The Mess That Is The Houston Texans
This comic tends to go through the occasional phase of bullying specific teams, usually coinciding with whichever teams are currently having a high amount of problematic drama, since that’s what makes good comic material. The Jets with Rex Ryan were an early example. The Patriots during deflategate. When people ask me to make more comics about X team, I usually respond by telling them that if I am making comics about X team, it means X team is being stupid. No comics means your team is boring or generally competent. I got a feeling I’m going to be making a lot of Texans comics in the coming months.
I didn’t think that by the end of January there would actually be some debate on whether or not the Texans would have been better off with Bill O’Brien. That’s how bad this has gotten. BoB alienated several stars, traded away Nuk, and pissed off Deshaun, but he was at least semi-competent at coaching and Deshaun was willing to stay and sign the big contract. Bob deserved to be fired but things have only gone downhill since.
The Texans after BoB were supposed to be the hot destination. They fired him week 4. They needed a general manager and a new coach. The team had an okay roster. They already had the most important position filled. The Texans job genuinely looked like a great spot to go. They had the time to find the right hire. They could easily wash off the filth of BoB and move on up. Instead now we find ourselves in this stew of discontent driven by a clueless failson owner, a disgruntled QB, a joke fall-guy hire for a coach, and a goddamn preacher. It’s practically farce. It feels like the plot to a comedy drama that is expertly written and everyone keeps telling you to watch it but you just never get around to it. Yes, I know I should watch Succession/Schitts Creek/whatever, I’ll get around to it okay, stop hounding me.
I feel sorry for David Culley. For a while it looked like the Texans might avert disaster with their QB and hire Bieniemy, and yet by now I think Bieniemy is better off. This is a hell-position that is going to be a puppet show for Easterby and has no chance of ending well. It makes some sense why Culley took it. On top of being a good jesus boy (probably the only thing Easterby cares about), Culley is 65 years old and before this had zero accomplishments of note and was resigned to never being a head coach. Culley is not some diamond in the rough that nobody noticed. He was the passing coordinator and WR coach on the Ravens, a team built around the run who was terrible in passing. He was the QB coach for the Bills for the Peterman/Tyrod era. He was the WR coach for the Chiefs in 2014, the year no Chiefs WR caught a touchdown all season. For you older folks, he was the WR coach on the early 2000’s Eagles. I can’t judge the guy as a person, but looking at his football resume…it….uh…doesn’t look good.
But there is a decent chance Culley already knows it. He openly admitted he never thought it would happen. He’s 65. Take that big fat coach contract and be Easterby’s puppet for a year or two, why not. At this point the fanbase knows who the problem is. Culley won’t be loved unless he’s somehow incredible as HC but he won’t be the one blamed when this mess finally comes home to roost for Easterby. Then he can go back to being a position coach on some team or retire. Not a bad way to grab some late career security.
Deshaun of course hated it and now we play the waiting game to find out where he goes. You can’t build a franchise around someone who doesn’t want to be there. This might get even worse before it’s over. We haven’t heard JJ say a damn thing yet and JJ has always been a good boy scout.
JJ to da Bears.
Is there a clause in the fan handbook that lets me change teams after 2 decades if the ownership is resigned to making losing football decisions in favor of being “God’s Team”?
Man if I were you I’d just swap teams to wherever Watson goes, fan backlash and leaving en-masse might be the only thing to save the Texans at this rate
Saw this comic coming. I think Deshaun’s reaction was pretty much every ones reaction. There have been some…unusual hires in this cycle.
Also, Reid gave us a nice quote on Culley. Mainly the last line lol
“David will do a good job,” Reid said. “He’s a people person. He’ll bring energy to the building. One of the most loyal guys I’ve ever been around. He’s a great person. We were together 18 years. We had a few cheeseburgers together.”
https://twitter.com/MattVerderame/status/1354820776675876865 I think JJ is saying something Dave
I once told a person at a party that I don’t watch much tv or play many video games. Completely baffled he asked me what I do all day. In general I have found that the people who must consume every single big budget movie, prestige television show, or viral youtube video to be uninteresting. Doubly so for the ones that are concerned that YOU consume the exact same media that they do.
I suppose it is different for a content creator on Twitter. A lot of people gonna @you about popular shit, and you can’t just tell the fans to fuck off and go outside like I can.
For the most part I still just do what I want, but most requests are fans who want to see their own team represented more (understandable) or fans who saw the most recent bit of news and are demanding a comic about that (also understandable). The second one is far more irritating because those fans basically already have an image in their head of what they want from me and I’m not going to match it and it takes a while for me to get it right if im not immediately inspired, like Rivers recent retirement getting a ton of people demanding more ringless rivers
The preacher thing doesn’t bother me all that much, I wouldn’t lump it in as worthy of ridicule beside the rest of Easterby’s failings. Frank Reich was a pastor before he got into coaching and he’s pretty good. Heck, Nick Foles almost retired the offseason before he won the Super Bowl to become a pastor. I don’t think the pastor-to-NFL pipeline is an inherently bad move.
Easterby is a failure because he’s bad at what he does, not because he was a preacher beforehand.
he’s the sort of dumbfuck preacher who compares THE CRUCIFIXION OF JESUS CHRIST to a football game.
which, and correct me if I’m wrong…seems like a bit heretical?
“Sure God sent Himself to suffer and die AND THAT IS JUST LIKE THIS SPORTING EVENT!”
Reggie White was a preacher while he played. His nickname was the “Minister of Defense”; pretty badass.
That is possibly the worst HC hire this year. Worse than the Lions hiring the Saints offensive assistant. The offensive assistant has less say than the coordinators. Maybe even worse than Michigan hiring Baltimore’s LB coach as their DC, instead of Muschamp. Woof. The best HC hire was Arthur Smith and Rober Saleh.
Dan Campbell is the only hire this cycle with previous head coaching experience.
Cal McNair seems even more eager than his father to buy into hucksters like O’Brien and Easterby who claim to be selling some sort of shortcut to winning culture, to “The Patriot Way”. But even Bob McNair I think understood the value of a franchise quarterback. Franchise QBs are more valuable than all but a very very small number of people in football. They are more valuable than all but a very few coaches, all but an even smaller number of general managers, and certainly more valuable than any executive or advisor on team culture. Deshaun Watson may or may not be the best advisor on rebuilding a team (I mean, he does want to play for the Jets…), but if he really wants to consult on hiring coaches and GMs you give that chance to him, especially if you promise him input (as McNair allegedly did). He’s worth that much. Millions of people understand this, literally millions… but Cal McNair clearly does not.
Utterly bizarre, but yeah, great stuff for comics. Houston fans have been stuck with bad ownership and bad management through nearly all of their history with two separate franchises, and they don’t even get to be famous for it like some other long-suffering fanbases.
Yeah, the Texans are just kinda there and miserable. Most bad teams like the Jags and Phins last year got memes and attention but the Texans have such bad management that no one really cares about them. Also, some of the trades that have been declined for Deshaun are just laughable, like decline 3 first rounders
In all fairness, the Chiefs had a QB who prefers throwing to TEs and RBs to compound the lack of talent at WR the year they had no WR touchdowns. Also Lamar isn’t a great passer. He’s okay. Maybe good, even. But his elite talent is at running and if you’re any good as a coach that’s what you’ll build your team around
Yeah, Smith checks it down and yeah, the WRs that year were not good but still, an entire year without a single WR touchdown, not even on a short easy crossing route or YAC play, that’s still amazing and there is a reason it is so rare
I need a bottle of Hell Yeah Bubbles.
Didn’t Bieniemy reject the Texans job offer? That’s why they went with Culley.
I hope he did, shows he’s smart to not get stuck in that mess
Pain. Football is pain and stupid and I hate it and hate myself for rooting for the Texans.
And now JJ Watt is likely gone too. The city of Houston is really going through it right now, eh? All of this pain for what? Just a single, tainted World Series win.