DeMeco Ryans Defends Texans' Offensive Line Struggles

The Houston Texans entered Week 1 of the new NFL season facing multiple questions about what was to come on the offensive line.

After their offseason was headlined by trading away star tackle Laremy Tunsil, bundled with multiple other moves upfront, the Texans had four new starters on their offensive line from how they entered last season, combining both young and veteran talents, all in hopes of providing a better layer of protection in front of C.J. Stroud.

And for the first week of action, it wasn't totally perfect for Stroud and this offense. The Texans quarterback was sacked three times to lose 37 yards, and ultimately, it was a matchup that was won out by a tough and budding Rams defensive front.

But Texans head coach DeMeco Ryans isn't too concerned about the Texans' offensive line one week deep into the season. In fact, when watching back the film, he even sees some areas in which Stroud himself can improve to limit those sacks in the backfield.

"I thought our offensive line did a good job," Ryans said during Thursday's presser. "In the game, we can help ourselves by stepping up in the pocket on a couple of the sacks that happened. But, I thought we had clean pockets vs. the Rams as well. There are a lot of good things that happened vs. the Rams. They made more plays than we made. That's the bottom line."

The outcome wasn't just centric on one factor upfront for Ryans. Instead, it's a collective effort. The Texans had an opportunity in the fourth quarter to come away with a win, and instead, they fell short to a team that made more plays, and made them when they counted.

Ryans then also turned to what the Texans could've done better on the other side of the field within the red zone defensively, noting that had Houston limited the Rams' scoring opportunities at the end of drives, they might be in a much better situation heading into Week 2.

"We hurt ourselves in the red zone defensively. We were down in the red zone three times. Two times, we gave up touchdowns in the red zone. We stop them, we make them kick field goals there, we're sitting here telling a different story."

It's easy to place the blame upfront on the offensive line, especially after the narrative the group faced last season and across the summer. The offensive line on Sunday also faced multiple injuries to make their day a bit more challenging for both Stroud and the unit's effectiveness as a whole.