Houston Texans News: Anthony Miller Returns to Practice, Tyrod Taylor Named QB1

There’s going to be football this week, starting with Thursday night in Tampa Bay and extended all the way to February. Your Houston Texans’ first opponent is the Jacksonville Jaguars, who will unveil their generational quarterback prospect Trevor Lawrence. Ahead of this game, the Texans unleashed a slew of news.

First, Houston finally named Tyrod Taylor their starting quarterback. After a few weeks of open competition and maybe some Deshaun Watson holding out, the Texans finally made the inevitable a reality and announced Taylor will start on Sunday at NRG Stadium gainst the Jaguars.

There’s more news on the depth chart. The Texans are prepared to start Charlie Heck at right tackle. Marcus Cannon sat out last season, was injured this preseason, and missed the entirety of training camp. Cannon is rustier than a Mojave mining operation. For whatever reason, the Texans are dead set on Tytus Howard playing guard, instead of right tackle, a more premium position that maximizes what Howard is best at—pass protecting on the edge.

There’s a roadblock to this plan, though. Charlie Heck caught a case of COVID-19 and will be on the COVID reserve list. There’s a chance Heck can return before Sunday thanks to the the joys of vaccination, but his dream that just came true may have to wait. If Heck doesn’t turn in the required negative tests, Cannon may start at right tackle or Houston may do the right thing and just play Howard at this spot.

On the injury front, the big news is Anthony Miller is back at practice. After dislocating his shoulder in Houston’s first preseason game, there were concerns Miller would have to go on Injured Reserve and miss an extended amount of time. Instead, Miller is practicing and should be considered week to week.

Whitney Mercilus, Maliek Collins, and Jonathan Greenard are back at practice too after missing the last few sessions.

The Texans are set and ready to go for the 2021 season. They’ll host Jacksonville on September 12th at 12 p.m. Central.