***TNF IN THE SWAMP - HOU @ CIN***

***HOUSTON TEXANS @ CINCINATTI BENGALS***

An AFC battle headlines the Prime Time stage tonight when the Houston Texans head on the road to take on the Cincinnati Bengals in a rematch of last season's ugly 12-10 Texan victory on Xmas Eve. Our beloved "Color Rush" will also be officially back as it looks like the NFL will continue with that new tradition for another year. Where I do think some team's Color Rush uniforms could be much better, I do like it and hope it stays. It's fun and different. Speaking of different, both of these teams will be looking to put on a different performance and hoping for a different result after their week 1 disasters. Both teams had hosted one of their Divisional rivals, but yikes....both got beat down badly, at home against teams they were expected to beat, the Jaguars & Ravens.

I personally leaned the Jaguars to cover the points last week, but with all the post hurricane emotions in the building and in my opinion two terrible QBs in Bortles and Savage, I knew it would be determined by the defenses and wow did the Jags D put on a show! Jacksonville finally has all their former high draft picks and offseason acquisitions healthy and on the field together for their defense and they looked dominant. It was against Savage however, an anemic starting NFL QB. Needless to say it didn't take too long for Houston Head Coach Bill O'Brien to hook em and put in the Rookie Deshaun Watson in the second half. The kid looked green, but definitely an improvement over Savage and I expect him to become a solid starting QB for the Bulls as the season progresses. He gets the nod tonight in Cincy in his first start and what also happens to be his 22nd Birthday coincidentally. What better birthday present than to get an upset win on the Prime Time stage in your first career start?! Not so fast my friends. I think Watson unfortunately will suffer a not so welcome, welcoming to the NFL tonight against a wounded and dangerous Bengals team.

Both of these teams are dealing with new pieces and absence of key starters. The Bengals are still without their bad boy MLB Vontaze Burfict due to suspension and now the Texans will also be without a key LB in Brian Cushing who was just popped for violating league PED policy, again...no surprise there. That being said both defenses remain stout with enough talent in all three levels to be fully capable of performing well tonight. So keeping it simple and chalking that side of the ball up as a wash, that leaves us with offense vs offense, and more specifically veteran QB Andy Dalton vs Rookie Deshaun Watson. The edge the Bengals have here is that they are home again and have not had to travel anywhere, whereas the Texans have been running around since the Hurricane hit and now are forced to go to Cincy on short rest all while getting their Rookie QB ready to go.

I believe last weeks game for Cincy was a bit of an anomaly. I still expect this team to be much better than they were a season ago and get back into the mix. When analyzing the week 1 performances, the Bengals I feel like just weren't ready for the Ravens. Baltimore is extremely well coached and can be deceiving. Their defense is on the rise once again, especially in the secondary. Yes Dalton threw a plethora of interceptions but many of those were off of tipped passes. The Ravens hadn't won in Cincy in quite a bit and I knew something stunk about that game, hence it being the only 1 I was on the right side of last Sunday afternoon! With the mysterious situation of QB Joe Flacco and some of his new weapons in the WR core, I think the Bengals were just caught off guard as weird as that is to say since it was the season opener where nobody should NOT be ready to go. In the words of Rex Ryan last Monday Night Football, "sometimes you're the dog and sometimes you're the fire hydrant" -- HAHA! I think that was the case when looking at this game, it was just one of those that sometimes happen where the ball just doesn't bounce your way, and everything seems to go right for your opponent. Chalk it up as an ugly lesson and move on. The best medicine for that type of outing is a short week and a Prime Time game at home to get the bad taste out of your mouth.

The Texans on the other hand looked every bit of a mess in their opener against Jacksonville. It still remains to be seen how much of that offensive chaos was QB Savage's fault and how much of it was the offensive line. Either way, they will be tested tonight against a Bengals defensive line led by DT Geno Atkins who I think will give Watson plenty of trouble in his debut. Basically, I think it will take a game at least for this offense to now click with a new QB in there and for everybody to get some chemistry flowing. Unfortunately Houston has had quite the whirlwind with everything going on in both the real world and professionally, and with a trip to Foxborough on deck in what will be a rematch of last season's playoff game, I think it will be hard for the Texans to be completely locked in here tonight and match the intensity that the pissed off and embarrassed Bengals will surely have here.

I think the Prime Time theme so far follows suit as I expect another Rookie RB in Joe Mixon to be unleashed here in this one for the Bengals. I have a feeling the youngster will have himself a game in a bit of a do-it all role both rushing and receiving. With Dalton now having his TE back in Tyler Eifert in addition to AJ Green I feel as though after getting the kinks out last week that they should be on the same page more tonight whereas the Texans will still be trying to find a groove offensively. Houston will make progress, just not enough to keep within the number here in the jungle tonight. BENGALS-5.5