The Houston Texans are 2-5 after Sunday’s 27-21 loss to the New York Giants, and while DeMeco Ryans has made it clear he is not planning any staff changes, the offense is still inviting hard questions.
That’s especially true when it comes to offensive coordinator Nick Caley. Houston has had too many uneven stretches on that side of the ball, and the concerns go beyond one bad afternoon.
The Texans have struggled to build consistent offense around a quarterback in C.J. Stroud who has gotten off to a strong start and shown he can carry the passing game.
But the help around him has not shown up often enough. The running game has sputtered, the offensive line has been up and down, and the play-calling has frequently looked too cautious for a team trying to dig itself out of an early hole.
That’s the part that puts Caley under the microscope. An offensive coordinator is supposed to shape the system around the players he has and find ways to make life easier for them.
Instead, Houston’s offense has too often looked predictable and conservative, even with the kind of investment the team has made in the roster. When the ground game isn’t moving, sticking with it without adding new ways to attack only makes the offense easier to defend.
Stroud should not be asked to do everything. The Texans need more ways to create clean chances for their playmakers, push the ball downfield and use the quarterback’s arm more aggressively.
At the same time, the issues are not all Caley’s to own. The line has had trouble opening steady running lanes, and no play-caller can magic away every personnel problem. Removing an offensive coordinator would not instantly fix those flaws.
Still, that doesn’t excuse the results. If the running game isn’t producing, Houston has to have a better answer than continuing to lean on a plan that keeps coming up short.
Ryans has already said the Texans need to get better, but backing the current staff cannot mean accepting the same outcome over and over again.
Any midseason change would come with risk, especially if a new play-caller had to step in during the year. Even so, Houston should be looking closely at whether a different voice could do more with the offense it has.
Ryans may not want to change anything right now, but with the season slipping further away, refusing to at least consider it could become its own problem.
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One path is to put more on C.J. Strouds plate and let the passing game drive the offense with greater urgency. Another is to lean harder into outside runs, while also making better use of Marvin Harrison Jr., Jaylin Noel and Tank Dell, all of whom give Houston different ways to stress defenses. None of that guarantees a quick turnaround, but it does give the Texans a clearer sense of where the offense can be sharpened before the season slips further away. [Read more 🡒]