Are the Texans on the same page?

Jonathan Alexander’s summary of all these press conferences has me scratching my head:

Perhaps lost in the hoopla of their offensive struggles through two weeks is that somewhere along the way, the Texans don’t really appear to be on the same page. It started with head coach DeMeco Ryans’ comments shortly after the Texans’ 20-19 loss to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers on Monday Night Football.

Ryans was asked about the offensive line’s issues protecting quarterback C.J. Stroud, who was sacked three times.

Instead of Ryans saying he needed to look at the film first before addressing it, he said the Texans had some “communication issues up front.”

“They got us on some blitzes, things that we’ve seen, we work on,” Ryans said. “We have to look at the film to see what those issues were. We got to, of course, not have those and make sure we’re picking things up the right way.”

Later, he added: “If you want to be a big-time player in this league, you got to show up and make plays.”

This was widely viewed by media and fans — whether he intended it to be or not — as a possible shot at Stroud, who is responsible for calling the protections.

Stroud, who was asked about those comments just 10 minutes later, appeared ticked off after hearing them.

“Communication with what?” Stroud retorted. “I didn’t have any communication issues. I thought we split the play pretty clean.”

Two days later, Ryans had a different message when asked about the pressure. He said it was “on all 11 guys.”

Ryans said Wednesday that he met with Stroud this week, though he didn’t elaborate. Stroud confirmed that they met and said they watched the film together.

“I can always be better,” Stroud said. “I told DeMeco the other day, if anything he sees or anybody sees I can be better in, let me know.”

More + predictions for the Sunday game: https://www.houstonchronicle.com/sports/texans/article/cj-stroud-demeco-ryans-jaguars-21056665.php