Terrance’s Take: Texans’ 0-4 start comes with frustration, no easy answers
Houston, now it’s time to panic.
The Texans are truly in trouble, and despite a play or two being the difference between a 3-1 start and the 0-4 reality, the issue runs deeper than those handful of plays. Their problem is a lack of continuity.
“You stick together, and you keep going. That’s what it is,” Texans head coach DeMeco Ryans said when I asked him how he deals with starting the season 0-4. “All these games, we’ve been in these games. We just got to find a way to finish these games.
“That’s what it is. It’s 0-4, that’s our record. That’s what it says who we are right now, but how do you come out of it, it’s what I told our guys, you stick together. There’s no pointing fingers, no blaming. ‘Hey, you look within yourself. DeMeco, what do you have to do better to get it corrected?’ That’s where I start with myself. How can I get it all corrected?”
Historically, NFL teams don’t bounce back from four straight losses to start the season, and things work out to the point of making the postseason. Only one team has ever bounced back from a 0-4 and made the playoffs, and that was the San Diego Chargers in 1992.
“I don’t think anybody in our building has a mindset of not finishing. I think it’s an execution thing. I think we just have to study more.”
Texans quarterback C.J. Stroud
So, it’s time for reassessment, beginning with Sunday’s battle for the bottom of the AFC South at Tennessee.
“I’m not concerned about it right now,” Ryans said in the aftermath of Sunday’s 34-30 loss to the Cowboys. “I’m concerned about finding a way to play better, coach better, and go beat the Tennessee Titans.”
His players feel the same way.
“It’s tough being 0-4. It’s tough. But right now, the mindset is to be 1-0,” said receiver Nico Collins, who bounced back from a hamstring injury to come up with seven catches for 118 yards and two touchdowns in the loss to the Cowboys. “We have to move forward, go to the next week, and we have to look back on this and watch that film.”
The film will show a disconnect and a lack of cohesion across all phases for the Texans right now.
When the defense plays well enough to win, the offense is lacking, and when the offense and defense put forth an impressive effort, special teams fall apart.
During Sunday’s frustrating 34-30 meltdown against the Cowboys, the Texans’ defense let down an impressive offensive effort. We thought the defense was poised to be the strength of the Texans again, but that has been far from the case consistently.
The unit that was supposed to be the best in the NFL, just hasn’t appeared to be that this season. It’s hard to put your finger on because while Ryans says this is a different team than last year, I just don’t see a huge difference in the personnel on the field.
What gives?
Defensive end Will Anderson Jr. is still a big-time playmaker; Azeez Al-Shaair, when healthy, is still making tackles all over the field; and when the pass rush is strong, the secondary is more than capable.
But there is a disconnect or a lack of chemistry on that unit. So far, the unit has given up 36 points to Buffalo, 20 points to Cincinnati, 19 points to Indianapolis, and then allowed way too much of Dak Prescott to CeeDee Lamb. It almost seemed anti-climactic that after C.J. Stroud and the offense had put the Texans ahead 30-27 with 2:23 remaining in the game, a 12-yard touchdown pass from Prescott to Lamb would rob the Texans of a must-win.
While most head coaches would have deemed Sunday’s fiasco at Reliant Stadium a team loss, Ryans put that one squarely where it belongs.
“Yeah, today it was not a great finish by our team defensively. It was not good enough,” Ryans said. “If the offense goes out and plays like they played to give us 30 points, defensively, you have to find a way to close that game out.
“It was disappointing that we’ve been in three games that way, where the offense has done a great job and we haven’t been able to close it out there in the second half. We’ve got to look at it all and see what changes we need to make and what we need to fix.”
Indeed, it does not need fixing. Right now, 0-4, and it’s especially frustrating because these last three losses could have been wins if not for a few mental mistakes here and there.
The Texans were hit with 13 penalties for -90 yards, and you must think that if those penalties didn’t stall offensive drives or prolonged Dallas’ drives, we might all be feeling a different way about the Texans’ trajectory this season.
But we are dealing with the stark reality of 0-4. The Texans are dealing with ways to incrementally improve.
“Just finishing better, executing better,” Stroud said to the Defender. “I think those are the two main things. I think we’re practicing well. I think this game (Dallas), we were able to create explosives, but we have to be able to finish. That’s the main thing.”
