There's a really good chance, unless you stayed home Tuesday night you missed the revelation that the Houston Texans have hired a new coach.
That coach, Bill O'Brien, now formerly of Penn State and previous to that, 5-years as a disciple of the Belichick, in the New England Patriots system.
O'Brien became THE hot coaching commodity after steering Penn State to a 15-9 record over the past 2-years despite a loss of scholarships and the general craziness surrounding the school in the fallout after the Jerry Sanduksy scandal.
The Texans, with 2-hours to spare in 2013, secured their immediate future in 2014, as O'Brien will become their 3rd head coach ever.
Read more about the hire from Chron.com RIGHT HERE
O'Brien does not have a lengthy background as a head coach. His 5-years in the NFL were as an assistant and the Penn State job was his first leading a team. The consensus by most was that he'd be ready for the task and with Houston, he inherits a team that has the coming years #1 draft pick. The Texans were expected to be a playoff and possibly a Super Bowl contender, but the season was a complete and total failure which led to the dismissal of Gary Kubiak. In addition, he goes to a franchise considered one of the best run in the league.
The team is expected to make a formal announcement of the hire by Friday.
Losing to the Jacksonville Jaguars will do that for you...
Multiple outlets are reporting that, after team meetings this morning, the Houston Texans have fired head coach Gary Kubiak- solidified after the team's 11th straight loss last night...
Kubiak coached the Houston Texans to back-to-back AFC South division titles and the franchise’s only two playoff victories. But injuries and inconsistency at quarterback sentenced the team to 6 of their losses by a total of 22 points heading into last night's loss in Jacksonville...
Bob McNair said he would normally wait until the end of the season to evaluate the team but thought it is best to start the process now
The standard, large table press conference is happening this afternoon...
Here's JJ Watt after last night's loss talking about accountability, which the players are now left with instead of their head coach
((HT: CSN Houston))
After the team has admitted publicly that Houston Texans head coach Gary Kubiak suffered a mini-stroke Sunday night, he was released from a local hospital.
The technical term for what Kubiak suffered was a "transient ischemic attack," or TIA.
He is expected to make a full recovery, but no one knows what the timetable for his return is at present...
Multiple reports on Monday say that Houston Texans head coach Gary Kubiak suffered a "Mini-Stroke", which led to his collapse at halftime of the Texans/Colts game on Sunday.
According to SI.com, the condition doctors believe Kubiak suffered from is called "TIA" or Trans-Ischemic-Attack". The TIA is not considered a debilitating event and is caused by blood clots. Kubiak is currently undergoing treatment to help alleviate clots. The worrisome part according to doctors is the "TIA" often leads to more serious strokes in the future if not addressed.
It's been a rough week for NFL Head Coaches and their health. Also over the weekend it was revealed the Denver Broncos head coach John Fox had a heart condition he was trying to deal with until the season ended. It caught up to him while playing golf on a bye week and he will have a heart procedure this week.
The question on the table is this? Are coaches pushing themselves too far? Is there too much pressure on them?
And in a lot of ways, yeah, there is.
There has always been a measure of that pressure and most who go into the coaching profession are aware any job with a team, may not be long-term.
But that pressure has only increased over the years and the turnover in the profession has gotten scary-fast. Fans, owners, and even on the college level, boosters are looking for instant results and non-stop success. Anything less and they are calling for these guys heads.
And yes, sure, there are situations where coaches are in over their heads and shouldn't have the job. But often they are blamed for things they can't control. Or otherwise known as player performance.
The "Dark" little secret of coaching is during the season, these guys work sometimes 18-hours a day and will sleep at their jobs. For a couple of hours. And that catches up to you.
But they have to do it. And it's not just the head coach. It's the Assistant Coaches, it's the equipment guys, it's everyone. In college, you've got grad assistants and others making next to nothing, working 18-hours a day for the whole season.
It takes a toll. But they do it, because they want the job. And all know if they won't do it, someone else will. All the extra time, the work for nothing, yeah, that might buy you a season. If the head coach is fired, most of the staff goes with him.
We hope that coaches will take this week as a message. That you can't kill yourself trying to put in more hours than anyone else. And hopefully, it will make fans, boosters, owners and others aware that you shouldn't be demanding these guys work 18-20 hours a day. Yeah, sure in some cases they get paid pretty well, but how much money is killing yourself on the job worth?
Leaving the sidelines at the half of the Houston Texans-Indianapolis Colts game, Texans head coach Gary Kubiak has been taken to a local hospital for precautionary reasons...
He collapsed as he was walking off and heading to the locker room and was immediately attended to by on-site medical personnel...
Kubiak, 52, has no known history of medical issues... and the Houston Chronicle is reporting that his family is with him in transport.
Wade Phillips and Rick Dennison are taking over the coaching duties in Kubiak's place in the second half as they lead 21-3...
More when we know more...
Here's video from NBC Sports when they came back from commercial at the beginning of their coverage...
((HT: TheBigLead/NBC Sports/random_sports via Daily Motion))
2245 UPDATE: Michele Tafoya reports that the Texans, via hospital personnel, are ruling out a heart attack...
2315 UPDATE: Here's a closer look at Kubiak that was captured by ABC13 cameras on the sidelines...
((HT: Instagram via David Nuno))
Nothing new on the precautionary status of Kubiak... the Texans are still reporting that Kubiak did not have a heart attack...
2345 UPDATE: Texans GM Rick Smith, on NBC's post-game show, told Tafoya he is being evaluated. Kubiak is awake and coherent and Smith said that Kubiak, initially, was light-headed and dizzy- thus, his being encouraged to lay down on the field...
Here's the report from ABC13 in Houston at the top of their late newscast...
The Houston Texans in the midst of a catastrophic plummet from what most alleged football experts thought was NFL Elite level have made a move to "Shake Things Up".
Coach Gary Kubiak announced Monday afternoon he was cutting 3 rookies for "Violating Team Rules" in the teams Kansas City hotel room. Though he did not specify what those rules were. The Texans played the Chiefs on Sunday, losing 17-16.
The players, RB Cierre Wood, DE Sam Montgomery and OLB Willie Jefferson were not big contributors on the squad, with Wood and Jefferson the only ones seeing any playing time at all. All 3 were inactive in KC.
However, there appears there may be more to this story.
James Palmer of CSN Houston tweeted he spoke to Montgomery who gave an interesting interpretation of the event in question:
Sam Montgomery says he walked into a hotel room where Jefferson & Wood were smoking a cigar. Went to team meetings and was called by Kubiak
— James Palmer (@JPalmerCSN) October 21, 2013
Montgomery went on to tell Palmer it was a "Childish Mistake" and no "Illegal Substances" were involved.
Sounds like a possible "Scapegoating" incident here if nothing else. No word on if any of the players has any recourse (doubtful) and more than likely, the Texans won't release any details.
Our guess is Kubiak et al. are feeling the heat of a season quickly spiraling out of control (Texans are 2-5). They are trying to re-establish there authority while giving the players the impression nobody is safe/secure.
But we could be wrong and this could be a mountain out of a mole-hill--so to speak....it's just interesting...
There's a really good chance, unless you stayed home Tuesday night you missed the revelation that the Houston Texans have hired a new coach.
