5 players who Houston Texans need to be great in 2020

1. QB Deshaun Watson

John Madden once said, in so many words as I liberally paraphrase, that “a quarterback is a great deodorant.” Nowhere is that more true in the NFL right now than in Houston with Watson.

Watson has had to overcome the incompetence of Bill O’Brien, as an in-game coach and decision maker (remember Tom Savage started Week 1 of Watson’s rookie season). More recently, he’s had to overcome O’Brien’s work as a general manager too. Less than a year after securing a high-end left tackle in Laremy Tunsil, however smart the trade was in terms of all the picks sent to Miami, DeAndre Hopkins was traded for pennies on the dollar with three years left on his contract.

The Texans’ defense was not the same after J.J. Watt was injured (again) last year. The team won four of the last five games Watson played though, to reach 10-5 and render Week 17 meaningless as Houston won the AFC South.

Watson has not missed a game due to injury since his rookie season, so durability concerns can be mostly set aside despite taking a fair chunk of sacks (44 last year, 106 over the last two seasons). But the unequivocal truth is Watson has to be on the field and brilliant in 2020, or the Texans’ season (and O’Brien’s job?) will go up in smoke.