Few NFL coaches have sounded more defensive lately than DeMeco Ryans.
In July, the Houston Texans coach expressed his discontent with the reporting of injuries. More recently, he complained that the Texans’ media thrives on negative coverage. Ryans’ airing of the grievances has focused on a convenient target. It’s easy to portray the media as a villain when the public’s trust in the fourth estate is at an all-time low.
Earlier this week, Ryans said: “You can see there’s a lot of negative talk about us. We get it. I hear people trying to give it to me all the time. I get it. But it really doesn’t matter. Again, I talk about it — everybody wants to write a hot story, and most of the time, it’s negative stuff that people want to talk about. Nobody wants to talk about the positive stuff that happens.”
Obviously, this did not go over well with the local media. When Ryans received pushback, he added: “I said that’s what people thrive on is the negative stuff. People thrive on the negative. You guys are good? You guys must be the negative ones with the negative stuff.”
🤯Texans HC DeMeco Ryans tries to end his press conference with “YOU GUYS GOOD??”
Reporters pushed back on Ryans after he said no one wants to cover the positives with the Texans.
Ryans is flat out wrong. There has been a TON of positives over the years.
This is… pic.twitter.com/SS65qsEpCC
— Will Kunkel (@WillKunkelV) October 27, 2025
The comments from DeMeco Ryans are a broad generalization that shows a fundamental lack of understanding of the media’s job. Some working relationships have an adversarial component. Coaches and the media do not have aligned goals. Coaches are paid to win football games. Reporters are paid to educate their readership on how and why teams win or lose games. There’s a natural conflict here because it’s not always in the coach’s best interest to share information with the media. And yet, that doesn’t mean that the two can’t find mutual respect. Part of that respect is Ryans recognizing that it’s not the role of the media to be overtly negative or positive.
In an ideal journalism world, the coverage would be neutral. Aiming for total objectivity is a goal that frequently proves difficult to achieve due to human behavior. We all have biases shaped by our life experiences. But the media is supposed to strive to cover teams, players, and events with an eye on those blind spots. That’s why newspapers, websites, and TV stations employ editors to evaluate fairness and news value.
From a public relations point of view, DeMeco Ryans would have been better off answering with a cliché, saying something like “We’re focusing on the things we can control.” Instead, he came across as defensive and like he’s looking for someone else to blame for the struggles of the Texans (3-4).
He’s the coach. His paycheck includes accepting responsibility and projecting an optimistic vision for the franchise. If he wants more press that he deems as positive, Ryans can either win more games or rely more on the Texans’ Instagram account. The media is not here to be your cheerleader.
What’s funny is that DeMeco Ryans hasn’t had to deal with the immense pressure that other coaches get. The Texans are not a national team like the Dallas Cowboys, Pittsburgh Steelers, or Green Bay Packers. Go ask Mike Tomlin what his life is like. Ryans has a young, talented quarterback in C.J. Stroud, so he already has it better than many of his peers. He has seemingly been treated fairly, receiving a ton of credit in 2023 for exceeding expectations in his rookie year when the Texans won the AFC South and a playoff game. Last season, the results were disappointing, and this season could be more of the same.
Ryans has said that he doesn’t care about media coverage. If that’s true, he needs to concentrate more on his job than on the media’s job.