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BILL O'BRIEN FIRED

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badboy said:
Hop new deal:2020 & 2021 $19.5 Cap hit David Johnson 20 &21 $20 m
Hop new deal 2022 $25 million Cooks $13 m so only 12 would come from 2022 cap space of $49 m leaving $37 m for other players.

2022 BMac cut saves $9.5 million
2022 Nick Martin cut saves 8 million
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I'm not sure if Cal was just parroting the justification provided by O'Brien and Easterby, but I call bull and looking at your breakdown, I know it's bull****
 
Texazan said:
Rappaport, who was/is very close with BOB said today on 790 that Easterby and BOB were in CONCERT and ALIGNED on all the moves BOB made so how on earth he stays I have no idea but if he does stay he goes nowhere near the talent evaluation process, trades, drafting etc. Just keep your smiling ass in the spiritual and rah rah realm.
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look at Easterby and look at BoB. Look at all the thingsthat are now coming out about BoB. In that regard, do you really think that Easterby was going to pose a threat and/or try to or be able to obstruct BoB in doing what he wanted to do? It’s more likely that Easterby was a yes man rather than Robin to BoB’s Batman. Dude had probably already seen what happens to folks when they disagree with him.
 
Earl34 said:
I'm not sure if Cal was just parroting the justification provided by O'Brien and Easterby, but I call bull and looking at your breakdown, I know it's bull****
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There is something to what Cal’s saying whether you’d like to believe it or not. Tunsil and DW4’s contracts were more important..period. We can look at stuff in hindsight with the numbers now, but there was really no way we should’ve risked losing Tunsil and/or DW4 to renegotiate Nuk’s contract. It just is what it is.
 
OptimisticTexan said:
I appreciate your stance but one has to wonder how he's even being thought of as someone who has a lick of credibility in helping the Texans to find their next GM. How did he position himself for that roll?
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He's been working in sports organizational management for a long time.

Over his impactful career, Easterby has served as a team/athlete development consultant for multiple NBA teams, United States National Teams, and has mentored numerous PGA Tour players as well as Major League Baseball players. Easterby gained his first NFL experience in the summer of 2004 with the Jacksonville Jaguars, helping in football operations and public relations. He became the character coach for the University of South Carolina Athletics Department from 2005-10, where he implemented team-building programs for all Olympic sports including the 2010 & 2011 Men's Baseball National Champions and the eventual Women's Basketball National Champion while he assisted in both academic and spiritual accountability initiatives on campus.
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I'm not advocating he stays with the team, nor am I pretending to know what value he brings to the organization.

But while we're asking about Easterby's qualifications, what exactly are yours & what kind of qualifications do you think should be on his resume?

& while we're at it, Cal mentioned he's already reached out to a search firm to help find our next GM. I would bet most of the search team has less "qualifications" than Easterby.

This guy talked high level football organizational operations with the likes of Belichick & Piolli.
 
Mr teX said:
There is something to what Cal’s saying whether you’d like to believe it or not. Tunsil and DW4’s contracts were more important..period. We can look at stuff in hindsight with the numbers now, but there was really no way we should’ve risked losing Tunsil and/or DW4 to renegotiate Nuk’s contract. It just is what it is.
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Nuke says he only want a band-aid deal.
Something like that can be accomodated with some kind of a bonus that can be spread out, thus minimizing the effect on the cap space.
OB shouldn't have done the other stupid deals before that to begin with.

www.google.com

DeAndre Hopkins Deletes Tweet Calling out Texans Chairman Cal McNair

DeAndre Hopkins briefly shot back at Texans chairman Cal McNair in a since-deleted tweet on Wednesday over the contract dispute that led to his offseason trade...
www.google.com www.google.com
 
TexansBull said:
Just to be Captain Obvious -

Watt has only paid a full season in 2015 and 2018. He hasn’t played a full season in last 3 of 5 years. Meaning he hasn’t had the full OB experience.

I am sure that KC loss is eating at Watt and he too knows that stage will always be more than OB can handle. And then the DHop trade...Watt wasn’t having any of his crap.
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Eh, he knows. Doesn't have to be physically playing to know how terrible its been.
 
Mr teX said:
There is something to what Cal’s saying whether you’d like to believe it or not. Tunsil and DW4’s contracts were more important..period. We can look at stuff in hindsight with the numbers now, but there was really no way we should’ve risked losing Tunsil and/or DW4 to renegotiate Nuk’s contract. It just is what it is.
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Just saying. If they wanted Hopkins around, they would have made it work. Maybe Hopkins didn't know the name of the person signing the checks:

https://twitter.com/x/status/1313990333068382214
 
76Texan said:
Nuke says he only want a band-aid deal.
Something like that can be accomodated with some kind of a bonus that can be spread out, thus minimizing the effect on the cap space.
OB shouldn't have done the other stupid deals before that to begin with.

www.google.com

DeAndre Hopkins Deletes Tweet Calling out Texans Chairman Cal McNair

DeAndre Hopkins briefly shot back at Texans chairman Cal McNair in a since-deleted tweet on Wednesday over the contract dispute that led to his offseason trade...
www.google.com www.google.com
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Agreed, but as I’ve said, we only have what Nuk’s side and just based on what he wound up signing for in AZ, it was a helluva lot more than a band-aid deal. Aside from that, the only “dumb” deals that had been done before Nuk came wanting his extension were the B-Mac and Martin deals. and no GM is above making at least 2-3 bad deals. B-macs wasn’t even bad.
 
Earl34 said:
Just saying. If they wanted Hopkins around, they would have made it work. Maybe Hopkins didn't know the name of the person signing the checks:

https://twitter.com/x/status/1313990333068382214
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Sure as hell wasnt a band aid deal he signed in AZ...which tells me Nuk is telling half-truths. If that’s all he wanted, he should’ve had no problems waiting in line...after all, he still had 3 years left on his current deal. And as has been said, the timing is curious. You start barking for a new deal as soon as your guaranteed money runs out....when you know we’re about to back up the brinks truck for our QB and LT? No one will be able to convince me that Nuk’s intentions were as noble as he tries to claim. What it was is he saw the writing on the wall and knew that after Tunsil and DW4, there wasn’t gonna be a whole lot left for his “band-aid” deal...which wasn’t going to be a team friendly deal at all imo...it was his way of trying to “cut in line”.
 
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76Texan said:
Nuke says he only want a band-aid deal.
Something like that can be accomodated with some kind of a bonus that can be spread out, thus minimizing the effect on the cap space.
OB shouldn't have done the other stupid deals before that to begin with.

www.google.com

DeAndre Hopkins Deletes Tweet Calling out Texans Chairman Cal McNair

DeAndre Hopkins briefly shot back at Texans chairman Cal McNair in a since-deleted tweet on Wednesday over the contract dispute that led to his offseason trade...
www.google.com www.google.com
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We don't know what Hop asked for and if it truly was small AND $ only issue I think Dhop would be here. If it was known he wanted small amount why did Arizona pay him so extravagantly? From a business standpoint bad move for his new team even more so if his ankle and other injuries lower his production as it did game four.
 
Mr teX said:
Sure as hell wasnt a band aid deal he signed in AZ...which tells me Nuk is telling half-truths. If that’s all he wanted, he should’ve had no problems waiting in line...after all, he still had 3 years left on his current deal. And as has been said, the timing is curious. You start barking for a new deal as soon as your guaranteed money runs out....when you know we’re about to back up the brinks truck for our QB and LT? No one will be able to convince me that Nuk’s intentions were as noble as he tries to claim. What it was is he saw the writing on the wall and knew that after Tunsil and DW4, there wasn’t gonna be a whole lot left for his “band-aid” deal...which wasn’t going to a team friendly deal at all...it was his way of trying to “cut in line”.
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I could care less about Nuk's actual intentions. He had 3 years left on his deal. Make him play 2 more years under that contract. If he holds out, so be it. Don't panic and make a bad trade. There was absolutely not advantage to trading him this past offseason.
 
We'll never know the whole truth behind all this. Football politics is like federal politics, you don't see much of the behind the scenes stuff and you only know what you hear on the news which isn't always factual. Whatever the hell happened is done anyway. The history of Texans "management" doesn't lead me to believe they'll fix very much with this latest house cleaning unless it's by accident.
 
dream_team said:
I could care less about Nuk's actual intentions. He had 3 years left on his deal. Make him play 2 more years under that contract. If he holds out, so be it. Don't panic and make a bad trade. There was absolutely not advantage to trading him this past offseason.
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I'm in total agreement with this.

Of course I didn't have to work with Nuk everyday.

Of course I hope you know they were never going to redo Nuk's contract regardless if Nuk was great or not. Fact is Nuk got his guaranteed $$$$ after he already got paid his guaranteed $$$$. It just wasn't going to happen. (Rightfully so IMHO)
 
dream_team said:
I could care less about Nuk's actual intentions. He had 3 years left on his deal. Make him play 2 more years under that contract. If he holds out, so be it. Don't panic and make a bad trade. There was absolutely not advantage to trading him this past offseason.
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Me either....but I do have a problem with a guy misrepresenting the situation...

& I don’t think it was a panic move. It was more like a “F you then” move.
 
76Texan said:
Nuke says he only want a band-aid deal.
Something like that can be accomodated with some kind of a bonus that can be spread out, thus minimizing the effect on the cap space.
OB shouldn't have done the other stupid deals before that to begin with.

www.google.com

DeAndre Hopkins Deletes Tweet Calling out Texans Chairman Cal McNair

DeAndre Hopkins briefly shot back at Texans chairman Cal McNair in a since-deleted tweet on Wednesday over the contract dispute that led to his offseason trade...
www.google.com www.google.com
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Yeah, they never had to trade Hopkins. I mean look at the money spent on Cobb,Whitney, Johnson,and Murray. 9m, 14m, 12m, and 6m =41m. Even if they didn't want to pay Hopkins, he wasn't going to sit out with the new rules. Not only that, at his salary (13m) and his production, there is no way in hell you shouldn't have gotten at least a 1st rd pick and a 4th for him. Minnesota got a 1st, Amari went for a 1st, Odell went for a 1st, and Hopkins went for a 2nd and a bloated contract. Sometimes owners got to analyze the deal.
 
Welcome back Texans fans - it finally happened! Reading this thread O'Brien's two loudest supporters are still at it, but the sun is once again shining down through Reliant Stadium. It's going to be a long road back from these past several years of roster destruction and false hope, but finally there is true hope for the future of our team.
 
Mr teX said:
Sure as hell wasnt a band aid deal he signed in AZ...which tells me Nuk is telling half-truths. If that’s all he wanted, he should’ve had no problems waiting in line...after all, he still had 3 years left on his current deal. And as has been said, the timing is curious. You start barking for a new deal as soon as your guaranteed money runs out....when you know we’re about to back up the brinks truck for our QB and LT? No one will be able to convince me that Nuk’s intentions were as noble as he tries to claim. What it was is he saw the writing on the wall and knew that after Tunsil and DW4, there wasn’t gonna be a whole lot left for his “band-aid” deal...which wasn’t going to a team friendly deal at all...it was his way of trying to “cut in line”.
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The fact that Hopkins even tweet about it should tell us that he was willing to negotiate.

First, let's take a look of the situation:

"Hopkins was scheduled to make $12.5 million this year, $13.5 million in 2021 and $13.915 million in 2022 before his extension. None of Hopkins' money was guaranteed.

With AZ, Hopkins is getting is a $16.5 million raise this year. His 2020 compensation consists of a $27.5 million signing bonus and a fully guaranteed $1.5 million base salary. The Cardinals gain $5.5 million of salary cap room in the process as Hopkins' 2020 cap number goes from $12.5 million to $7 million."
................

Even before knowing about any deal, I can already guess that the first thing is almost always about "guaranteed money" and/or cash in hand.

Secondly, I imagine he wants to be paid top 5 money; which I can't say I blame him, can you?
(A J Green was at the no. 5 - $18.2M for 2020).

And thirdly, players usually prefer not to have a franchise tag on them, and maybe a no trade clause so they can choose where they want to go next.
(But, We've seen that some of these "presumably" perks didn't work out for Clowney.)

.........

Now back to the deal he signed with the Cards.
Notice how his cap number actually goes down by $5.5M for 2020?

Basically, it's just kicking the can down the road, but the Texans (with O'Brien) is already in the "supposedly" win-now mode, so they can always approach the schedule of payment in the same manner.
If they don't win, they will just have to dismantle the team and rebuild. It's not uncommon.

Hopkins is likely to agree to a deal for less than what he got in AZ to stay with his buddy Watson in term of up front money, but that figure $18.2M for 2020 probably needs to be met (or at least something close to that, depending on the negotiation.)

Hopkins understand somewhat about the Texans cap situation (why he said he only wanted a raise).
The Cards just happen to have more cap space, so they were able to give a better deal.
So meet him somewhere close to his asking price and kick the can down the road.

Then you can use his contract to negotiate better deals with Tunsil and Watson; that's what I would have done.
A million here, a million there, the Texans might ending up raising the budget just slightly.

Bumping Hopkins salary from 12.5 to 18; that's 5.5M more, but that can be offset slightly by negotiating with Tunsil and Watson for a little less.
As seen with the Cards actually reducing their current cap space by extending Hopkins, it doesn't have to hurt the Texans at the moment, just the same.

Hopkins guaranteed money for the first two years with the Cards.
27.25 (singing bonus) + 1.5 (base salary for 2020) + 9 (option bonus to be paid in 2021) + 4.75 (base salary for 2021) = 42.5 cash outlay.

That's really not too bad.
If the team needs to be dismantled after 2021, his new contract isn't too bloated such that a contender would shy away from.

................

Now, I maybe incorrect in a few things that I wrote there, but the basis is still that it can be accommodated.
 
Mr teX said:
Agreed, but as I’ve said, we only have what Nuk’s side and just based on what he wound up signing for in AZ, it was a helluva lot more than a band-aid deal. Aside from that, the only “dumb” deals that had been done before Nuk came wanting his extension were the B-Mac and Martin deals. and no GM is above making at least 2-3 bad deals. B-macs wasn’t even bad.
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To follow up my previous post, I would think that since Hopkins was shipped out, the Texans ended up having to pay Watson and Tunsil more than necessary just because there seem to be more money left on the table now (in the view of those players).

What actually transpired is that they have to pay David Johnson some $11M instead of playing the waiting game, and either resign Hyde for about $4M (see his deal with the Seahawks) and only .75M in guaranteed money or Fournette for $2.5M.
This alone would have absorbed the money to pay for Hopkins already.

Then they have to pay Cooks $8M (basically a one-year rental), and shell out $18M in guaranteed money to Cobb (basically 9M per).
They already have Stills at high No. 2 salary to play no. 3.; they really only need a vet playing at minimum salary.

So in fact they ended up having to pay more for less.
 
Here's the transcript of the Mcnair interview yesterday; MV is Marc Vandameer

MV: One thing about your statement, you said we have a good team. That had to factor into your decision of why you did things now.

CM: I've heard "Why now?" It is a good question. We were 0-4. The last several quarters I felt deserved some attention. In the Pittsburgh game 2nd half we struggled and against the Vikings, we weren't playing the caliber we should be playing. At 0-4, I felt we needed to change directions. Typically people do it at the end of the year. We certainly could have waited. There was another off-ramp around the break, on our bye week. I had also thought about if we hadn't played better against the Vikings & Jacksonville, I would need to have to make the hard decision. It was after the Vikings game that I felt it was the right thing to do. With 12 games left, the season isn't over. If you divide the season up into quarters, we've played just the first quarter. It's time to go out there and focus on one game at a time. We made the change. I really believe in our players. We have really good players. We've seen it in spurts. We gotta put those together & go find a way to win a game. I really believe we can do that.

MV: Confidence in Romeo Crennel taking over.

CM: We've known Romeo for 6 1/2 years. He's a terrific person, terrific coach. Guys have a lot of respect for him. He's a natural fit there. We had gone through the exercise with thinking through the virus and what happens in different positions on our staff if someone caught the virus and was out a couple of weeks. In fact, Bill felt strongly Romeo was the right guy. In talking through all of our options, we absolutely agreed with that. This wasn't the same reason for making the change but we thought through it. We're ready for this & made the change.

MV: Bill was also GM. How will you handle the GM side?

CM: So the league does like to see certain names in certain boxes. Romeo will fill the head coach box on the interim basis. Jack Easterby will step into interim GM role. We'll go forward in that way. We turn in our list of contacts to the league so people know who to call. They already know who to call because it's a close knit bunch. We will start a search for the HC & GM on a permanent basis. At that time, Jack will switch back to the job he had before, which was in football ops. I've started a conversation with the search firm but right now, we want to focus & get everyone settled down and go play a great game Sunday and rally around coach. I know it's a cliche when you say "one game at a time" but for us it really is. We need to focus on this one game ahead of us and put together great effort. I want to see our guys having fun. I want to see the defense flying around. I want to put the rock boy band back together. I want them to play their songs. I want Justin Reid to take a pick back 99 yards. I want to see Deshaun playing air guitar. He has a great end zone dance my wife really likes to see. These are things I want to get back to. I want to get back to having fun. I want the guys flying around. I want playing fundamental. That'll lead to wins & where we'll go.

MV: Despite the 0-4 start, sounds like you are confident in the roster.

CM: We have seen the players put together, like I said earlier, good drives on offense. They can roar up and down the field. We can run the ball. We can pass the ball. On defense, we've seen them step up and make stops. We have the players. When you look back in time, and I don't want to spend too much time on it because it is in the rear view mirror, we would have loved to have Hopkins on our team but when you have a franchise LT, which we re-did his contract and by the way, he's playing at a top 5 level right now. We have the franchise LT. We have a franchise QB, which we've been looking for for years, we have him and have very firm belief Deshaun is our guy. We had those two major contracts. When you look across the league, we're paying more than anyone & it isn't really close. When Hopkins wanted to re-do his contract, it wasn't something we could do. We did trade him. We traded him to a team that had the salary cap to extend him, to a team with a great owner, to a team with a exciting and fun offense. We did a good job placing him in a good place. He's a talented, talented guy. We would love to have him but it wouldn't fit financially with the constraints we have operating the club under the salary cap. It wasn't possible to do at this time.

MV: As the search goes on, would it be hiring one before the other? (GM/Coach)

CM: That's how we've been structured traditionally, with a HC and a GM. I'll look for us to go back to that. We'll spend a lot of time working on getting the exact fit. Typically the GM first and then use his expertise and your search group to find the right head coach. I'm confident we can do that. We're coming up with lists, we already have lists. We'll refine them. We have plenty of time to do that. There's restraints in the league while the season is going on & totally respect those. We'll cast a broad net & find the right guys who will work hard together, be smart, be dedicated & bring championships to Houston. I can't tell you how excited I am for the players. I believe in the players. The players will come out & do great things. The season isn't over. We have 12 games. I'm excited to see how this season plays out.

MV: Founder's Day was yesterday. (Founding of the franchise on October 6, 1999) You were able to visit with school children.

CM: Founder's Day, Jamie Roots & his group do a great job. They came up with this Founder's Day concept. Last year we utilized it to put dad in the proper Ring of Honor. Wonderful day. This year & year's going forward, we'll all volunteer & try to make the world a better place. Yesterday was that day. Numbers were at least 90 of our people called at least 100 classrooms and we all read to them and tried to make a small difference in someone's live. Over 2,000 kids we read to. Something we were excited to do. A great Founder's Day.
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dream_team said:
"F you then" move would have been to send him to the Jets or Lions. Not to an up & coming team with a HOF receiver and up & coming QB.
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not if the jets/lions weren’t interested and/or they couldn’t or wouldn’t give you anything that you would’ve wanted.
 
76Texan said:
To follow up my previous post, I would think that since Hopkins was shipped out, the Texans ended up having to pay Watson and Tunsil more than necessary just because there seem to be more money left on the table now (in the view of those players).

What actually transpired is that they have to pay David Johnson some $11M instead of playing the waiting game, and either resign Hyde for about $4M (see his deal with the Seahawks) and only .75M in guaranteed money or Fournette for $2.5M.
This alone would have absorbed the money to pay for Hopkins already.

Then they have to pay Cooks $8M (basically a one-year rental), and shell out $18M in guaranteed money to Cobb (basically 9M per).
They already have Stills at high No. 2 salary to play no. 3.; they really only need a vet playing at minimum salary.

So in fact they ended up having to pay more for less.
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not really. It was already known that Tunsil wanted to be the highest paid OL guy..so at a min we knew we were going to have to pay him at least 22 b/c Brown’s contract pays 21. We also already knew DW4 was going to be somewhere between just over Wilson and below Mahomes who had just signed his deal. and that’s in that 37-39 range.
 
100% agree with this post.
steelbtexan said:
He didn't have a problem going to work with BOB until his guaranteed $$$$ ran out. Coincidence? I think not.
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The way the NFL contract guarantees work is very problematic from a player's perspective. If they push for, and get, fully guaranteed contracts, they will be comparably miniscule to what they sign today in both length and money. Football is too violent and the rosters too large to ever have 100% fully guaranteed contracts of the size they currently sign under the CBA and hard salary cap.
 
Scooter said:
As for Hopkin's contract, ask yourself why anyone at his level would leave himself open to unprotected years.
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I don’t think anyone faults Nuk for trying to get more guaranteed money after his ran out. But I’m calling BS on this narrative he’s been trying to put forth that all he wanted was a little pay bump in light of the timing when he started making noise for more money, the whole “he disrespected me” angle that came out in the SI article and what he wound up getting in AZ. Nuk had been here a while playing under BoB, you don’t think that he saw **** with other players that this dude is unstable?

All I’m saying is Athletes play the media game too and are generally much more effective at it than coaches and GM’s as long as things don’t leak out from other sources. Plus too, they are who we cheer for. In that regard Nuk had a slam dunk win in the media against BoB b/c most of the fans already hated dude, thought the trade was stupid and Nuk was a great player who had a relatively unscathed track record. All he really had to do was do what he’s doing, put out cryptic tweets alluding to some form of the truth and/or HIS version of events.
 
Scooter said:
^ is there a real way to respond to him?
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lol, I mean you could go to your other team and flame the **** out of him like Brooks did...or you could just be the professional and leave it alone all together b/c in the end, he got what he wanted. Nuk is responding to fans on his twitter feed who are coming at him, but keeps deleting his tweets and/or being passive aggressive.

Just leave it alone, block the jackasses who keep coming at him and eventually he and everyone else will move on.
 
Deshaun Watson is barely 25 and only in his fourth pro season, so he’s quick to say he’s still young and still learning. But the quarterback has already experienced a career’s worth of drama and change with the Texans. His time in Houston has featured multiple general managers, the departure of his favorite receiver via a controversial trade and the early-season firing of his head coach.

With the Texans sitting at 0-4 and their playoff hopes practically dead, Watson doesn’t need to experience more to recognize the lesson in that upheaval.

“If you have a lot of change and a lot of people that are not on the same page, regardless of how good your team is, or how good your organization is supposed to be, it’s not going to be where it needs to be,” Watson said Wednesday, in his first public comments since Bill O’Brien’s ouster. “There’s gonna be a lot of inconsistency. That’s the thing that we’re going through right now, and sometimes it takes a little time, but you got to have that solid foundation before you can pile on things that you want to pile on.

“That foundation of whatever you believe in, and whatever you stand on, has to be solid.”

What will the Texans’ identity be under their next head coach and general manager? It’s hard to say. Though Houston fired O’Brien early, team chairman and CEO Cal McNair said the Texans will wait until after the season to hire a general manager, and that person, along with EVP of football operations Jack Easterby, will work with McNair to identify the right coach.

No matter who gets those jobs, their focus must be putting Watson in a situation that maximizes his elite skill set. In a league that is scoring more points than ever, building a top-notch offense with a great quarterback as its engine is the most reliable way to construct a consistent contender. Not only do analytics suggest this, the Texans’ best player ever on the other side of the ball does, too.

“He’s the face of this franchise; he’s the future of this team in this city,” J.J. Watt said of Watson. “So we have to do whatever we possibly can to make sure that he’s in the best position to have success and to lead this place to success, not only this year, not only next year, but for the next 10 years. And so, whatever it takes to give him all the tools he needs to be successful, in order to flourish and build into the best possible version of himself he can be, that’s what we need to do.”

Watt declined to comment on the heated exchange that a source confirmed took place between him and O’Brien during a Week 3 practice. He said he appreciated the success the Texans enjoyed under the ex-head coach and general manager, who Watt thinks “always did what he believed was best for this football team.”

“But obviously, this year, we’re 0-4 and stuff wasn’t working,” Watt said. “When you have the talent that we have, specifically at the quarterback position, you can’t be 0-4.”

With an assortment of new weapons around him and a new play-caller in offensive coordinator Tim Kelly, Watson hasn’t looked as sharp as he did a season ago. Though his net yards per drop back this season (7.06) is his best since his electric rookie year, his percentage of bad throws (18.9) is higher than each of the previous two seasons. Watson is also running less than ever before (17 carries for 58 yards), helping him produce a career-worst 57.3 QBR, which ranks 21st.

O’Brien’s vision for Houston’s overhauled offense — Watson tossing bombs downfield with a speedy receiving corps, then letting pass-catching running backs eat defenses up underneath — has flopped so badly that he lost his job. But as interim head coach Romeo Crennel said, “you’re not going to come in and put in a new offense or a new defense just overnight because it takes time if you’re going to do that. We’re going to have to work with what we have.”

So these final 12 games — whether they end in a playoff berth or the Texans’ top 10 pick going to Miami — must help Watson and Easterby figure out which pieces of the offense should stick.

Will Fuller and Kenny Stills are both free agents after this season, and Brandin Cooks and David Johnson both have contracts that make them either cuttable players or renegotiation candidates. And from a schematic standpoint, Watson might now have more freedom than ever to shape the offense while working alongside Kelly, who had been under O’Brien since their days at Penn State and could use the remainder of the season as an informal audition for other jobs.

“Now, Tim Kelly has the open book for him to just do what he wants to do and how he wants to control this offense with me,” Watson said. “We’re gonna do it together.”

Watson believes the offense still has explosive potential, but like the rest of the Texans, it has failed to find consistency. The passing attack enjoyed a big first half against the Steelers in Week 3, then the Texans didn’t score in the final two quarters. Houston’s defense held Minnesota’s rushing attack to a respectable yards per carry average for much of the Texans’ Week 4 game, but it failed to make tackles in high-leverage situations.

Crennel said he’ll try to fix this by harping on fundamentals and reminding players not to overextend themselves in hopes of making a play. He senses the 0-4 start has worn down some on a roster that entered this season with playoff expectations, but he said players must “bring their own energy.”

“They have to be excited about playing, excited about the game, excited about the game plan,” said the 73-year-old Crennel, the oldest head coach in NFL history. “If those things are in place, then they can be excited about playing and they can look forward to the game and what they’re able to do in the game.”

On Wednesday, following a practice in which he thought his teammates displayed good energy and communicated well, Watt was noticeably more enthusiastic than he had been in some of his other recent news conferences. He said he was excited about “getting on the same page with our fan base again.”

“There’s certainly been a bit of a tension there in the last months and years,” Watt said. “I can’t wait to have us all pulling in the same direction.”

If all goes as Watt hopes, that direction will lead the Texans bringing the best out of their young quarterback.
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Mr teX said:
not really. It was already known that Tunsil wanted to be the highest paid OL guy..so at a min we knew we were going to have to pay him at least 22 b/c Brown’s contract pays 21. We also already knew DW4 was going to be somewhere between just over Wilson and below Mahomes who had just signed his deal. and that’s in that 37-39 range.
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Was it there somewhere? I don't think I've seen that.
Even if that was what he wanted, it's the job of the negotiator to tell him/his agent that his production wasn't even in the top 5 (Sacks, QB Hits, Pressures Allowed - not to mention the penalties) in pass pro and that he didn't show well in run block (Win rate or whatever metric that they use to score their linemen).
There's just no way his agent can justify top LT salary.

https://overthecap.com/position/left-tackle/

$19M is what I saw, and that should be more than enough.

https://www.si.com/nfl/texans/news/...w-representation-to-land-a-contract-extension

As for Watson, $37M is VERY different from $39 (you don't have 2 Mil lying around somewhere you can throw me, now do you?)
And Watson hasn't done enough to earn the no. 2 spot on the salary scale.

The very least should have happened with those two guys are some incentive bonus.
Heck, Mahomes' contract is full with those languages.
 
DocBar said:
100% agree with this post.
The way the NFL contract guarantees work is very problematic from a player's perspective. If they push for, and get, fully guaranteed contracts, they will be comparably miniscule to what they sign today in both length and money. Football is too violent and the rosters too large to ever have 100% fully guaranteed contracts of the size they currently sign under the CBA and hard salary cap.
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Nobody was talking about 100% guaranteed; where did you get that from?
 
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