Would have loved to see the Kubiak Era with DeShawn Watson play action with Foster......Dam we would have won that Pats game in New England...
Gaines has done one draft..... Without a 1st or 2nd round pick he landed Justin Reid and Coutee. Rankin could also be a solid find now that they are going to play him where he belongs. Akins, Thomas, and Ejiofor are at least still on this team after a year. That's more than we could say for some of Rick Smith's mid/late round picks in the past.
A lot of Ricks picks have been on the team for years. Even through that top ranked defense year. You guys keep trying to bad mouth Rick but he did pretty good. The coaching made him look bad.
Hard to give him a ton of credit for Rankin. They needed a tackle but drafted a guard. They drafted two tight ends and it feels like tight end is still a need. Duke and Coutee need to make more contributions on the field. This team's success is largely because of Rick Smith's picks.
I was about to say, you can build through the draft, but if you dont know what to do with pieces, does it matter?
Gaine has had one draft so no one knows how he is at drafting talent. I wouldn’t count Coutee has some sort of great success, he proved very little last year. Everyone but the Texans knew Rankin was a guard before the draft last year... it took the Texans 12 months longer to figure it out. Reed is a solid and possibly more type player.
Can you imagine Morey or Luhnow saying they won’t utilize free agency or trades to build a team, but only the draft. Very narrow minded thinking. No one is saying the Texans have to put all their eggs in the free agency basket, but it should be one of several methods to build a team. Also it is funny that BOB said you try to just keep your team together in free agency.... because they failed at that if that was their goal. I keep hoping that BOB isn’t as dense as he sounds. However he has showed zero ability to be creative or innovative or even really good at an area of coaching.
It's about maximizing Watson's rookie deal contract, which seems to be what the smart teams are doing with their stud rookie QBs.
I agree with the Texans strategy as shocking as that may be for some... Building thru the draft is how teams win in this league. Free agency is a consistently inefficient way to improve your team. I also am giving Gaine the benifit of the doubt after his abiltiy last year to find some key pieces in the draft without a 1st or 2nd round pick. I think we have a real chance to add at least 3-4 more productive players this year and i am excited to see who we target.
Not unless I was posting here drunk. What I have said is there was a time on here that it felt Morey could do no wrong and Rick Smith could do no right. Anything good the Texans did was because of the coaches, anything bad was Rick Smith's fault. Smith was average to slightly-above average. I think I've said that consistently. Morey is definitely above average. Regarding building through the draft, I don't think there's a team that doesn't do this. Cleveland built through the draft (QB, RB, WR, CB) before supplementing with free agency and trades. Jacksonville (QB, RB, CB, RB) built through the draft before complementing with free agents. Even the Patriots have key pieces on the team that weren't drafted. They all want to build primarily through the draft. The key is you gotta draft well AND you gotta bring other pieces in to complement through the draft. No different than any other team.
It’s a true statement. You build through being effective in the NFL draft. Those guys as the pan out are under cost control for a few years, if they are successful they will garner big money contracts too. I’d rather pay the same big money contract to a guy who you know fits in the system than a guy who may or may not fit. There is value free agency that is good to fill holes, heck how many 1 year deals did the Texans hand out. If those guys succeed, they are in for a big payday. Now getting stars in FA for massive contracts backfires big time more often than not, because it uses up all the cap space for when the younger talents are ready to collect their payday. I get it if the FA is a franchise star, but for a borderline pro bowler a team should not break the bank.