Last week on our "In the Lab" podcast, John Harris and I came up with the offense and specialists for our all-time Texans 53-man roster. We chose a kicker, punter, long snapper and two coverage guys, and then had 24 offensive players. You can listen to it below, and read about it **HERE**.

We had a few stipulations: you must have played more than one year for the Texans OR been a Texan in 2018 and under contract to be a Texan in 2019. So Tyrann Mathieu, who was an excellent addition at safety last year, but is now a Chief, is not eligible.

As I stated in last week's article: Not just the starting 11 on each side of the ball. We have that. But we also have the specialists, and the backups and we've designed a roster that we'd want to take into a season. It's also a roster that includes some names that we project are going to be special. You'll see what I mean.

With 29 already chosen, that left us 24 to choose on defense.

We started up front and went with players who were defensive ends, outside linebackers and interior linemen. In the secondary, a few guys played at both corner and safety, so we lumped them in together.

Defensive front (9): J.J. Watt, Jadeveon Clowney, Mario Williams, Antonio Smith, D.J. Reader, Gary Walker, Seth Payne, Connor Barwin, Whitney Mercilus

Linebackers (6): DeMeco Ryans, Brian Cushing, Benardrick McKinney, Jamie Sharper, Jay Foreman, Zach Cunningham

Defensive backs (9): Johnathan Joseph, Aaron Glenn, Dunta Robinson, A.J. Bouye, Danieal Manning, Justin Reid, Glover Quin, Kareem Jackson, Marcus Coleman