DeMeco Ryans addresses late-game kickoff gaffe: Plan 'was kicking the ball out of bounds'
Ka'imi Fairbairn apparently did not execute the plan
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On a night full of offensive miscues, a special teams mistake ultimately proved to be the one that spelled defeat for the Houston Texans in their 27-19 "Monday Night Football" loss to the Seattle Seahawks.
The Texans crawled to within one possession with 2:04 remaining after C.J. Stroud's 4-yard touchdown pass to Woody Marks. With one timeout and the two-minute warning remaining, the Texans were in position to get the ball back with about one minute remaining if they could force a three-and-out.
On the ensuing kickoff, however, Ka'imi Fairbairn kicked the ball into the field of play, and George Holani smartly returned it, causing six seconds to run off the clock and triggering the two-minute warning.
"The plan at the end of the game was kicking the ball out of bounds so we could utilize the two minute and then had a timeout," coach DeMeco Ryans said. "And we did not execute that. Again, just goes to the entire game. Frustrating that we're not executing the things that we're coached to do."
The kick did not come particularly close to going out of bounds.
It's a similar situation to one that arose earlier in the year for the Chicago Bears. Chicago trailed Minnesota 27-24 with 2:02 remaining when Ty Chandler returned Cairo Santos' kickoff to trigger the two-minute warning.
"The intent was for the ball to go out of the end zone," Johnson said after the game.
Even though kicking the ball out of bounds or through the end zone gives the opponent good field position (own 40-yard line for out of bounds, own 35 for through the end zone), it is far more important to preserve the two-minute warning.
As Ryans alluded to, a lack of execution was a major reason the Texans lost. Houston scored just one touchdown and one field goal on three red-zone trips and failed to convert multiple short-yardage situations.
As a final nail in the coffin, the Texans would have gotten the ball back with a few seconds left after appearing to get a third-down stop, but Tim Settle was called for unnecessary roughness that gave the Seahawks a first down.
