Your excuse for the Saints also work for the Texans though. Lovie is also qualified for a head coaching job, he's one of the few people to coach a superbowl team, that's always a plus in your resume no matter what happens. Also, the whole already being in the organization thing, which the Texans did. How was the Saints not a sham interview either? Everyone seems to agree Allen was their guy? Why'd they interview Flores and Bienemy, they interviewd Bienemy like a day or so ago too? That seems like it was a complete sham interview. He was never a serious contender, interviewed him on Sunday and moved right on.
There is a fine line between sham and due diligence. The Steelers were prepared to hire Russ Grimm but got sold on Mike Tomlin in the interview. So, did the Saints think Allen was the guy but wanted to do their due diligence and "proved" themselves right and hired Allen? Or had they already decided on Allen and went through the motions with others. It's hard for an outsider to know for sure what happened. In the Daboll/Flores situation but what makes it APPEAR to be an obvious sham is that the Giants were already telling people it was Daboll.
Except that your comparison requires us to work under the assumption that the Texans have earned the same benefit of the doubt as the Saints. One of those is a well-run, winning franchise and the other is the Texans. Context and history matter.
Cal McNair looks like the type of dude that farts into his cupped hand and then tries to waft it as fast as he can too his nose.
Not the same thing although that's the story the Three Stooges want you to buy into. Lovie was a fall back choice period. He was not even mentioned as a candidate for the job until AFTER the Goodell PR missive on Saturday. Also, it's important to point out that Lovie hasn't been considered for any NFL HC position since going 8-24 at Tampa so to say that he was a legitimate candidate all along is not the case. The Texans were going to hire McClown until the fallout from the Flores lawsuit blew everything up. If Lovie was SO qualified for the position then please explain why you didn't even hear his name until Sunday night? And again, they interviewed Bienemy BEFORE they made their decision which is not what the NYG did with Flores. Flores was interviewed AFTER they (Giants) had made the decision to hire Daboll. The entire exercise was intended to make it look like they were following the Rooney Rule which is what pissed off Flores. This is exactly what the Texans were planning to do with McClown as the decision to hire him had already been made and they were interviewing the others so Caserio can stand up there today and talk about how "comprehensive" the search was (unlike last year). Plus, if you want to keep in place the systems that have been working for the Saints then Allen is a great choice. Under Allen, the Saints were 4th in total defense while the Texans were 30th (not all Lovie's fault due to the shitty roster). For NO, Allen's hire checks more boxes than Lovie does for Houston. Now Lovie Smith is a better hire than was David Culley - that goes without saying. But Lovie Smith is the worse of the nine coaches that just got hired. You keep trying to equate the two situations in order to justify the cluster that is the Texans and that's what Caserio is counting on to provide cover for himself and his two amigos.
My point here is I don't think it is fair to speculate some nefarious motivation behind the Texans hire like that they NFL forced them to do it and if it hadn't been for Flores suit they don't hire Lovie...we just don't know that for sure. You mentioned Tomlin, why couldn't that be true of the Texans? Maybe they figured they hire Lovie and wait and see on McCown? I don't think there has to be a racial reason for it and if people know my posting history, I'm never shy of calling out racism. I'm careful though, I don't see it here. I think it's also insulting to Lovie who is a respectable coach (not great...but respectable) so that's my take on it. If people want to question the Texans then they should also question the Saints and Giants etc etc. But we're not talking about the quality of franchises or how many games they have won. The Texans DO have a better history with hiring black people in their FO than MOST NFL teams, that's a fact...and it's even more damning when you consider that they are also the youngest NFL franchise. If anyone deserves the benefit of the doubt for racial hires for the NFL it's the Texans. Not the Saints.
The 2pm 610 radio show start with them reminiscing about the fire alarm interrupting their Lovie trance was absolutely pure gold if anyone heard ! Lmao
Hiring one or two black coaches doesn't make u progressive. Just like having one black friend doesn't make u not racist. Texans deserve no fking benefit of the doubt. Especially the way caserio got hired is another example of how much our org likes to do sham pr interview process before hiring the candidate they really wanted. McCown was the end goal, Flores lawsuit delayed it.
Flores' lawyers just released a statement claiming that the lawsuit prevented the Texans from hiring him. I'm calling BS on that because Flores was never going to be hired here for the same reason that Gannon wasn't. Lovie was hired because he, like Culley before him, agreed to let Nick "give" them coaching "advice" because, after all, he is the smartest guy in the room. Neither Gannon nor Flores would have put up with this - they wanted to run their own show without interference from the GM - which is why they were never going to be hired here. I think that in the end, Flores was just a little too much Belichick for Jack & Nick to control.
Naw might be his other son Miles who coached our LBs this past year and has always coached with his dad.
Your entire point is based on assumptions though. Just because we heard of their interest at the last moment doesn't mean they never had interest. They obviously liked him, they cleaned out the coaching staff except for him so they obviously wanted to keep him around. How do we know they interviewed Bienemy before they made their decision? The only reason we know that about the Giants is because of the Belichick text, if that never comes out then it looks like the Giants too considered Flores but had just coincidentally picked Daboll. That's my point, you can't really prove that the Texans never considered Lovie until after the Flores suit. You're just assuming the worst from them which is your perogative but I wouldn't call it truth or fact until there is some kind of evidence for the claim. It's entirely possible that they liked Lovie this whole time, had the interview with him last because he apparently was advising them throughout this whole thing and then decided just to pick him. It's entirely possible that they really like McCown but might decide he needs more experience to make that move especially considering that they just had an inexperienced coach and saw how that worked. It's entirely possible that for that reason they decided to go with a more experienced coach that they knew the players enjoyed playing with. Yes, Lovie has qualifications to be a head coach, again, you mention Tampa and I mention Chicago. To assume he's just a minority hire isn't really helping progress.
KEVIN!!! or Flores were my top choices. The way they arrived at Lovie was very North Korea. I don't dislike Lovie as head coach especially with Pep still working with Mills. They have to find players to fit Lovie's Defense for real for real now. Right? I don't think Lovie's defense is outdated. The way offensive rules are set, practically every defense can be overwhelmed. Mills needs some young running backs and a speedster wr. If they really want DJ around give him a gig as the running backs coach.
There are individual teams named outside of Miami. NYG and Denver are named. The Texans surely would've been, too, had they hired McCown.
It's not that Lovie isn't qualified or deserving. It's that he wasn't even considered or any part of the process until the lawsuit was filed. This thought that the Texans magically realized they had a coach that had Super Bowl experience on their staff is just silly. They knew who he was and where he was. If that was the case, then they're just as incompetent as we perceive them to be...which they are, just in a different way.
