Matchup analysis
Before kickoff our model projected Texans 24, Bills 22 at Reliant Stadium in Week 1. That is a genuine toss-up: Texans win about 55% of the time by our estimate, with a projected margin of 1.5 points and 46.3 combined points. Tags: coin flip.
The Bills are 5-1, scoring 32.8 and allowing 28.5 points per game (+4.3 per game). The Texans are 2-5, scoring 23.6 and allowing 24.3 points per game (-0.7 per game).
The most lopsided unit battle: Bills' elite offense (1st of 32, worth about 28.9 points against an average defense) against Texans' strong defense (9th). Texans' middle-of-the-pack offense (15th of 32, worth about 23 points against an average defense) has the clear edge over Bills' below-average defense (24th); that mismatch is where most of Texans' projected points come from.
The NFL is noisy: even a well-rated projection misses the final margin by about 10 points on average. Based on how real results have scattered around our numbers, the final margin should land somewhere between Bills by 15 and Texans by 18 about 80% of the time.
The Texans get about 2.6 points for playing at home. That home edge is the difference: on a neutral field Bills would be favoured by 1.1. The game is on CBS.
Result: Bills 36, Texans 31. Bills won, so this goes down as a miss for the model (margin off by 6.5 points).
More: Bills schedule · Texans schedule · all Week 1 projections
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Projections are statistical estimates for entertainment and analysis only. They are not betting advice and nothing here guarantees any result.
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