The Houston Texans confirmed that Mario Williams will be placed on IR and will be out for the rest of the season. Williams injured his pectoral muscle, with many speculating that he suffered a tear. Williams has been a dominant pass rusher for the Texans throughout his career and this year he had five sacks. Williams played defensive end in the 4-3 alignment, but this season he made the move to outside linebacker in Wade Phillips’ 3-4 defense. The transition had been going well until the injury.

Coach Gary Kubiak reacted to the news on the team’s official website:

I feel so bad for Mario because man, he’s been such a heck of a player, and what we’re doing to me is really going to blossom his career from now on. I think he had really taken to the position he’s playing. He was improving every day in practice, improving in every game and really enjoying – I think I’ve never seen him so upbeat about what was going on – and to lose him on a freak play, it doesn’t look like much at all.

The Texans can’t seem to catch a break. The team was poised for a breakout season with the Colts floundering in Peyton Manning’s absence, and now they lose their best player on defense.

The Houston Chronicle’s John McClain writes that the Texans will hire former Cowboys’ head coach Wade Phillips, although not to replace Gary Kubiak.

Owner Bob McNair’s game plan is to keep Kubiak and hire Phillips to run the defense. There’s still a chance that an embarrassing loss to the depleted Jaguars this Sunday would cost Kubiak his job, but McNair likes Kubiak’s offense and wants to keep him around.

Bringing in Phillips certainly makes sense on the surface. The Texans rank 29th in total defense and their secondary needs plenty of work. Phillips lost his touch this season in Dallas but in previous years, his defenses always performed well. He also has more experience and a better track record than current coordinator Frank Bush, who oversees the worst secondary in the league.

Now, will it work? Who knows. There are plenty of pundits who think Kubiak is a lame duck head coach and the Texans should just cut bait and move on. There’s plenty of evidence to suggest that he doesn’t have what it takes to get the Texans to the next level, although his offenses have been very good in Houston. He also has already worked with Phillips when the two were with the Broncos in the late 90s, so maybe the partnership will breed success.

We’ll see if the reports are true and McNair does bring in Phillips. Either way, he needs to do something to turn around the losing mentality in Houston.

Texans fans are mad as hell and they’re not going to take it anymore.

According to the Houston Chronicle and ESPN.com, fans who believe coach Gary Kubiak should be fired are organizing a rally for Sunday’s game to make their point.

Fans Brad White and Scott Carter are hoping the demonstration before Sunday’s season finale against the Jacksonville Jaguars will help convince team owner Bob McNair to change coaches, according to the report.

“I want to stress that I don’t want people to come out to bash Kubiak,” White told the Chronicle. “We don’t want vulgar signs out there. We’re not there to bash him. We’re there to say that we want a change.”

“Five years has been enough,” White said of Kubiak’s coaching tenure in Houston, according to the report. “We’ve regressed this year. Minus a couple players, we believe the players aren’t responding to [the coaching staff] anymore.”

I don’t disagree that Kubiak should be fired – his record (36-43) through five seasons speaks for itself. Many people believe that this team has had enough talent to at least make one playoff appearance in the past few years but it just hasn’t happened.

That said, the Texans had issues coming into the season that people wanted to look past because of their explosive offense. Everyone knew the secondary was highly inexperienced as a whole and would need time to gel. So it shouldn’t be surprising that opposing teams were able to shred Houston through the air on a weekly basis.

Everyone got excited when the Texans started 4-2, as well they should have. That win against the Colts in Week 1 was impressive and they showed some grit on the road in Week 2 against the Redskins.

But when a team has issues, they eventually come to the surface and that’s what happened in Houston. It didn’t help that Andre Johnson was banged up for most of the year, or that Owen Daniels was still recovering from knee surgery, or that Matt Schaub showed an inability to finish games strong. The wheels came off and unfortunately for Kubiak, he’ll be the one that has to pay for that.

But just because the Texans make a coaching change doesn’t mean that all of their problems will vanish. This isn’t a team that’s one missing piece away, which has to be disheartening to fans.

We are a quarter of the way through the NFL season, and there are lots of wacky things happening. The Chiefs are 3-0 and the only undefeated team. That’s a far cry from last year, when the Colts and Saints were unbeaten almost all the way to the end of the 2009 campaign. There are also some interesting candidates emerging for MVP consideration, as well as for Coach of the Year and Rookie of the Year. And like last year, we’ll start to analyze them in power rankings fashion. For this week and maybe the next few, we’ll put this in one post and give three names for each category. Around the halfway point of the season, more candidates will emerge so we will separate things out. Sound good? Right. Let’s go……..

MVP Power Rankings

1. Michael Vick, Philadelphia Eagles—Do we even have to spell this out? He steps in for Kevin Kolb in Week 1 and almost leads the Eagles to victory against the Packers. Then he wins against Detroit and Jacksonville before having his ribs crushed on a meaningless play vs. Washington last Sunday, knocking him out of the game early. Kolb comes back in, and the Eagles lose. Vick is averaging 200 yards passing per game, has 6 TDs and no interceptions, and is also averaging 7.2 yards per rush on 26 carries and one TD on the ground. He has a QB rating of 108.8 while Kolb’s is 71.1. Simply put, this team is dangerous with Vick, and not scaring anyone without him. That’s the very definition of MVP.

2. Arian Foster, Houston Texans—The Texans were tied with Oakland 14-14 last week in the third quarter, and Foster had been benched for personal reasons by Gary Kubiak. He came in mid-way through the second quarter, and while Derrick Ward had been carrying the load acceptably, Foster opened things up with a 74-yard touchdown, which ignited the Texans to 17 unanswered points. He has 689 all-purpose yards (172 yards per game) and 5 total TDs. That’s not just fantasy magic, that’s plain magic.

3. Clay Matthews, Green Bay Packers—Kevin Greene is the linebackers’ coach for the Packers, and that guy was nasty when he played. He’s made Matthews his pet project, and Matthews has responded to the tune of 7 sacks through four games. That’s on pace to shatter Michael Strahan’s NFL record of 22.5 sacks. Matthews just has a sick nose for the ball, too, and is around it on almost every play. And the Pack needs him, because with no running game to speak of, the pressure can’t all be on Aaron Rodgers and his receivers.

Honorable mention: Antonio Gates, San Diego Chargers

COY Power Rankings

1. Steve Spagnuolo, St. Louis Rams—The Rams were giving up 31 points per game in 2009, and so far this season they are giving up 13 per game. Spags is a defensive guru…remember the 2007 Giants and what they did to Jeff Garcia, Tony Romo, Brett Favre and Tom Brady in the postseason? Well, he’s finally got that D humming and his upstart Rams, led by rookie QB Sam Bradford, are 2-2 and atop a weak NFC West. It’s too early to anoint this team a division winner, but it’s not nearly out of the realm, either.

2. Todd Haley, Kansas City Chiefs—You can’t really not put a 3-0 team here when nobody else is undefeated. This, despite the fact that the guy is saving Jamaal Charles touches like he’s hoarding cookies under his bed.

3. Rex Ryan, New York Jets—His team is 3-1, including 3-0 in the division, and the only loss being by a 10-9 score to the Ravens. They have scored 106 points while giving up 61, a league best differential of 45 points. The Jets are for real, and they can back up all that swagger that trickles down from their head coach.

Honorable mention:Lovie Smith, Chicago Bears; Gary Kubiak, Houston Texans

ROY Power Rankings

1. Sam Bradford, St. Louis Rams—Bradford was a winner at Oklahoma and he carries himself like a winner in St. Louis, something this franchise desperately needed at the quarterback position. Bradford has thrown for 944 yards in four games with 6 TDs and 6 interceptions. That’s a pace for 3776 yards with 24 TDs and 24 picks. If this kid can limit his picks, and lead his team to a division title, he’ll practically be a lock for the Pro Bowl. But that’s still a big “if” at this point.

2. Ndamukong Suh, Detroit Lions—We all know he’s a beast, but he’s already racked up 15 tackles and 3 sacks. The Lions still have a ways to go on defense, but this young anchor has already made an impact.

3. Jahvid Best, Detroit Lions—Despite being slowed by injury, Best won the starting RB gig in Detroit and has responded with and average of 98 all-purpose yards per game with 5 touchdowns. Not only is this something the Lions haven’t had the likes of since *maybe* Barry Sanders, but it takes so much pressure off of Calvin Johnson to carry the offense.

Honorable mention: Rolando McClain, Oakland Raiders

Leading the way here, are, not surprisingly, the two coaches who have unblemished records. But remember how the Giants started out 11-1 last year and then finished 12-5, including an early playoff exit? The Titans did something similar. So nothing is guaranteed, but these guys are sure off to good starts and deserve to top the list. The boy wonder in Denver, however, fell under scrutiny after losing to Baltimore, but if he bounces back against Pittsburgh, look out.

1. Sean Payton, New Orleans Saints—The talk has begun on whether or not the Saints can run the table. Think about that for a minute. Did anyone see that coming at the start of the season?

2. Jim Caldwell, Indianapolis Colts—Everyone is saying to wait until the Colts play a real opponent, but still, you don’t get to 7-0 by being lucky. Still, should be interesting to see how that upcoming Sunday nighter against New England shakes out.

3. Brad Childress, Minnesota Vikings—Yeah, the Vikings are pretty good. And we’ll keep saying Childress looks like a genius for bringing back #4 until #4 proves us otherwise.

4. Josh McDaniels, Denver Broncos—Finally a blemish on the Broncos’ record in Baltimore, but it was lopsided enough to start wondering about just how talented this upstart team is.

5. Marvin Lewis, Cincinnati Bengals—A bye week keeps Marvin safe, but a rematch against Baltimore looms, and then a road game in Pittsburgh.

Honorable mention: Bill Belichick, Patriots; Gary Kubiak, Texans; Andy Reid, Eagles; Wade Phillips, Cowboys (well, he’s 5-2 and climbing back into contention!); Mike Tomlin, Steelers

Sean Payton has climbed into the top spot this week after his team had a riveting come-from-behind win in Miami, and by come-from-behind we mean they were trailing 24-3 late in the second half and won the game 46-34. That means for the rest of the game, they score was 43-10 New Orleans. Just sick.

1. Sean Payton, New Orleans Saints—Sorry Josh McDaniels, but while you were on bye Payton’s team had a remarkable comeback against the Dolphins on the road. They appear to be the 2007 Patriots, and for that we have to give the coach top props.

2. Josh McDaniels, Denver Broncos—We know the Broncos upset the Cowboys and Patriots, but the next two weeks they face Baltimore and Pittsburgh. We’ll see if the boy wonder is still sitting pretty after that.

3. Jim Caldwell, Indianapolis Colts—The rookie coach is still waiting for his first loss. Good for him.

4. Brad Childress, Minnesota Vikings—Okay, so the Vikings are human. However, I think Childress’ investment will pay off this weekend in Green Bay.

5. Marvin Lewis, Cincinnati Bengals—Regained confidence by thrashing the Bears and remained tied for first with the Steelers in the tough AFC North.

Honorable mention: Bill Belichick, Patriots; Mike Smith, Falcons; Gary Kubiak, Texans; Ken Whisenhunt, Cardinals