Texans Fire Richard Smith!!
 

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/sports/6186849.html


Merry Christmas!!

Richard Smith Fired
 

Looks like the Texans are doing the deed and firing defensive coordinator Richard Smith. They also fired Hoke & Franklin. Here's the link from the Chronicle.
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/sports/6186849.html

wow, that was quick. I guess after several years of low defensive side performance something had to give. wonder who the replacements will be.

I hate to wish the guy ill will, but I hope we have a shot at Dick Jauron if he gets fired. I'd also call Mike Nolan. We need to once and for all get someone who knows what the hell they're doing on that side of the ball.

BTW, Hoke and Franklin were fired too. Can't say I'm surprised seeing Hoke go. They should have fired Marciano too.

Seems they are keeping Frank Bush, Johnny Holland, and Ray Rhodes.

Bush will either be the DC or DL.

Holland stay with the LBs.

Rhodes is with the safeties.

Now what?
Could Bubba McDowell be given a shot at the DBs, he interned here the last two summers.

Not seeing to many big named DC wanting to come in to a ready made staff, most want their own guys. Now Gregg Williams did step into the Jags job without his guys, so maybe. But remember Williams made $2M last year from Washington, how much money is he going to want?

After much research Nolan feel off my list. His defense always played worse for him then the guys he replaced. And the 49ers played better defense once he left.

Have the 49ers said anything about Singletary?

Would Gray be a cheaper answer to Williams? Will the Titans rehire Williams to replace the hot DC Schwartz?

Thanks. One of the best first posts I have seen!!!!!!

What about Sean McDermott... The Eagles secondary coach as a replacement? I doubt the Texans would have interest but it would be nice to bring in someone who has learned under one of the best DC in the game and has been in 43 defense that dials up the pressure.

Maricano is considered one of the best ST coaches in the league. I know our coverage teams were a bit down this year, but you'd be hard pressed to find a better replacement.

By who? I never heard anyone publicly say he one of the best and I don't think anyone is beating down the door to hire him away. ST has been average to mediocre at best for the last few years. It has noticeably gone downhill during that time, IMO. If we hold that standard with the other coaches like Smith, Hoke and Franklin, then we should hold it with the ST coach as well. IMO, our ST was atrocious this year. From the debacle in Jacksonville to the brain-dead on-side kick against the Raiders. I'm not sure what the hell they were doing in Oakland constanly kicking the ball short and giving them great field position. Sure, we could blame Kubiak, but they're not firing the HC so it's the ST coach who should take the fall in this case.

I actually think the defense improved this year over last year. Last year we couldn't get pressure on the QB even when we blitzed. The first part of this year it was the same thing all over again. Then, about the middle of the year, something mysterious happened: we still coudn't get much pressure with the front four, but suddenly our blitzes were working much better.

If you look at our stats, the db's and lb's seem to have had a pretty fair amount of sacks. That is encouraging to me. In other words, if we can get better results from just three spots (both tackles and the end opposite Mario), our defense could be much improved next year. It was actually a pleasure finally watching our defense force QB's into bad throws and bad decisions. That's something we seldom saw before the middle of this season. I wish I could put my finger on why it happened. Some have given Dunte most of the credit, but I'm not buying it. That's because we had poor results almost all last year, even before Dunte got injured. I'm wondering whether something concerning coaching happened to make us improve. Maybe Kubiak got more involved and started changing some of the things Smith was doing. Maybe Bush got more involved. Maybe it was because we were giving more playing time to guys like Adibi, Deljuan Robinson, and Bulman. Anyone have any theories about this?

Players have to make the plays. No scheme can make a bad player great. So the defense played better when better player got on the field.

Rhodes will handle all the DB's. That was my understanding anway, at least for now.

I doubt it...they might make him some kind of paid assistant to Rhodes though...but I would guess that will have a great deal to do with the new DC.

Greg Williams took the J-Ville job as a fill in until something else came along. He was getting the money from Washington, and was on a one year trial with the Jags. I think he would prefer to have some of his own staff in place this go around...but it wouldn't be that out of the ordinary for a few coaches to remain in place from the previous staff. Hoke was a hold over from Capers.

Dunno why the assistants, especially Franklin, had to be sent packing to, but Smith was clearly a scapegoat.
I think Franklin did an outstanding job. OK Amobie hasn't panned out but the Texans don't have the kinda guy playing next to him that can let him play his game, as TJs not the guy to compliment Okoye.
But Franklin has got to be given a lot of credit for Marios developement and that's very important to the organization because after David Carr there's been no player whos success was as important to the team as Mario because of the controversy in drafting him, not to mention the monetary investment. And Franklin found some real diamonds-in-the-rough (3 of them), in Bullman & Cochran & DeLJuan.

I can kind of see your point, but there are 3 young first round picks on the line and only one of them has really developed. Not that that is totally Franklins fault, but couple that with the lack of consistent pressure from the front four and I see why he's gone.

Hoke has been given a lot of pub for being a good young coach, but I commented a hile back that players seem to regress the longer they are with him. Faggins, Robinson, and Bennett all regressed to some extent after their rookie years (or first significant playing time). The secondary has been an issue for just about the whole time the Texans have been in the league....and Hoke has been the man in charge there the whole time. He's not always had the best talent (Matt Stevens) to be fair. Either way I guessed he was on the way out.

A new D-coordinator, assuming it's not Bush, will want to bring in some of his own people too. This gives them some room to do that.

Don't know how much input Franklin had in the schemes but Mario said a few weeks back that the D line's first responsibility is to stay home and read and react to what the offense is doing. I think this is a terrible scheme for Amobi, as his strength is his quickness and his weakness is trying to hold the line. If Franklin was partly responsible for implementing this scheme, it does reflect poorly on his ability to scheme to his players' strengths.

I agree as to Hoke. The limited talent he was given didn't greatly improve under his tutelage. As an aside, I'm still amazed that a team with as little secondary talent as this team has had since day 1 let both Marlon McCree and Aaron Glenn walk for nothing. While they may not have been great, we were never in a position to just let servicable players walk. If Hoke played any role in this talent evaluation, he bears some responsibility for that as well (although it would be coming 3 years too late).

Totally agree. Every one of our players ,other than maybe Weaver, are better suited as one gap type guys. Okoye, Johnson, Bullman, Deljuan, and so on. I never understood why they used them liked they did. I understand how much riskier it is to tell all your lineman to shoot the gaps, but that's the roster they've got. The brunt of the scheme falls on Richard Smith's shoulders, so I don't blame Franklin at all for that. His group didn't perform well though, so he's gone. It might not be fair, but that's the way it works.
I wanted McCree back, but he played better than anyone could have expected the season after he left, so hindsight makes that decision look even worse. Glenn was definitely on the way down, but the C&C suck factory thought we we're much further along than we were and placed too much faith in the young players on the team. They totally under-estimated Glenn's positive effect on the players around him from a mentor/role model perspective.

If you look back to Okoye's pre-draft evalualions, they all said that he was terrific at shooting the gap, but only had average to below average speed and strength. That being the case, I can't help but wonder why the Texans drafted him if they weren't planning to use him as a penetrater.

Another question I have is who was mainly responsible for the overall scheme of the defense? The idea of playing read and react. The Idea of having two small tackles but not using them to penetrate. The idea of having smallish LB's to go along with small DT's. The idea of not moving corners from side to side. The idea of not playing more press coverage. Our whole defense seemed passive most of the time. I wonder who was most responsible for that?

I cant say I am sad to see Smith go. While his pre-snap vanilla def scheme was a good idea it just didnt work. And for some reason it was so complex that it made schemes like the Steelers and Ravens have seem like elementry classes, because every time the def was made "less complex" they always played better.

I cant say that Hoke suprises me much either, while he may be highly touted his results have been poor. I will give him a nudge for having no great talent on the roster though.

Franklin isnt a big suprise either, while I understand that he is suppsed to be a good line coach the line played way better after Bush showed up.

I wouldnt be at all suprised if Bush was named DC very soon, as he was Kubiaks guy from the start. I think Smith was just given a bit of rope becasue he was already in place and the organization prodes itself on image, immediatly firing a DC who hadnt been given much of a shot when he wasnt told he was the interm DC is not somethig the Texans Org. would do. It is entirely possible that Smith and Kubiak have been drating for a different def closer to what they expected Bush, or the next coordinator to run, rather the def that Smith was trying to run.

I also wouldnt bee suprised if there was no secondary coach hired unless they are an assitant to Rhodes.

As for Marciano, I cannot quote anything, but my understanding is that he is one of the best ST coaches in the out there also. This year was was bad for ST coverage and return wise. Pittman, while supposedly being one of the better LS out there was bad, supposedly because of his drug tests. JJ has had serious issues not only carring the ball tight but, some missed catches and bad mental mistakes. Brown has been off and the last 4-5 games almost all his kicks seemed very short, his miss real close, and passing on a 51 yarder make me think that he may be having either mental or physical issues.

If you look at alot of the depth on our team they are very young with a sprinlling of experience, but less ST players than we have had in the past. I think that some of the ST problems came from wanting better depth while passing on some of the ST abilities where as in the past it seemed the other way around, ST abilities would sway the decision over some of the position ability.

Ditto :D

Let the dogs run and attack.