Houston Texans: A curious tale
In light of the Lovie Smith hiring by the Houston Texans, I recently tweeted that Smith’s hiring told me three things…
Houston wanted Brian Flores
Houston does not want to trade Deshaun Watson
Unless Lovie Smith wins 8-9 games, he’s one and done as a coach
Recently Josh Pacheco, a well respected and knowledgeable voice in sports mentioned my tweet on his radio show. During his broadcast on February 8th (episodes of The Josh Pacheco Show can be found on ESPNhonolulu.com or on SoundCloud) Josh and I disagreed on the content of my tweet so I would like to take this opportunity to offer a rebuttal along with a deeper explanation to my points.
Houston wanted Brian Flores.
Josh is a voice is respect very much and for the most part, we have similar views on the Hawaii football program. A program for which he covers immensely and for the most part, I’ll defer to in terms of arguments. The reason I mention this is this is the main point of disagreement. I would suggest watching his show as well to get his points, he starts around the 11 minute mark. On either January 9th or 10th of this year, several head coaches were fired upon the conclusion of their club’s regular season finales. Coaches including Vic Fangio, Matt Nagy, Mike Zimmer and Joe Judge were all fired within the standard timeframe of the NFL. Black Monday as it is called where many coaches receive a pink slip and a disingenuous thank you on their team’s social media page. There wasn’t many surprises as majority of the coaches listed above had secured their fates long before the season ended. However there was one curveball to the written narrative: Brian Flores. Flores, a defensive mind who is a disciple of the Bill Belichick coaching philosophy led Miami through a rough 2019 season and to back to back winning years in 2020 and 2021. Flores however has failed to make the playoffs in his three season, a major criticism as his predecessor Adam Gase took Miami to the postseason once in his three years in Miami. Flores however was handed a mess in Miami. Players trying to force their way out in 2019, headlined by Minkah Fitzpatrick demanding a trade which led him to Pittsburg. None of this was Flores fault, he inherited an awful roster with majority of their top players ending up on IR at some point in the season. Fans were calling on the team to lose the rest of the games in the season to secure at that time, the projected number one overall pick Tua Tagovailoa. The campaign was titled “tank for Tua.” Despite this and an 0-7 start, Flores finished the year with a 5-11 record, going 5-4 in his final nine games. Fast forward to 2021, there was reports that Flores didn’t want Tua to continue on as his quarterback and a trade for Deshaun Watson was in the works. Watson who has a no trade clause in his contract agreed to wave it if he was traded to Miami. The trade never went through as with Watson’s legal situation, there was no guarantee Watson would be able to take the field. As you all know, Watson has decided to sit out of the 2021 season due to issues with the Texans management. Houston still pays him his contract to sit at home so neither the league office or the NFLPA has had to step in or do anything up to this point. Flores was a surprise fire as it looked as he was building a dominant defense in Miami. Tua’s early season injuries set the Dolphins back but they came on late and was only a game out of a playoff spot. Rumors have circulated that a power struggle between GM Chris Grier and Brian Flores erupted, primarily over Tua Tagovailoa. Owner Stephen Ross sided with Grier, most likely due to both his 20+ year relationship with Grier and his faith in Tua Tagovailoa. Thus on the 10th of January, Flores was no longer the HC of the Miami Dolphins.
Now why I did I mention all of that? On the many firings made on Black Friday, a name that wasn’t on that unenviable list was David Culley. Culley was on the hot seat for majority of the season, not to any fault of his own but because he was a last minute hire for a failing Houston franchise. In the 2020 season, Houston traded away cornerstone wide receiver DeAndre Hopkins to the Cardinals for essentially chump change. The trade masterminded by at that time HC Bill O’Brien and VP of football operations Jack Easterby came about when Hopkins wanted more money during his contract negotiations. Hopkins leaving took away not only a star wide receiver but also Deshaun Watson’s most reliable target. Houston suffered greatly. Along with this trade and several other deals done by Bill O’Brien, an 0-4 start to the 2020 season was the end of O’Brien’s time as head man. David Culley walked into an impossible situation that many other coaches didn’t give a second look to. No first round pick in 2021, Watson was on sabbatical indefinitely, no D-Hop, no JJ Watt and no clear backup plan at quarterback. Culley was expected to fail miserably, many projecting Houston to have the worst record in the league. Culley overachieved. Despite having a 4-13 record, Culley actually met and exceeded expectations. Vegas had the Texans at 4 wins, done. The worst record belongs to Jacksonville, the second to Detroit. Rookie quarterback and 3rd round pick David Mills exceeded expectations. In only 11 career starts, he has 16 touchdowns and over 2500 passing yards along with several franchise rookie records. Why do I say all this? Because David Culley wasn’t supposed to be fired. David Culley was fired on the 13th of January, 3 days after everyone else. Culley himself said that he hadn’t had any prior conversation with Houston executives regarding termination. Why would Houston, if they were truly ready to move on, fire Culley late and allow other teams to schedule interviews with prospective coaching candidates before them? 3 days they wasted and the answer is simple, they weren’t expecting Flores to be available and pounced at the chance to get him.
Why would Houston go after Flores? It’s all about who you know. As previously mentioned, Flores was an assistant under Bill Belichick up in New England. The two head executives for the Houston Texans are VP Jack Easterby and GM Nick Caserio. Both of whom spent many years as coaches/ executives in New England. They all know each other very well and we’re molded by the same philosophy: The Patriot Way. Adding to this fact is the evident relationship/ respect between Watson and Flores. Yes Davis Mills exceeded expectations but he’s no Deshaun Watson. Flores who had established a winning culture and a ferocious defense in Miami would be the perfect fit for the Texans. Oh and if you want to get race involved, zero backlash from the Culley firing.
Flores was so close to getting the job that he and former NFL quarterback Josh McCown were named finalists. I don’t know how McCown got into the mix, his highest level of coaching was his head coaching job at a high school in 2021. So why didn’t the Texans pull the trigger? Flores sued the NFL. On February 7th, Brian Flores sued the NFL claiming racial discrimination based off sham interviews scheduled by teams attempting to comply with the Rooney Rule along with claiming that Miami owner Stephen Ross tried to bribe Flores to lose during the “Tank for Tua” campaign, offering $100,000 dollars per loss. By suing, Flores removed his name from any coaching candidate list because now Houston Owner Cal McNair has to defend himself against Flores in court. I don’t care that Houston said the lawsuit wasn’t the reason, there’s no company in America that would give you an upper echelon role while you’re suing them for millions of dollars.
How do I know the Texans weren’t serious about McCown, because they didn’t hire him. In fact they promoted AHC Lovie Smith to be the new HC. Houston never wanted Smith as HC. He wasn’t a finalist for the job, he hasn’t had a winning season in college or the pros since 2012 nor has he been able to mentor a young quarterback, failing with Rex Grossman, Kyle Orton, Jay Cutler, Jameis Winston and all of his quarterbacks at the University of Illinois. The man has had 7 straight losing seasons. Flores was the clear and obvious choice. The timing, the connections and the media reports point to one man. Again, it’s Brian Flores.
2. Houston doesn’t want to trade Deshaun Watson. Both Josh and I agree that Houston doesn’t want to get rid of him. Josh brought up a great point that Watson due to his disdain of Houston’s management and his legal issues may sit out in 2022. All I’m going to say is that Houston thought Flores could mend that relationship and if they stayed out of the way, allowing Flores to be the only figurehead of the Texans franchise to have any contact with Watson, this situation could work. If they wanted to dump him, they would. There’s many team interested in him and Mills is always an option.
3. If Lovie Smith doesn’t win 8-9 games, he’s gone. Josh said that there’s no way Houston can win 8-9 games, this is a roster built to win 4-5 and I agree. I never said Houston could win, what I am saying is Smith is a placeholder. He would need to greatly exceed expectations to keep his job. Culley matched his win expectations, was fairly competitive in more games then he should’ve been and helped Davis Mills become arguably the 2nd/ 3rd best performing rookie QB in 2021. I have 1. Jones 2. Fields and 3. Mills. Pretty good considering both Trevor Lawrence and Zach Wilson were selected 1 & 2 overall with teams who had better rosters. If Smith doesn’t double his expectations, he’s out. A friend of mine on twitter who lives in Houston states that a trusted Texans beat writer said Smith could go winless and not lose his job because the optics would look bad if Houston fired two minority coaches after having one season each. I agree with this assessment and shoutout to @codysseustoo Follow him on Twitter please, great person with a lot of knowledge of Texas sports. I think if Davis Mills improves, Houston will permanently hire Pep Hamilton as OC and bring in Arron Glenn as HC. Glenn who is the current DC of the Lions was a candidate to replace Sean Payton in New Orleans. He’s a POC who is respected around the league and would check every box while having the ability to build a solid defense. I’m a firm believer in winning solves everything so I don’t necessarily think Houston should have that mindset but considering their lack of success, perhaps a new change in philosophy might do them good.
Houston needs a full rebuild and I thought Flores would be a good fit. Now that he’s not there, it’s time to blow everything up and reset. I want to say thank you to Josh Pacheco for mentioning my tweet. You can find him on Twitter @Joshontheradio and his weekly show airs on ESPN Honolulu, station 92.7.
