The Sports Xchange

HOUSTON — Houston Texans head coach Bill O’Brien said he won’t declare who his starting quarterback will be this week and says everyone can learn whether it’s Brian Hoyer or Ryan Mallett on Sunday afternoon against the Carolina Panthers.

“I’m not going to make a big quarterback announcement,” O’Brien said. “You’ll have to wait until the first play of the Carolina game. Every decision is in the best interest of the team. Whatever decision is made, whoever starts the game against Carolina, it’s always in the best interest of the team.

“It’s a big-picture decision. It’s not just one play. It’s what we think is the best thing for the team. We have two quarterbacks here. We think both of them are good players. Both of them can get better.”

O’Brien said he knows who will be starting. Hoyer is expected to retain his job, at least for this week.

Downcast in the locker room after the game, Hoyer was visibly disappointed about losing the game to the Kansas City Chiefs. Hoyer was replaced by Mallett in the fourth quarter after completing 18 of 34 passes for 236 yards, one touchdown, one interception and a lost fumble as he was sacked four times.

Hoyer finished with a 72.7 passer rating. It’s unclear what the Texans plan to do against the Panthers, but Mallett gave O’Brien plenty to think about after completing 8 of 13 passes for 98 yards, one touchdown, a two-point conversion pass and only being sacked once as he had a 110.4 passer rating.

“That’s coach’s decision, and I can see why he did that,” Hoyer said Sunday. “It couldn’t have gone any worse, you know what I mean. Obviously, I feel terrible. I feel like I let this whole entire organization down. It just went from bad to worse. I really just couldn’t fight back. That’s coach O’Brien’s decision. I respect the hell out of him and whatever he feels is best for the team I think that’s what he will do and we’ll just see where it goes.

“It just started bad. Poor execution, lack of communication and you never want to come out and start the game that way. I think that was bad. There were some good drives. There were times where we were able to put the foot on the pedal and get things going. The other times, they just sputtered out and you can’t have that.”

Mallett was pleased overall with his performance, but not the outcome of the game. “I was ready to go,” he said. “I just got warmed up and knew what I was asked to do.”

When asked if he feels like he has an opportunity now to be the starter, Mallett replied: “I’m going to prepare every week like the starter, whether that’s the case or not. That’s the only thing I can do to help this football team win games. That’s why I’m here. That’s all I care about.”

When asked if he thinks the team believes in him, Mallett said: “I believe in myself. That’s all I’m worried about.”

From the sideline, Mallett had an excellent vantage point to diagnose what was going wrong with the Texans’ lackluster offense.

“I mean we struggled,” he said. “We’ve got to play a lot better. We’ve got to come out, we can’t have penalties, we can’t turn the ball over as a unit. That’s not putting the blame on anybody. We have to play better as a unit, get the defense off the field quicker. They were on the field too much.”

REPORT CARD VS. CHIEFS

PASSING OFFENSE: C-minus — Quarterback Brian Hoyer was replaced by Ryan Mallett after throwing an interception and losing a fumble. Mallett sparked the offense with a touchdown and a two-point conversion in a comeback attempt that fell short.

RUSHING OFFENSE: D-plus — The Texans’ running game was limited to 98 yards on 21 carries. Although they averaged 4.7 yards per carry in a committee approach led by Alfred Blue’s nine carries and 42 yards, they clearly missed Arian Foster and failed in short-yardage situations.

PASS DEFENSE: D – Tight end Travis Kelce dominated the secondary with six catches for 106 yards and two touchdowns on six targets. Running back Jamaal Charles caught five passes for 42 yards on swing passes with one touchdown. The Texans only sacked Alex Smith twice and hit him three times, all by star defensive end J.J. Watt.

RUSH DEFENSE: B — The Texans limited Jamaal Charles to 57 rushing yards on 16 carries, 3.6 per carry. The Chiefs rushed for just 97 yards on 32 carries, a 3.0 average per run.

SPECIAL TEAMS: F – Randy Bullock missed an extra point. The punt coverage was shoddy. Punt returner Keith Mumphery muffed a punt, but recovered it. He averaged just 3.5 yards on four returns.

COACHING: C-minus — Texans head coach Bill O’Brien and his staff were clearly outcoached by Chiefs head coach Andy Reid, who executed a sound game plan. The Texans are involved in a quarterback controversy on offense. Defensively, they need to develop other players beyond J.J. Watt and need better assignment football and reactions to play-action fakes.