Texans Preparing to Roll With Davis Mills vs. Jaguars

With a vital divisional battle with the Jacksonville Jaguars looming into view, it's plain to see that rolling with backup Davis Mills is just about the only card Ryans has left to flip over.

The trouble is, the Denver Broncos’ impressive defense just offered up a solid blueprint to nullify any surprise element the Texans’ second-string passer might be able to spring.

Some shrewd halftime adjustments saw the Broncos utilize a whole lot more zone coverage, and Mills really struggled to work things out.

DeMeco Ryans Says Texans Preparing to Start Davis Mills

In fairness, Mills did pretty well to maintain his composure after being thrown to the wolves, but the Jags are bound to be sensing that blood in the water.

Denver head coach Sean Payton also declared his guys won the critical battle up front against the Texans’ offensive line, and that's a recurring problem that is yet to be solved.

"I thought we controlled the line of scrimmage," Payton declared on Sunday. "If you want to know one thing, we controlled the line of scrimmage. We felt like that was a big advantage for us in this game, our front versus their offensive line." 

How different things would have been just lately if only the Texans had been able to move guys off the line of scrimmage with the goalposts in view cannot be underestimated.

Even with Stroud still in the lineup, the Broncos mounted a statement goal-line stand in the first quarter which delivered a real body blow to the Texans’ hopes.

Where to plant the bulk of the blame for the repeated failings in short yardage tends to flip between Ryans and offensive coordinator Nick Caley, but it's clearly driving the Texans’ head coach to distraction.

"That's just about, it's sheer willpower to me at the one-yard line," Ryans conceded. "We gotta find a way to displace guys at the line of scrimmage and punch the football in. That's what it takes in that situation. We didn't get it done."

In years past, the trade deadline might well have provided some kind of quick fix; alas, that's a pretty dark alley to head down right about now. Even so, the fact that the Texans went three of 17 on third down against the Broncos only shines a glaring spotlight on a group upfront that is incapable of moving the pile when it absolutely has to.

Caught between a rock and a hard place, Ryans needs to turn rather quickly into a coaching magician, or else the Texans’ fractured season begins to slip away pretty rapidly.