Game #76- Houston Texans

September 29, 2013 Houston Texans vs. Seattle Seahawks Reliant Stadium Holy crap, what a stadium. As I walked into Reliant Field, a strange thing hit me. I have never heard tailgate parties all rocking out to country music. I know, I know, I am in Texas. But country doesn’t seem like the type of music to get you pumped up for a football game. Anyway, as I headed toward the stadium it was once again miserably hot and humid. It had been raining all morning and I couldn’t be happier to be in a retractable roof stadium that was blasting AC. Inside, the two largest LCD screens in the country were hung up on both ends of the field (yes they are larger than the Dallas Cowboys) and inside it was just massive. As I headed to my seat I knew I had to make friends with the people around me because I needed a hard ticket stub. I ended up chatting to a bunch of Seattle fans who came from all over to watch the game. One from Seattle, one from Vancouver (yes we talked hockey), one who lives in Mission Viejo…how weird, and a father from Hawaii who I later found out was Seattle Seahawks center Max Unger’s dad. They were cool dudes and I bet they were stoked with the final score of the game. The Texans had complete control of the game until the second half. QB Matt Schaub was uncharacteristically reliable, Ariane Foster and Ben Tate were rumbling through defensive lines, Andre Johnson was catching everything around him, and JJ Watts was a beast for the Houston defense. On the other had, sophomore QB and legitimate star in the NFL Russell Wilson was lackluster for the Hawks while Marshawn Lynch was mediocre at best. Houston went into the half with a comfortable 20-3 lead and the home town fans were stoked. That was the first half… Quickly in the 4th quarter the tides changed and the Seahawks were a different team. Wilson is not a very accurate passer and is rarely a deep threat, but if you don’t pressure him he is way to fast to catch. Any play action call and he can be off for 20 yards in less than a few seconds. That ability really screwed with the Texans. You could feel the energy in the building slowly starting to die off and when it was 20-13 with only two and a half minutes left you almost knew something was going to happen. Schaub was doing the right thing by handing off the ball every time to Foster, but for some stupid reason the Texans decided to throw on a 3rd down and Richard Sherman stepped up to intercept the ball and actually took it all the way back for a 58 yard pick six. It took a while in OT, but Steven Hauschka kicked a 45 yard field goal to give the Hawks a 23-20 come back win sending home the 80,000 fans in shock (well maybe closer to 60,000, there were a lot of Seahawk fans in the stands). It was a good game, exciting as hell in the end, and maybe a little karma for their comeback win against the Chargers in week 1. I walked around the stadium but did not see any cool fan exhibits. Maybe because I couldn’t get to the lower bowls, but up top there really wasn’t much to look at. I haven’t seen a football stadium outside of Green Bay that has anything worth looking for. An interesting side note. Recently there has been a big push for e-cigarettes. They only produce vapor and often smells really good. The dude next to me was smoking the entire game, and for the first time ever I didn’t really care. I know smoking and nicotine is bad for you, but if it doesn’t affect me then go for it. In fact ban all real cigarettes and only sell the vapor versions