Although he may not be the first individual who comes to mind when you think about Houston Texans football, DeMeco Ryans' fingerprints have been all over this organization for many years. Consider: Ryans was the first player in Texans history to win Rookie of the Year. He led the NFL in solo tackles as a first year player, made All-Pro 2nd Team in his second season, and twice made the Pro Bowl. He was still patrolling the middle of the field when the Texans won their first ever postseason game in 2011.
From there, Ryans went away for over a decade, finishing his playing career as a member of the Philadelphia Eagles in 2015, and then beginning his coaching career with the San Francisco 49ers in 2017, eventually becoming the team's defensive coordinator ahead of the 2021 campaign.
By the end of the 2022 regular season, it felt like a foregone conclusion that Ryans -- who had just overseen the league's top-ranked defense -- would soon get his opportunity to sit in the big seat. With the Houston Texans being one of five teams in need of a new head coach during the 2023 offseason, a reunion between Ryans and the franchise that drafted him 17 years earlier felt like the natural next step in Ryans' coaching career.
But even more than that, it felt like the hire that the Texans needed to make to get this franchise out of the dark forest they had found themselves in over the previous few seasons.
After showing promise during the 2019 season -- a season that ended with a trip to the Divisional Playoff Round, where the Texans let a 24-point first half lead against the Kansas City Chiefs slip away -- the Texans went into a spiral. During the 2020, 2021 and 2022 seasons, Houston's 11-38-1 record was the worst in the NFL, even worse than dreadful three year runs from the likes of the New York Jets, Chicago Bears, Jacksonville Jaguars and Carolina Panthers.
And as if things weren't bad enough, the partnership between the Texans and quarterback Deshaun Watson ended in ugly fashion, both on and off the field.
Stepping into Houston's head coaching job wasn't just the opportunity that DeMeco Ryans had worked toward for years. It was personal.
"I saw from afar, the organization was kind of in a bad spot. A lot of negative news about the organization," Ryans told DJ Bien-Aime of ESPN. "I was like, man, if I can come back and just really impact this team, impact the organization, impact the city in a positive way where people feel the pride again in the Texans, because I felt that as a player. I just wanted to reestablish that."
It didn't take long for DeMeco Ryans to reestablish this feeling in Houston. In his three seasons as the head coach of the Texans, Houston's 35 wins (postseason included) are the 5th-most in the NFL in that span, with only the Kansas City Chiefs, Philadelphia Eagles, Detroit Lions and Buffalo Bills boasting more victories. Regardless of how the current postseason plays out, Ryans has undoubtedly sparked a turnaround for a franchise that desperately needed one.
For Ryans, winning back-to-back division titles in 2023 and 2024, or overseeing a franchise record 10 consecutive wins this season isn't the ultimate prize. The greatest source of satisfaction for the 41-year-old head coach is seeing what kind of impact having a winning football team has had on the city of Houston.
"People are genuinely joyful about what these guys are able to do on the field and winning football," Ryans said. "It changes the landscape of the city and how people feel. We can provide some joy to our community. That's one of the main reasons why I came back."