austins23
Hall of Fame
Maybe Weiss for OC?
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O'Brien & His Coaching Staffs
- Thread starter PockyAF
- Start date
Maybe Weiss for OC?
dalemurphy
Hall of Fame
Crennel is a great DC and a big reason why we have an elite staff. He was O'Brien's choice and runs the defense that O'Brien believes in... Just like Kubiak deservedly received criticism for the defense when he was coach, so should O'Brien receive credit for recruiting a great DC and accompanying staff.
infantrycak
Hall of Fame
I haven't watched enough of Arians or whoever the other candidates are to judge that because that's a comparison.
I don't think getting last year's team to 8 or 9 wins is very special. I'm not impressed by the offense so far. It has been barely tolerable. And that's his side of the ball.
Exactly... It might mean a lot to the 2-14 team, or its fans. But in the grander scheme of the NFL, it means nothing, nothing at all to celebrate, especially when the two previous 2-14 teams won 11 & 10 games into the play offs.
Arians team didn't look so special last night when they had to go with their #3 qb. Considering we had to go with our #4, and who the #1 was, I thought they did a pretty good job. Moved the ball well between the 20's, showed a little inventiveness and kept the Ravens off balance the entire game. On the season has a whole it's been a good job.
Did you really expect a Fitz led team to post a winning record?
That's the difference in having an Andrew Luck or Alex Smith and a Ryan Fitzpatrick
Is that because you thought we had a better than 2-win team to begin with, or that 7 win improvements aren't that significant?
Well, flip side of the coin here, I'm diggin' all the "love fest" for O'Brien and his staff. So gag away.
It is a welcome change from the rather stale and much maligned Kubiak regime, all things considered.
Yeah, there's a lot of work to do on the offensive side of the ball, but most educated fans know that implementing a new offensive scheme takes time, especially when the team is still searching for its starting QB. I'd rather he go with journeyman Fitz and than hook his wagon to a high round QB that he does not believe can get the job done in the long run.
I'm not saying O'Brien is perfect. No first year head coach ever is perfect, and there were certainly some playcall trends yesterday that I question. However, that said, he was starting Case Keenum, and it is basic understanding to know that O'Brien's options were limited under the circumstances.
What other first year head coach is going to take a practice squad QB from another team and beat a playoff contender that both teams need to win? It's a short list, and O'Brien is on it.
You should give O'Brien the same chance that you gave Kubiak all those years.
infantrycak
Hall of Fame
It's because (a) I did not think we had a 2 win team to begin with and (b) I went back about 15 years and posted that teams which have had that precipitous of fall-offs have had big return bounces the next season. Teams that go from 6 wins to 2 - yeah, getting to 5-6 the next season is about average. Teams going from 12 to 2, no. Unusual fall, unusual bounce.
infantrycak
Hall of Fame
I agree with almost everything you said but I think I am also giving OB the same chance.
Sorry, I'll just back out of the love fest. I'm optimistic for next year. Just not giddy impressed.
Nah, I cannot defend some of those calls. Ask Greg, I was almost pulling my hair out.
That one, and then being 1st and goal and not feeding the rock to Foster three times never made much sense. Foster is one of the best RBs in the NFL, and it seemed like O'Brien was out-thinking himself on some of those decisions.
If Foster had been getting any yardage at all, I would agree with you. But his avg must have been 0 or close to it yesterday. He was continually stopped for no gain or a loss all day. Ravens came into the game with one of the best run defenses and one of the worst passing defenses in the league. OB was going with what he thought stood the best chance of working.
infantrycak
Hall of Fame
Which brings up another complaint I have. We run up the gut when we have no success with it. We have stopped the aggressive cut blocking on the back side of out ZB stretch plays so they all go playside now instead of the cutbacks Foster used to kill on. We are caught in some bizarre mish-mash rushing attack.
WolverineFan
Hall of Fame
Weis has proven himself to be a product of Tom Brady in my eyes.
And who else was available? You gonna hold it against him for not picking a QB at 1-1 that he didn't believe in?
That first statement of yours is ludicrous
Yeah, I think the fit of OL isn't real good. Myers was getting blown up all day. Hopefully that will be fixed this off season.
Our OL coach sucks too, IMO
edit: And no TK, I don't believe that Ben Jones is the future at C
I've got no idea what OB has in mind for the OL. I thought zone blocking was central to what he wanted to do on offense, considering who he was trying to get to coach the OL... who we ended up with.
But the way we ran the ball yesterday, kicking Newton inside... he may be up to something. If we see the zone stretch come back next week, then I'll chalk it up to being unpredictable & a tip of the hat to Kubiak being on the other sideline.
You can bet that OB evaluated them and found Yates lacking. Keenum was cut because of the Mallett trade and OB must not of thought he was as good or better than Fitz and Mallett. He worked with Keenum all off season and had last years film to work off of. His option to replace Fitz was Mallett. You're nitpicking what was the only reasonable direction that OB had.
Fair enough, I just see the 12-win season as the aberration, not the reverse.
All he had Fitz do was hand the ball off to Foster on first & second down, then throw a screen on third & long. He could have got Tebow to do that. No reason to spend $4M for Fitzpatrick to do it.
All I'm saying, is that you can't say, "He should be COTY because he did it with Fitz." when he hand picked Fitz.
I'm not. You're the one that said he shouldn't be COTY because he picked Fitz.
And as far as the Tebow comment, get real
infantrycak
Hall of Fame
Seriously? We were closer to the 2 win team that whole time and just faked our way into two division wins? And then beat a team faking their way into the playoffs even worse than we were. What does that make the Bengals, one win teams? Don't buy that one bit. Neither did the NFL, commentators, anyone associated with the game as a whole other than a few after the fact Houston voices I've heard.
Sorry I interrupted the love fest.
Obviously, OB disagreed with you. Case had the entire OTA's and pre-season to prove that he could learn the system and execute the offense. He was found lacking.
And you didn't watch the games if you think Fitz did nothing but hand off to Foster and Blue.
Now that's not the complete tale. Keenum was the last Kubiak QB standing this spring/summer that had a chance to learn O'Brien's system. It seems that Keenum must still be way ahead of Thad Lewis since Lewis has only been here 2-3 weeks and Keenum had OTAs and training camp to get reps.
Don't portray this game like O'Brien pulled off a miracle with "a practice squad QB from another team" who had never seen our playbook.
O'Brien got with Keenum and compiled a set of the plays he remembered Keenum was decent-to-good at and made him a game package that Keenum was least likely to screw up. Now, I'll grant you, that's damned good coaching all day long.
But if Flacco had had a halfway decent game (thank you J.J. & Co. for getting in his head early) and turned this into a shootout, we would have lost.
I know that didn't sound like it, but I'm actually warming up to O'Brien. But I still haven't forgiven him for sticking us with "Fitzy" for most of the season.
& I'm saying he was wrong. It's ok that you agree with everything OB does, or agree with this & disagree with others. It's cool, whatever. I disagree with this & I've been very consistent since we signed Fitz.
Doesn't matter to me if it were Yates, or Keenum, even if he'd have brought in Thad Lewis to be our starting QB. That would have made more sense than bringing in Fitz.
Sometimes when you're last in line at the cafeteria and all they have left is SPAM® and bat paste, you gotta go with the SPAM.
Foster had 96 yards rushing with a 3.8 average yesterday according to NFL.com.
Given the scenario, I still would have trusted Foster three times to get a few yards rather than the plays they called to finally settle on a FG.
I NEVER said that. That's you making crap up to fill in a narrative.
But fine, show me another first year head coach who took a practice squad QB from another team "that had some exposure to the same scheme in preseason" and beat a playoff contender in a game that both teams needed to win.
I'll wait for your list. It'll still be a short list, and O'Brien will still be on it.
You act like it's done all the time, so should be easy to provide me some more examples.
"Miracle"? I never implied that, either, but it was a DAMN FINE COACHING JOB yesterday by O'Brien and his staff.
If that is hard for you to admit, we can just agree to disagree.
As far as Fitz is concerned, there is nothing to forgive for me. He coached Fitz to be as good as he can possibly be this year, and I'd rather deal with that for a season than some unqualified rookie QB who we will be stuck with for years on end.
yeah my bad. He should have tried it a few times. Perhaps he was getting a bit too cute trying to catch them off guard. But yeah at least on 1st or second down go with Foster. I do remember one of the gtg scenarios was screwed up with an OL penalty that had us out of running range but we were there for a couple.
Yes, seriously. Go ahead, calculate the mean and median wins for the Texans historically.
At some point, you are what your record says you are. In Houston, that's been sub .500. 6 seasons with 10 or more losses vs. 2 seasons with 10 or more wins.
The Pencil Neck
Hall of Fame
A great coach is able to take whatever mish-mash collection of players he's given and figure out a way to win with them.
RAC has put together a fearsome D that is starting to gel at the right time.
But OB has taken a carousel at QB and found a way to win with a QB group that is less-than-stellar. He deserves some credit for that. He didn't draft a QB in the first or second round and then throw away a season with an excuse. He put together a team that could win right now and at least be in the hunt for a playoff spot up until the last game.
Granted, Arians has had a great season in a much tougher division but his team was 10-6 last year. This isn't his first year with this set of players so he should have more of "his guys" playing in a more complete version of "his system." And I expect Arians to win the COTY but OB should at least be in the conversation.
RAC has put together a fearsome D that is starting to gel at the right time.
But OB has taken a carousel at QB and found a way to win with a QB group that is less-than-stellar. He deserves some credit for that. He didn't draft a QB in the first or second round and then throw away a season with an excuse. He put together a team that could win right now and at least be in the hunt for a playoff spot up until the last game.
Granted, Arians has had a great season in a much tougher division but his team was 10-6 last year. This isn't his first year with this set of players so he should have more of "his guys" playing in a more complete version of "his system." And I expect Arians to win the COTY but OB should at least be in the conversation.
I think we have a real HC for the first time in our franchise history. Minus a few elite pieces that we have, he has won more with less all season. He has had a few kinks to work out early on with playcalling and other things and that still could rise from time to time, but as the leader of the franchise I think he has done a great job in his first year. 
Scooter
Funky
from 2006 to 2012 we were 59-53 and on the rise. that includes a season of david carr and by 2010(?) we had replaced 52 of the previous regime's active roster.
Scooter
Funky
to add my take, i'm coming around ... slowly. i do like romeo and vrabel, always have - and they've exceeded expectations. however our first draft is currently looking REALLY bad, as well as almost every offensive addition. our offensive playcalling is still ugly, but IF it's premeditated to install the base principles this year and then bring in a true coordinator next year - i can be patient.
still not a fan of o'brien or frankly any coach on the offensive side, but i'm going to try to wait until the end of next season before passing final judgment.
still not a fan of o'brien or frankly any coach on the offensive side, but i'm going to try to wait until the end of next season before passing final judgment.
My objection was simply that your initial statement left out the part where O'Brien had taught Keenum his system all spring and part of the summer before he let Keenum go to the other team because he saw, in Mallett, a chance to "upgrade".I NEVER said that. That's you making crap up to fill in a narrative.
But fine, show me another first year head coach who took a practice squad QB from another team "that had some exposure to the same scheme in preseason" and beat a playoff contender in a game that both teams needed to win.
I'll wait for your list. It'll still be a short list, and O'Brien will still be on it.
You act like it's done all the time, so should be easy to provide me some more examples.
"Miracle"? I never implied that, either, but it was a DAMN FINE COACHING JOB yesterday by O'Brien and his staff.
If that is hard for you to admit, we can just agree to disagree.
And you also left out the part where I, too, said that was a damned good coaching job.
And I agree that the list you defined would have very few names on it. But is that solely a credit to O'Brien's mad coaching skillz or the fact that this situation (having to use a 4th string QB) in and of itself is very rare?
We were VERY lucky that (a) Case had been here and learned our system, (b) he still had P/S eligibility, and (c) the Rams (or someone else) hadn't already called him up.
Maybe there's something to that Luck o' the Irish stuff.
infantrycak
Hall of Fame
so, from 2006-2013 we were 61-67? yeah that ain't no success story
But including Caper's era under Kubiak isn't close to accurate or objective and Dan knows better. Recency also plays a role.
And even cooking the books including the whole existence you don't get to 2 as the mean or median. It's the aberration and you have to have totally lost your freaking mind to argue otherwise.
But let's play that little game. Throw out the two worst and two best seasons and you get within a game maybe 2 of where the Texans are right now.
They were never going to win a SB under Kubiak. 8 yrs of Kubiak is enough proof of that. Hopefully BOB is an upgrade.
I just don't get all of your defending Kubiak at all costs. It's like 10-12 yrs of Kubiak wouldn't be enough to prove to you Kubiak wasn't a championship coach. Cant admit you were wrong about Kubiak, or have an undying mancrush?
The Texans record under Kubiak was 61-67. Not sure what you are saying. If you throw out the two best and the two worst you are looking at 31-33 over 4 yrs.
Team record to date is 87-120
True. But, let's not leave out that OB chose the QBs on the carousel. And he chose not to spend a 1st or 2nd round pick on a QB. Which it turns out, would not have kept the team from having a winning record at this point. He's done a great job in a lot of aspects. But, I don't think you can say every decision O'Brien made has been golden.
I never would have believed that Tom Caughlin would have won a Super Bowl, much less two if I didn't witness it myself.
All I'm saying, is if Tom Caughlin can win two Super Bowls, it wouldn't surprise me if Capers could have won one, or Kubiak, or O'Brien.