I thought it was weird when he said he looks at 3 things when evaluating a player: -what that do on first down -what they do on third down -what they do on fourth down Second down doesn't matter?
There's a local media guy who has hated O'Brien since his arrival... He had an in with a unhappy player who was giving him detailed injury information on other players -- very specific stuff that teams don't like releasing, even the college teams. This local media turd proceeded to release this injury information publicly just to undermine the team, and thereby O'Brien. So yeah, media is a necessary evil for coaches that can sometimes become a real problem. Kind of ishtty that McNair didn't even show up to support his new hire. Didn't want to answer any questions, I'm sure. Some kid running that account, LOL?
McClain asked him what pick or free agent signings he is most proud of in his tenure here. He said every one was an Texans organization pick, not an individual person pick. What? What happened to Rick forcing guys on O'Brien?
Full transcript from today’s presser: http://media.houstontexans.com/article_display.cfm?article_id=2564
They asked him how he knows he'll have a good relationship with Bill OBrien? He said he's worked with him for 3 years already and they'll continue to get good players (lol) They will emphasize height/weight/speed and explosiveness and scouting/interviewing. I think OBrien just wanted Rick out from day 1 to get his own guy in there. Lots of stuff from Gaine on scouting and team building, and Rick probably just didn't have the exactly same philosophy. Nothing much is gonna change because Gaine has been here most of the time anyway.
Since you were involved with the draft and free agency process for four seasons here, who are the players you’re most proud of that you recommended? So, I like to think that every pick that we made was a Texans organizational pick and maybe not a specific person. There are scouts who scout specific players, but at the end of the day, there’s a lot of aspects that go into the player acquisition process. Those are Texans picks What gives you the confidence that you and Head Coach Bill O’Brien can produce a collaborative effort moving forward and will have that kind of relationship? “Well, having been here for three years and knowing what Coach O’Brien’s able to do, I certainly have an insightful feeling for what Coach O’Brien is able to accomplish. We’ll continue to get him good players. Didn't he get the memo? The roster is terrible and it's all Rick's fault. He and O'Brien had no input for four years
How does that work... Coach is all CYA b/c Smith ran the show, yet Smith has the Owner/Child who has Coach in his pocket... Owner/Child now has the "front office" who had Smith but now has Coach who now has a GM who works for Coach... This is the most ****ed up organizational chart I've ever seen. Unless it's just vertical.
People are angry and won't want to hear this but it is kind of true. GM doesn't do much in terms direct evaluations. He gets reports fed by area scouts through the director of college scouting, probably crosschecked through director of pro personnel, coaches and pro scouts. He relies on information that is filtered and interpreted by many layers of individuals. His 1st hand evaluation is limited. Back in the day, everybody was back and forth on whether the Ed Reed fiasco was Rick Smith's fault or OBrien's. My understanding is, it was actually on Brian Gardner, who championed him directly to McNair and was fired after that year to give Brian Gaine the job Director of Player Personel in his first stint with the Texans. Draft picks are more complicated than Brian Gaine vs BOB in a vacuum. If you have the best GM ever, and a scouting department full of cross-eyed half-wits, you won't draft well. I sincerely doubt any one individual is capable of competently evaluating every player in the draft by direct observation. I guess you could blame the GM for every bad scout, as he is above them on the org chart, and do that with Rick Smith, but I dont think it's helpful for understanding what is actually happening. If one guy could do it alone, teams would fire their entire scouting departments to save money.
Ed Reed was under Kubiak, but otherwise I agree. I take this as O'Brien aligning the scouting department more with his vision. For better or worse. I think it's good to have different point of views between the coaching side and the scouting side, now scouts are gonna align with Gaine and OB.
Yes and don’t forget McClain pointedly posting immediately after the hiring of Gaine that the GM only answers to the owner and the Coach controls who plays Sunday, only. Then the next day the GM says he and the coach are on the same wave length and all decisions will be concensus based on the opinions of everyone. Last we have McNair Jr. asserting himself into the decision making process.
But the GM is (or should be) in charge of the scouting/personnel dept...so I don't get your point. Nobody thinks that he's out there personally scouting 1000 players every offseason. If he is hiring the wrong people to filter the info up to him, then.... It's not impossible to tell which scouts are good and which are not, which "directors of scouting/personnel/whatever" belong, you do have the benefit of hindsight every offseason. That's the GM's job.
I think that's why OBrien blamed Rick for everything. He probably thought the scouting was bad. A lot of talk about scouting from Gaine, and OBrien had mentioned it previously in interviews. But scouting is a crapshoot. No one really has more insight. That's why "analytics" and "asset management" and "cap flexibility" are so emphasized these days. No mention of any of that from Gaine. I honestly think OBrien is just dumb.
I disagree that football scouting is a crapshoot, it's the most hands-on, vision and projection based talent evaluation around. I'm not sure how "analytics" as known in baseball/basketball factors into finding an OLman in the 5th round, for example.
It's important, I just mean scouting doesn't provide an edge over other teams. They all look at basically the same things. Is that why the Pats are good? Scouting? I doubt the Texans scouting department is somehow worse and needs a new philosophy
My point is that Gaine is right, it's a team effort. I'm also saying that firing Smith and hiring Gaine isn't going to change things much and you shouldn't expect it to do so. As far as I know, the rest of the scouting department under Gaine is the same as it was under Smith. A significant portion of the department is staffed by people whose tenure with the Texans predates when Kubiak and Smith were first hired. You cant just fire the entire scouting department and hire a new one. It would be akin to cutting the entire Texans' roster and hiring 52 new players. There simply aren't 52 more competent people sitting at home waiting to fill your roster. You'd be worse. Teams generally never change more than a handful of scouting jobs. A bunch of the upper level scouting jobs are filled by people who worked their way up the chain. It's not as simple as "Rick Smith should have fired the department if it wasn't getting the job done". You maneuver where possible to upgrade when you see what you think might be a better option has come available. You evaluate performance over years of results.
