‘It’s unacceptable’ the Texans offensive line has a penalty problem

Penalties on the offensive line killed any momentum for the Houston Texans , who lost 34-7 against the Minnesota Vikings Sunday. The team committed 11 penalties, which costed them 88 yards. In Week 2 the Texans committed 12 penalties.

"Way too many penalties again, that starts with me," Texans coach DeMeco Ryans said after the game. "It's too many penalties. Back to back games over 10 penalties. It's unacceptable. And you can't win that way. When we have something positive going, we negate it by the penalty. So that just zaps the energy out of everyone ... A lot of miscues today, and you can't do that and expect to win in this league."

There was a second quarter drive when the Texans' offensive line had penalties on four consecutive plays. That lost Houston's offense 15 yards and forced it out of field goal range when the team still had zero points.

Texans left tackle Laremy Tunsil had six penalties in the game. Three of those came on the NFL's new illegal formation rule, when an offensive tackle is too far behind the line of scrimmage.

"They tried to make an example out of us," Tunsil said about the illegal formation penalties, via KPRC2′s Aaron Wilson . "The first two weeks, we lined up the same with no problem. Now, it's a problem. I feel like somebody told them to make an example out of us. Got to call it the same both sides."

Tunsil's other three penalties were false starts.

"False starts, I want people to understand," Tunsil said, via Wilson . "We all have to be on the same communication. I'll take accountability because they're calling my name, but it takes all of us."

Tunsil has 10 penalties this season, he had 11 during 14 games in 2023.

"The pre snap penalties, it all is self inflicted, so we have to take ownership of it," Ryans said. "And we all have to man up and be man enough to just do what we're supposed to do and be what we're supposed to be and play smart, clean football."

The penalty problems go beyond Tunsil, but it's not a great start to the season for the star of Houston's offensive line. C.J. stroud was also sacked five times and often pressured when he dropped back to pass. The Texans have discipline problems one the offensive line that will continue to affect their offensive production if it's not cleaned up.