things that they're doing this year,and you know they've lost some games,
but they've won some against some plusfive hundred teams. What is the biggest
in that in that locker room orin that meeting room. What's the biggest

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been the biggest issue on this teamthis year? What's the biggest disappointment for
the Texans. You know, headingtowards Week thirteen, there's many good things
that happened Sean. They are aninconsistent football team, different problems every single
week. In most cases, there'sbeen something that could have been a lot
better. And when they started playingconsistent football, that's when I think they'll

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turn the corner and they'll be adivision champion and they'll be a playoff team,
all those good things. They're wayahead of the curve of where they
were expected to be. But nowthe expectations have change, and I just
think, you know, some guys, it's a performance business, and that's
even been communicated to the players.They will start changing guys out. You'll

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start seeing lineup changes with this teamin the very near future. If guys
don't perform, I can expect somechanges that they expect. They expect guys,
they're holding them to a higher standard. Right now, I can tell
you that this coaching staff do theyexpect better. And that's a great sign
of progress. Right You've been onteams before showing, you know, expectation,

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how low. Maybe some things slidenot at all. Here, No,
they expect and it's a very demandingenvironment, which is good. That's
what players want. They want tobe coach card and that's what they are.
Pako Ryans. He wants more fromthese guys aside from talent. The
two biggest reasons this team has turnedit around and will turn it around quicker
and be in playoff talks again nextyear is the head coach's accountability he's putting

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on this organization and the quarterbacks poisedthrough good and difficult circumstances. Both of
them. You can feed off greatstuff. Brother, This is a huge,
monster game. Yep. I lookforward to it and we'll look forward
to next week. My man.Thanks, thanks, I appreciate you.
That's great. Aaron Wilson will comeon back and discuss these Texans and for

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the same page, inconsistencies but preventthe big play. But that's just not
on the secondary. Got to generatemore pressure with four and possibly five upfront.
Sports Talk seven ninety