FanHouse Richard Smith

Franchise tags and salary-cap concerns play a very important role in real-world wheelings and dealings, but what if the biggest-named free agents were matched with the teams that gave them the best chance to make a Super Bowl run? What would that list look like? Glad you asked.

Yes, this is a strictly fictional account, one that requires you to suspend reality for the next few minutes. But, hey, it's the NFL offseason, which means that there won't be any meaningful football for another seven months. What else do you have to do?

This afternoon, the Texans announced that Frank Bush would be promoted into the position of defensive coordinator. (interview above) This is not really a surprise, but for many it is a pretty curious decision.

Why promote a guy from within for a defense that has been one of the worst in the league for years? What in his performance justified him being the only guy interviewed for the job?

FanHouse readers who pay attention to such things may note that I have never been a big fan of Texans defensive coordinator Richard Smith. (massive understatement)

In a move that was long over due, Smith was fired today, along with defensive backs Coach, Jon Hoke and defensive line coach, Jethro Franklin.

According to Football Outsiders stats, the Texans defense under Smith's tenure was ranked as follows:

2006: 31st
2007: 30th
2008: 29th

So instead of waiting a few more decades to build a dominant defense, head coach Gary Kubiak finally pulled the plug.

With the home destruction of the Texans by the Ravens last Sunday, and only three wins to their name this year, head coach Gary Kubiak has been catching some heat in the Houston media. The players don't want to hear it and can't be any stronger in their support of Kubiak.

Texans defensive coordinator, Richard Smith isn't getting similar support. Texans DB Dunta Robinson couldn't say enough positive things about Kubiak but when asked about the heat that Smith was getting he shrugged his shoulders and responded:

It is what it is. As players, we're going to go back and we're going to go out and work hard and practice hard and get the job done.

The Texans are usually very good about keeping their dirty laundry in-house, but when Robinson isn't supporting you publicly, that's usually the beginning of the end for a coach. Though he did also say that the players aren't going to be throwing the coaches under the bus.

The Ravens-Texans game was relatively close at the half, with the Ravens leading 12-6. Then after the half, the Texans defense allowed the Ravens a 5:44 scoring drive, and then the Texan offense and defense lost their collective minds..

In a game where minimizing turnovers was seen as the key, Texans backup quarterback Sage Rosenfels, playing for an injured Matt Schaub, managed to throw four interceptions. As Steve Slaton fantasy owners might intuit, Texans coach Gary Kubiak didn't do Rosenfels any favors by having no patience with the run at all. He had 4 attempts. (Those same owners might be angry about a 58 yard TD to Slaton that was nullified by a touchy holding call away from the play).

The Ravens offense was able to move the ball at will, with both the run and the pass, and really were only stopped when they made mistakes or penalties. TE Todd Heap and RB Willis McGahee had huge games with two touchdowns for each. Rookie quarterback, Joe Flacco played for the most part, a very poised game.

The Texans defense continues to give up big plays where key players like Heap, have no one guarding them. It is a interesting scheme that Texans defensive coordinator Richard Smith runs.

And when I say "interesting," I mean, very enjoyable to the fans of opposing teams or those who have fantasy starters going against the Texan defense. Houston fans would find it interesting to give Smith the Homer Stokes' treatment (as seen at the end of this YouTube).

In their first drive last week, the Vikings offense scored against the Texans defense in 4 plays. It was a typical start to a Texans game. They have by far worst red zone defense in the league, allowing touchdowns 17 of 25 times for a 81 percent red zone rate. The 213 points the Texans have allowed is 4th most in the AFC.

Football Outsiders currently has the Texans defense ranked 30th (compared to 12th for the offense and 4th for special teams). They ranked the Texans pass defense at 21 and the rush defense last in the league. I believe that most of the pass defense improvement in recent weeks is that teams know the Texans rush defense is garbage, and also they have faced a parade of horrible QBs (Orlowsky, Fitzpatrick, Frerotte).

Hey, but there has been some improvement right? Maybe this young defense is figuring it out? Perhaps if you live in blind optimism land, but this week, a thin defense limited in playmakers has become thinner.

The Houston Texans started the season playing the Steelers, Titans, and Jaguars. On the road. With a hurricane-imposed bye in the middle that took out power for weeks and damaged some players' homes. Even without the hurricane, I said before the season that the Texans' biggest test for a young team was to come out of this brutal series of games with their confidence and health intact.

The Texans are remarkably healthy right now, but they are not yet playing with confidence -- at least for 60 minutes. For the fourth week in a row, a Texans game was in doubt until the end of the fourth quarter.

The Detroit Lions were desperate for their first win, and now ask themselves this question: If they can't beat the Texans, is it possible they will go 0-16 this year? Each of their future opponents have won at least 3 games this year.

Texans cornerback Dunta Robinson has been taken off the PUP list after recovering from torn knee ligaments, nerve damage and a hamstring that was torn off the bone during last year's game against the Raiders. He's practicing for the first time today, and by tomorrow the Texans will have a sense if he is going to play limited minutes on Sunday.

Paul Kuharsky in the ESPN NFL blog suggests that Robinson is Houston's hope on the horizon. Hmmm, seems to me that horizons by their nature are pretty far away.

I enjoy watching the intensity of Robinson's play (see YouTube above), but I don't think the Texans defense will see much improvement. First of all, if Robinson plays good ball coming off his combination of injuries suffered by a corner, it should be the biggest comeback story of the year.

Texans cornerback Dunta Robinson has been taken off the PUP list after recovering from torn knee ligaments, nerve damage and a hamstring that was torn off the bone during last year's game against the Raiders. He's practicing for the first time today, and by tomorrow the Texans will have a sense if he is going to play limited minutes on Sunday.

Paul Kuharsky in the ESPN NFL blog suggests that Robinson is Houston's hope on the horizon. Hmmm, seems to me that horizons by their nature are pretty far away.

I enjoy watching the intensity of Robinson's play (see YouTube above), but I don't think the Texans defense will see much improvement. First of all, if Robinson plays good ball coming off his combination of injuries suffered by a corner, it should be the biggest comeback story of the year.

Yohei Hori is a system engineer who lives in Tokyo. He is also a huge Houston Texans fan who writes a Japanese language blog focusing on the team. As he explained to me, he knows English, but the translation plug-in for his blog that translates from the Japanese leads to really messed up, humorous results.

The translated name for his blog is "Da Bull Pen - TEXANS cheering blog: Houston Texans and the NFL that, and I love it."

Admittedly, I must confess I enjoy reading the silly Japanese to English translations of all things Texans and NFL. Check his blog out and find your favorite odd, yet somehow accurate account. It's like bizarre poetry.

Discussing the Texans' defensive line after the first week loss to the Steelers:

Mario [Williams] is wonderful. Is, Marvel Smith, not more Willie Colon on the side of the line-up I'd have to be. Richard Smith's campaign to question. Amobi [Okoye] Where is it? Travis Johnson? The two will run unstoppable inside. Inactive [Frank] Okam of the game was to keep up hope.

I discovered Yohei posting as "texamaniac" at the I'm a Texans Club website (the above graphic spells "Houston Texans" in Japanese). He agreed to answer a few questions about what it is like to follow the NFL in Japan, and how he became a fan of the Texans.

Q: How popular is the NFL in Japan?

A: American football is a very minor sport in Japan. It is a pity, but most Japanese don't even understand the rules.