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Fired Jack Easterby

Discussion in 'Houston Texans' started by coachbadlee, Nov 11, 2020.

  1. J.R.

    J.R. Member

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    [...]

    The Jack Easterby Texans have made many, many irrational decisions. They aren’t a rational actor. There was never any logic in trading DeAndre Hopkins. There was never any logic to believing that trading for Laremy Tunsil would be a long-term winner. There was never any logic in not replacing Jadeveon Clowney, D.J. Reader, and so on with anyone better than Eric Murray. When you look at this interview through the scope of the long-term rather than the short-term, it is not out of place. When you look at the rumors that have come out about Easterby’s tenure, when you look at the fact that the team continues to go out of its way to hire people who will not challenge his position in any way, it’s hard to come to any conclusion but that he is basically the owner of the team. The buck stops with Jack Easterby and the buck has been traded for a quarter and two nickels.

    The reason it’s hard to believe that whichever of these not-Eric Bieniemy head coaches will work out is because none of Jack Easterby’s moves have worked out. The Easterby Texans as presently constituted have maybe a 5% hit rate on their bold, galaxybrained ideas. I brought up the trades already. The contracts for players like Randall Cobb and Whitney Mercilus were bad before the ink dried. I will give them maybe the tiniest smidgen of credit on Brandin Cooks las year, and that could still look bad in two years.

    [...]

    Remember: I’m supposed to be the idiot sportswriter. They’re supposed to be the franchise that has the data I don’t have, the knowledge I don’t have, and they are supposed to use those things to prove me wrong. When we play this game, me playing it with less information than them, I am supposed to lose.

    If I would be outperforming you by virtue of just not doing stupid **** every year, that says a lot about how stupid that **** is and how unqualified the person leading the charge of all those moves is. To some people, that would be a sign that maybe they should get back on the trolley. To the Texans? They are permanently emboldened by Easterby’s toxic positivity.

    So yeah, I understand in a vacuum that there’s nothing “wrong” with interviewing Josh McCown as a head coach. There’s nothing “wrong” with interviewing David Culley. But when your front office has a predilection for doing dumb ****, well, it’s dangerous. You see the gears working as they figure out how to pole vault off the tracks and into the Dunning-Kruger effect stratosphere. If the Patriots interviewed Josh McCown to be an offensive coordinator? Fawning everywhere. The Texans interviewing Culley? It’s like watching a child fiddling with a book of matches outside of a gas station.

    The Texans are a slave to Jack Easterby’s desires. He holds them in his hands. It is okay to admit that. I know it feels powerful to blame Cal McNair, and he certainly deserves some blame for falling under the spell of this seersucker of a man. But Easterby holds the keys to the kingdom.

    This will never be stated overtly, and because it will never be stated overtly, a segment of intentionally dense people will refuse to understand it. But the power dynamics at play here make it very obvious.

    In a sense, it’s not hard to blame Easterby for what he is doing. He’s been empowered beyond the wildest dreams he could think of while using edgy Grand Theft Auto fonts on his South Carolina bible study power points. He is making, per reports, a metric ton of money for a long time, and he intends to keep making that money for a long time. So he has worked hard behind the scenes to install a general manager of his choosing. Based on the candidate pool for the head coach job — as well as the reported finalist pool — it’s very clear he has influence on that. Easterby doesn’t want anybody in town that will challenge his authority.

    And if that means that Deshaun Watson has to go? Well, the preacher did tell us that his favorite game was watching Jesus struggle on the cross for six hours.



    In Easterby’s vision of the Texans, we’re about to watch a lot of competing on the cross, every Sunday.

    [...]

    As Watson grows into whatever he will ultimately be, he understands a little more each day. We give him a lot of credit for his growth on the field, but I think maybe his growth off the field is undercovered and underreported. I think he’s beginning to piece together more about what he wants and doesn’t want his future to look like. And I think of him walking off that field with Watt as a powerful scene in what he doesn’t want to see.



    Watson is the kind of man who has always been able to say that he wants to win a title and then back that up. It was enough to have the goal and enough to be transcendent on his own. He’s learning that this isn’t Clemson. You need the organization and culture to have a drive to win a championship that manifests in actions rather than words. And he just watched his fellow superstar on the team spend his entire season trying to get that across to anyone who would listen:



    Watson isn’t turning away from the Texans because he’s mad at them hiring Nick Caserio. He isn’t turning away from them exclusively because of Easterby, even though that is definitely a main issue from what I’ve heard.

    He’s turning away from them because, on a very elemental level, he’s growing, and they are not. That’s the wedge.

    [...]

    Steph Stradley has put it well when she has noted that the organization has chosen Easterby over everybody. It almost transcends that for me when you consider that the Texans are ostensibly an organization that faces the public. It’s not just that the Texans are choosing people over other people, it’s that they are literally disengaging with one of the purposes of a football team — their community — to serve Easterby.

    Since Nick Caserio has been hired, there has been almost nothing of substance put out by the team website about the team itself. It is in a holding pattern, an airplane circling around the port while a hostage situation happens below it. They also have started putting up pictures of players who have worn each number. Did you know Tom Savage and Brandon Weeden both wore No. 3? Guess we’ll get familiar with that sight again soon.

    It would be incredibly easy to fire or re-assign Easterby. It would be incredibly easy to make the steps that would be real apologies to Watson for the way this offseason was conducted and hire the best head coach on the market instead of the best one who prays exactly as Jack commands. It would be incredibly easy to have as much respect and concern for Watson as the mayor of the city does.

    But it is beyond this cabal of Generational Intellects to do anything but serve Easterby’s ego. To do anything but watch the fire in the dumpster as Easterby throws the next thing in it.

    And as we all go into that fire, the organization, the players, the employees, the media, the fans, I want to tell you that I understand perfectly if you want to check out of it. I have zero ill will for you. Life is too short to be tethered to something that brings you pain, and I say that even though it means I have a lot of eyes to lose.

    As we get deeper into the 21st century, it becomes more and more obvious that the institutions that were set up to protect us have been underfunded, destroyed, or otherwise incapacitated. The NFL doesn’t have a system in place to demand an ownership recall. It never envisioned a scenario in which a person who made enough money to own a football franchise would be so hamheaded that he’d throw the figurative implements of money-making away for his pastor.

    That is what we are on the verge of. We’re all waiting to see what gets tossed in the fire next.
     
  2. Joshfast

    Joshfast "We're all gonna die" - Billy Sole
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    Good read, but not harsh enough imo.
     
  3. conquistador#11

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    We're witnessing the NFL's first cult ascend. It's history in the making. People that defend this, forget that Deshaun is on the team. How will you get another star quarterback to buy into this cult? Money? I don't think so. Because of A winning 'culture', yeah if you can't get along with Deshaun, culture might not be your forte. It's a mess. The thing is eventually Jack will be done but it will be years hopefully not decades too late. Houston fans don't deserve these wackjobs.
     
  4. showa13

    showa13 Member

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    It's been insinuated plenty that culture is a big aspect of the team now that Easterbunny has indoctrinated Cal(Cal thinks he's his guardian angel), but I've been told that Easterbunny will sit in his high castle and smile ear to ear that his culture and power are in full force. Cal thinks this will lead to winning, but Easterbunny doesn't care about winning. He cares about his culture and his power, winning be dammed(there won't be a lot of winning going on here anytime soon).

    The Texans are going to struggle mightily to sell tickets to games, the diehards will go but the casual fans or the fairweather fans will stop paying attention. The Texans will struggle to get free agents to sign here, they will struggle to retain their own guys, they will struggle to develop guys, the football side of things is going to be in the dumpster as long as Easterbunny is in charge of anything football related. And Easterbunny does not care, a good Christian culture is the most important thing to Easterbunny.

    I've mentally checked out. Football is my favorite sport and I'll always watch it but the Texans are about to enter a phase of mediocracy/failure that would make the Jags/Lions/Bengals/Jets fan bases shudder. Y'all have fun rooting for this dumpster fire.
     
  5. zeeshan2

    zeeshan2 Member

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  6. conquistador#11

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    Have you seen where jack texts the mother of one of players to tell her his son is not making the right life choices? I didn't want to post because I saw it on "sb nation" but considering jack has people following players around this is kind of minor. Culture!
     
  7. Newlin

    Newlin Member

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    I read the entire SI article for the first time today. That was an interesting and frightening read.

    Easterby is VERY good at what he does. And I’m not talking about making football decisions. Easterby knows how to convince people he has value. He knows how to convince people he has answers. Cal McNair seems to be the latest in a long line of people that have bought in to what Easterby sells.

    To be fair to Easterby, he was able to find a niche in the NFL that he could fill. It’s somewhat surprising that it would be with the Patriots and Belichick. Belichick and Easterby seem like an odd couple. But, Easterby figured out what Belichick was ill equipped to do and then was able to exploit that weakness for his own benefit. Easterby has done the same thing with the Texans. Easterby gained power within the Texan organization by taking over tasks that Bill O’Brien didn’t care to do, or was ill equipped to do.

    In Cal McNair, Easterby has found the perfect rube. Cal is not comfortable in his role as owner of the Texans. Cal is not good at running a business. He’s not a natural leader. Easterby understands all this and has skillfully been able to gain the confidence of Cal McNair.

    The way Easterby casts his spell over people is troubling. Using faith, religion, and righteousness as a tool is the way Easterby works. People that Easterby can’t easily sway become the enemy. Just look at what happened to Hopkins. Hopkins didn’t buy what Easterby was selling. He had to go. Now, Watson isn’t buying what Easterby is selling.

    Easterby has his hooks in Cal McNair. Watson understands this, so he now wants out.

    It’s a sad situation. Cal is weak. He’s gone all in with Easterby. Unfortunately, Easterby doesn’t know anything about how to build and run an NFL team. Cal, at some point will realize Easterby is just a con artist. But, by that point it will be too late. It already is too late.
     
  8. zeeshan2

    zeeshan2 Member

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  9. Damion Laverne

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    Jack Easterby is a sugar baby.

    Cal is the sugar daddy.

    And we (the fans) are the angry wife.
     
    Nook and fchowd0311 like this.
  10. J.R.

    J.R. Member

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  11. McNultyisDrunk

    McNultyisDrunk Contributing Member

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    What's V Stiviano up to these days? Need some smoking gun audio/video to get rid of Cal and Easterby.
     
  12. El_Conquistador

    El_Conquistador King of the D&D, The Legend, #1 Ranking
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    The media manipulates public perception in ways that most people reading this can not even understand. Many times this is done by the media for ulterior motives... and most times it's done in dishonest ways.

    If you were Deshaun Watson and wanted to A) Preserve your reputation; B) Influence public opinion in your favor; and C) Not turn the rest of the league off to your situation... then it would make sense to work the media to portray the Texans front office in the worst possible light. It further makes sense to target one or two individuals (Easterby and McNair) to focus the public attention on and 'personalize' the negative feelings. Furthermore, if you were a member of the sports media, you would have a vested interest in taking the player's side of the story... in order to preserve your standing amongst players and also the sports fan public at large. Bill O'Brien was responsible for the bad trades. But scapegoating him makes no sense because he's gone. So Watson's people and friendly members of the media would need to find someone still at the organization to target. Enter Jack Easterby and Cal McNair.

    Are you someone who accepts at face value everything the media feeds you? Or are you someone who thinks critically, considers ulterior motives, and understands that PR campaigns are used as weapons to achieve objectives? Food for thought.
     
    ROXRAN likes this.
  13. DatRocketFan

    DatRocketFan Member

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    Delusion as fk if u think Watson is weaponizing the media to sht on the front office just to make himself look good. The front office is incompetent as fk, we don't need the media to report this. Who the fk promotes a hc to full time gm after he gets sht on in playoff. Who the fk hires a search firm to look for a gm to just outright ignore it. There's many stories out there that r tru, don't b a dumbass and call anything u don't like fake news.
     
    topfive likes this.
  14. Andre0087

    Andre0087 Member

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    lol...glad you're to weak to post in the D&D anymore.
     
  15. houstonstime

    houstonstime Member

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    Dude, I don’t wanna be one of the other posters that brings politics or labels you as being one political way or another. But much like the flat earthers believe in all types of other conspiracies... it’s really obvious which way you fall and what your line of thinking is. Everything is fake news, media is stealing the culture of this team, and cal/Jack are the best leaders this team has ever had and work every day and night to make it better no matter what the lying media says about them....
     
    dookiester likes this.
  16. El_Conquistador

    El_Conquistador King of the D&D, The Legend, #1 Ranking
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    Whoa there, big fella. I am in no way defending the Texans' front office. Clearly they've damaged the team's prospects. But is the other extreme also true? That Watson doesn't have something to gain by sensationalizing the Texans' front office? Does Watson have something to gain by demonizing Jack Easterby personally? I think you know the answer to that. The media is helping Watson's image in a major way, by influencing public opinion against the Texans' executives and ownership. This is not an accident -- this is business today. Digital marketing, influencers, public relations, brand management.
     
    houstonstime likes this.
  17. houstonstime

    houstonstime Member

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    Fair. But I don’t think Watson started this. If ownership wasn’t so stupid, Watson wouldn’t be wanting out and “working with the media”. Cause and effect. Ownership made their bed. Watson doesn’t deserve this. I would be mad at my boss too. And be looking for other companies.
     
    dookiester likes this.
  18. sanedolt

    sanedolt Member

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    Just read Andre Johnson's tweet. What has the organization done right since Easterby is here? Don't just conjecture, use your own observation.
     
    itzIce, conquistador#11 and UTSA2step like this.
  19. Brando2101

    Brando2101 Contributing Member

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    Fans need to stop going after Cal McNair and need to start going after Janice Mcnair, McNair Interests and Cary McNair. If there were fans protesting outside the post oak offices of McNair Interests every day then Janice McNair would act.

    Start ****ing with the company they actually care about and isn't a big toy then you get their attention.
     
    Nook and conquistador#11 like this.
  20. El_Conquistador

    El_Conquistador King of the D&D, The Legend, #1 Ranking
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    Wow, this sounds like inciting of violence. Please calm down. This is too much.
     

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