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Texans hire Bill O'Brien as HC

'cept, you know, Belichick, Coughlin, and Payton....6 rings between them.

As far as Belichick's coaching tree...seems like the law of averages would eventually kick in and he'd have one head coach from it find success. It might as well be O'Brien!

The ones off Belichicks tree all failed at their first job. O Brien had success at Penn State so he has already broken the cycle.
 
The ones off Belichicks tree all failed at their first job. O Brien had success at Penn State so he has already broken the cycle.
Belichick failed at his first HC job with the Browns. Probably a big part in Cleveland ditching Cleveland and moving to Baltimore. Once he figured it out though, man did he go on a tear!!

BB
 
Belichick failed at his first HC job with the Browns. Probably a big part in Cleveland ditching Cleveland and moving to Baltimore. Once he figured it out though, man did he go on a tear!!

BB

So BOB has already one upped his mentor.

bxDuL45.jpg
 
Belichick failed at his first HC job with the Browns. Probably a big part in Cleveland ditching Cleveland and moving to Baltimore. Once he figured it out though, man did he go on a tear!!

BB

Actually, Belichick & Co. were starting to win in Cleveland; they finished 11-5 in'94. Then, in the middle of '95, Modell announced that he was moving the franchise to Baltimore and that sunk player morale the rest of that year - I think they won one more game (after starting 4-4). If Modell hadn't moved the Browns, I'm thinking Belichick and Co. would have brought a championship to Cleveland.
 
Actually, Belichick & Co. were starting to win in Cleveland; they finished 11-5 in'94. Then, in the middle of '95, Modell announced that he was moving the franchise to Baltimore and that sunk player morale the rest of that year - I think they won one more game (after starting 4-4). If Modell hadn't moved the Browns, I'm thinking Belichick and Co. would have brought a championship to Cleveland.
You give 1 winning season out of 5 a lot more credit than it probably deserves. There was a lot of mediocrity going on in Cleveland.
1995 Browns
You may be right about a championship, but it's kinda like how many licks it takes to get to the toosie roll center of a tootsie pop. The world may never know.

mr-owlFURIO.png
 
'cept, you know, Belichick, Coughlin, and Payton....6 rings between them.

As far as Belichick's coaching tree...seems like the law of averages would eventually kick in and he'd have one head coach from it find success. It might as well be O'Brien!

Maybe I'm missing something here, but Payton outside of the SB year has basically won two Wildcard games in seven seasons. And Coughlin, outside of his two SB trips in his decade as the Giants coach, has never won a playoff game and outright missed the playoffs half the time.

5 SB appearances, 8 conference championship appearances and 12 playoffs in 14 years. These other two don't come close. They were just lucky to catch lightning in a bottle.
 
Maybe I'm missing something here, but Payton outside of the SB year has basically won two Wildcard games in seven seasons. And Coughlin, outside of his two SB trips in his decade as the Giants coach, has never won a playoff game and outright missed the playoffs half the time.

5 SB appearances, 8 conference championship appearances and 12 playoffs in 14 years. These other two don't come close. They were just lucky to catch lightning in a bottle.
That can be said of most of the Super Bowl winners the last 15 years. Only one back to back championship and only one 3 out of 4 years. It's been the Pats or some team that got lucky at the right time with the Giants being the luckiest I've ever seen.
 
You give 1 winning season out of 5 a lot more credit than it probably deserves. There was a lot of mediocrity going on in Cleveland.
1995 Browns
You may be right about a championship, but it's kinda like how many licks it takes to get to the toosie roll center of a tootsie pop. The world may never know.

mr-owlFURIO.png

Bill's turn around came when he bought a video camera to film his grandson's little league game . Bill learned he could steal the third base coaches signs and the rest is history . :peek:
 
That can be said of most of the Super Bowl winners the last 15 years. Only one back to back championship and only one 3 out of 4 years. It's been the Pats or some team that got lucky at the right time with the Giants being the luckiest I've ever seen.

Coughlin and Manning miss the playoffs 4 out of the last 5 years, but because the one time the do make it they ride a hot streak to a SB win...
 
Coughlin and Manning miss the playoffs 4 out of the last 5 years, but because the one time the do make it they ride a hot streak to a SB win...
That would be 2 times they rode a hot streak to the :trophy:, highlighted by 2 of the unlikliest plays ever seen. :cowboy1:
 
That would be 2 times they rode a hot streak to the :trophy:, highlighted by 2 of the unlikliest plays ever seen. :cowboy1:

If we follow the pattern of SB/suck/suck, then the Giants should go 7-9, somehow get into the playoffs, and win it all. Against the Texans of course.
 
I really like the way he is running training camp. Scrimmages with teams and seems if they do well. Using preseason games as they should. Live fire game film on "bubble players" . Mixing up the lineup depth chart.on game day. Maybe it is something I never really paid attention too before. It just seemed that we went through the motions before. Play starters "x" amount of plays and sit them (example ...was surprise when Brown got the sitdown for the falcon games)

Time will tell if it will translate to wins but I do like his approach
 
All signs of intelligence and awareness, I feel like. Same with seeing guys like Harris fall down the depth chart.

The most exciting thing I've enjoyed about O'Brien as the HC thus far is his application of common sense.
 
All signs of intelligence and awareness, I feel like. Same with seeing guys like Harris fall down the depth chart.

The most exciting thing I've enjoyed about O'Brien as the HC thus far is his application of common sense.
I'm liking the hire so far, even though he wasn't my favorite choice.

I really like the fact that OB seems flexible with everything. If something doesn't work, he doesn't try to pound that square peg into the round hole, like the previous regime seemed to do. :cowboy1:
 
I like the basic direction we've been going.

But it's only been two preseason games and the reason a lot of it feels positive at this point is because of how we blew out the Falcons in that second game (and because of some good reports from Denver.)

I'm hoping for the best. I liked the OB selection. I liked the draft. I didn't hate free agency.

But I've got to see how this translates in to W/L over the next couple of years before I'm sold on it.
 
It's football and we have a team and the season is about to start. Everything is sunshine and unicorn farts until reality hits. Still, I'm going to enjoy it while it lasts. One thing I've realized about following the Texans and that is that regimes that need to go get a lot of time to wear out their welcome. We're not at that point yet and so hope is still alive. I'm going to stay in this mode for as long as the facts will let me.
 
Agreed. It seems like years past. It would take hell or high water to move someone down on the roster chart once the coaches had their mind set....again I might be over analyzing
 
It's football and we have a team and the season is about to start. Everything is sunshine and unicorn farts until reality hits. Still, I'm going to enjoy it while it lasts. One thing I've realized about following the Texans and that is that regimes that need to go get a lot of time to wear out their welcome. We're not at that point yet and so hope is still alive. I'm going to stay in this mode for as long as the facts will let me.

Agreed. It seems like years past. It would take hell or high water to move someone down on the roster chart once the coaches had their mind set....again I might be over analyzing
AMEN, brothers!! That's why I don't have any real expectations other than be competitive and improve week to week. I expect setbacks, close losses, ugly losses, close wins, and maybe a blowout win or two. I'm just gonna throw up my hands and enjoy the rollercoaster ride!!! :doot:
 
Maybe I'm missing something here, but Payton outside of the SB year has basically won two Wildcard games in seven seasons. And Coughlin, outside of his two SB trips in his decade as the Giants coach, has never won a playoff game and outright missed the playoffs half the time.

5 SB appearances, 8 conference championship appearances and 12 playoffs in 14 years. These other two don't come close. They were just lucky to catch lightning in a bottle.

That's an incredibly uncharitable way to look at a league that has probably more parity than any other in the world.
 
Bill O'Brien: A coach's life
By Brian Smith


While Houston sleeps, Bill O'Brien awakes.

A clock strikes 4:30 a.m. and a first-year NFL coach attempting to stabilize and reenergize a staggered team readies his 44-year-old body for a four-month season that never actually ends.

By 5 a.m., O'Brien is inside NRG Stadium. Quarterback Ryan Fitzpatrick and a few coaches are already working through a new day. O'Brien briefly remains alone, finding comfort in the emptiness of his new office and the silence that precedes the noise that follows.

"I like to work early in the morning before everybody gets here," said O'Brien, who became the third coach in franchise history on Jan. 3, replacing a fired Gary Kubiak. "It's a quiet time where I can get a lot of work done."

For O'Brien and the Texans, there is so much work to be done.

Rebuilding a broken team for a patient but hungry owner in Bob McNair, who ended Kubiak's unfulfilling eight-year reign by saying a franchise that finished an NFL-worst 2-14 in 2013 wasn't going to wait around for its next era to begin. Reinspiring a collection of high-priced professional athletes, who drifted apart last season as 14 consecutive defeats mounted and the worst overall year in team history became a numb reality. Reigniting 53 players, who for years haven't been strong, tough or driven enough in an unflinching league that demands total sacrifice and the unity of one.

Then there's real life. O'Brien's New England roots created a son, brother, husband and father of two boys. The untypical NFL path that followed – Brown University; 20 criss-crossed football years, doing everything from low-pay grunt work to standing alongside legendary New England coach Bill Belichick – branched off with an oldest son, Jack, who is being treated at Texans Children's Hospital for lissencephaly, a chromosome-deletion medical condition that affects about one in 100,000 children and prevents the normal development of a fetus' brain, resulting in almost total debilitation.

"I have pretty good..."
 
Maybe this story was posted somewhere in this thread but I certainly can't find it at this point. It was written by David Jones on September 10, 2013 prior to UCF and Penn State going head to head.

Jones detail's Bill O'Brien and his relationship with George O'Leary, Ralph Friedgen and Doug Marrone, Bill's best friend (and future Texans staff member, I believe.)

It's a more personal account from the perspective of Friedgen.

http://www.pennlive.com/sports/index.ssf/2013/09/nobody_knows_bill_obrien_and_g.html
 
There is a very strong propensity for players and coaches alike that leave the Belichick nest and get out from underneath Belichick's thumb, fail miserably after leaving the nest. Unfortunately for the Texans they're LLLOOOAAADDDEEEDDD with folks who have left that nest.

So that reminds me. Is Bill O'Brien really a bird that left the nest? I mean he came to the Patriots with a pretty good coaching history & he left the Patriots doing his own thing. So really, he was just passing through.

Just like all of us, he's an amalgamation of all his experiences & the Patriots was just part of it. He refers to his experiences with Georgia Tech & George O'Leary as much if not more than the Patriots. Not that he out right mentions either.

O'Brien has been coaching for 20 years, only 3 of them associated with Belichick.
 
Maybe this story was posted somewhere in this thread but I certainly can't find it at this point. It was written by David Jones on September 10, 2013 prior to UCF and Penn State going head to head.

Jones detail's Bill O'Brien and his relationship with George O'Leary, Ralph Friedgen and Doug Marrone, Bill's best friend (and future Texans staff member, I believe.)

It's a more personal account from the perspective of Friedgen.

http://www.pennlive.com/sports/index.ssf/2013/09/nobody_knows_bill_obrien_and_g.html

Hadn't seen that posted before, enjoyed it. Thanks for posting.
 
Maybe this story was posted somewhere in this thread but I certainly can't find it at this point. It was written by David Jones on September 10, 2013 prior to UCF and Penn State going head to head.

Jones detail's Bill O'Brien and his relationship with George O'Leary, Ralph Friedgen and Doug Marrone, Bill's best friend (and future Texans staff member, I believe.)

It's a more personal account from the perspective of Friedgen.

http://www.pennlive.com/sports/index.ssf/2013/09/nobody_knows_bill_obrien_and_g.html

Enjoyed that read, thanks for posting it.
 
So that reminds me. Is Bill O'Brien really a bird that left the nest? I mean he came to the Patriots with a pretty good coaching history & he left the Patriots doing his own thing. So really, he was just passing through.

Just like all of us, he's an amalgamation of all his experiences & the Patriots was just part of it. He refers to his experiences with Georgia Tech & George O'Leary as much if not more than the Patriots. Not that he out right mentions either.

O'Brien has been coaching for 20 years, only 3 of them associated with Belichick.

Enjoyed that read, thanks for posting it.

Sure. I thought it was interesting to learn that basically you had Friedgen, O'Brien and Marrone all creating together, thanks to some diverse personnel at Georgia Tech and O'Leary urging the offensive staff to think outside of the box.

It seems that would create a very good foundation for offensive creativity and flexibility that seems to have served O'Brien well.

And much to Thunderkyss' point, I think it supports the idea that O'Brien is much more than another fruit from the Belichick tree.
 
After watching the GB-Sea game, I can't believe the Texans didn't at least interview the Seahawks' OC (Darrell Bevell) for the HC job.

Some team will be smart enough to hire him next season.
 
After watching the GB-Sea game, I can't believe the Texans didn't at least interview the Seahawks' OC (Darrell Bevell) for the HC job.

Some team will be smart enough to hire him next season.

Cleveland should have went after him. I think he would be the perfect coach for Manziel.
 
I can't believe the Texans didn't interview a lot of people.
I like McNair, but the guy just doesn't hire head coaches correctly.

He suffers from impulse buy every time out!

After watching the GB-Sea game, I can't believe the Texans didn't at least interview the Seahawks' OC (Darrell Bevell) for the HC job.

Some team will be smart enough to hire him next season.
 
I understand all the second guessing after a performance like SEA gave last night, but GOOD GOD MAN can yall just keep your respective Texans inferiority complexes in your pants until BoB starts screwing up? (Assuming he does a bad job.) The guy hasn't even officially been our HC FOR ONE GAME OF THE REGULAR SEASON.

The Texans fan base is insufferable at times.

Carry on...
 
Drew Dougherty ‏@DoughertyDrew

Really? I thought the TEAM picked THEIR captains. How many other teams do this? I'm probably wrong but that doesn't seem like a real good method of building team camaraderie. I'm not sure how to say exactly what I mean, just that it doesn't sound like a good idea. Sounds like more of a college thing to me.

It may be just O'Brien's MO but I can't get it out of my mind that this is his way of making sure that AJ isn't a C since he pulled his little stunt in OTAs and Minicamp. idonno:
 
Really? I thought the TEAM picked THEIR captains. How many other teams do this? I'm probably wrong but that doesn't seem like a real good method of building team camaraderie. I'm not sure how to say exactly what I mean, just that it doesn't sound like a good idea.

It may be just O'Brien's MO but I can't get it out of my mind that this is his way of making sure that AJ isn't a C since he pulled his little stunt in OTAs and Minicamp. idonno:

With most teams, I think, the coaching staff picks captains and then the teams choose captains and then you end up with 2 captains offense, 2 captains defense, ST captain like we had with Kubiak.

Sometimes, I think, the team chooses weekly captains, recognizing guys who had big weeks the prior week or guys who were expected to be important that week.

I'm not really worried too much about this.
 
With most teams, I think, the coaching staff picks captains and then the teams choose captains and then you end up with 2 captains offense, 2 captains defense, ST captain like we had with Kubiak.

Sometimes, I think, the team chooses weekly captains, recognizing guys who had big weeks the prior week or guys who were expected to be important that week.

I'm not really worried too much about this.

I guess, though I've never heard a commentator say player X is a Captain this week 'cause he played really well last week. I guess it probably went down and I just din't know about it.

Again, I wasn't consulted.:foottap:
 
I guess, though I've never heard a commentator say player X is a Captain this week 'cause he played really well last week. I guess it probably went down and I just din't know about it.

Again, I wasn't consulted.:foottap:

I heard Aaron Rodgers mention last nite that he was captain for the week
 
OB mentioned that they have captains/leaders of position groups, and inferred the team captains would be drawn from those.
 
OB mentioned that they have captains/leaders of position groups, and inferred the team captains would be drawn from those.

Is that in a presser, on the mothership or what? Hafta listen when I get home. The crew threatens to mutiny when I pull rank and listen to Texans news instead of their steady diet of classic rock. :foottap:
 
Really? I thought the TEAM picked THEIR captains. How many other teams do this? I'm probably wrong but that doesn't seem like a real good method of building team camaraderie. I'm not sure how to say exactly what I mean, just that it doesn't sound like a good idea. Sounds like more of a college thing to me.

It may be just O'Brien's MO but I can't get it out of my mind that this is his way of making sure that AJ isn't a C since he pulled his little stunt in OTAs and Minicamp. idonno:

I heard Aaron Rodgers mention last nite that he was captain for the week

I had read somewhere that this is how Mike McCarthy handles his team captains as well. Based on week to week on performance in games, practices, and meetings. Then once the regular season is over the players vote on playoff captains.



... mmmm ... playoff captains ...
 
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