Culley already has his hands full considering Watson's trade request. Photo by Patrick McDermott/Getty Images
David Culley
You would like to give the Texans the benefit of the doubt on the hiring of David Culley as head coach. The Ravens assistant has worked for top minds like Andy Reid and John Harbaugh. But he is also a 65-year-old who has never called plays and seems like an out of nowhere hire.
Still, you would like to hope that it works out. But since Jack Easterby arrived on the scene and starting his bible-thumping and backstabbing, the Texans have traded Jadeveon Clowney for peanuts, overpaid on multiple contracts, made the horrid DeAndre Hopkins deal, lied to their quarterback who now wants a trade, hired a GM under suspicious circumstances and have generally become the joke of the league. If Watson is moved, it will look truly horrible if they are unable to get a Herchel Walker-type haul, and based on what we have seen so far from this group, they will probably give him away for nothing.
The hope is that Nick Caserio is the adult in the room, and that he and Culley will pull a big time deal and the team will start back on the road to mediocrity. Caserio is well respected around the league, and maybe he works out. His first coaching hire, however, has been met with a collective "huh?" Most surprising hires don't go so well. Remember Jim Tomsula?
However, there are some reasons to think it can work out. Yes, you have to dig pretty deep, but let's take a look:
1) You don't have to be a play caller to be a good coach. One only need to look at Culley's most recent boss, Harbaugh. The difference is everyone thought Harbaugh would be a great head coach and he was much younger, but he wasn't a play caller either. Neither was recent Eagles hire Nick Sirianni. Eric Bieniemy, everyone's favorite for the job, is not a play caller either. So there is no reason to hold that against him.
2) We've been begging for a coach and GM with a non-Patriots pedigree. So the Texans failed on that GM wise, but Culley is certainly a win in that regard. He was a part of two of the most successful non-Patriots coaching staffs, so if he can bring a little Chiefs and Ravens to the table, the Texans will be better for it.
3) Assistants will be the key. Tim Kelley will return as OC. He wasn't great last season, but his offense looked better than what Bill O'Brien ran (not saying much, I know). The run game was a disaster, but a better OL coach and better running backs could fix that. On the other side of the ball, Lovie Smith is an excellent hire. A very good DC who was not great as a head coach but has experience. That's exactly what a first-time head coach needs.
4) Culley seems to be respected and well liked. Let's face it, hardly anyone outside of Baltimore knows much about the man. He has not been considered a head coaching candidate, and seemed to be a lesser prospect than Ravens OC Greg Roman and DC Wink Martindale. It says a lot that he impressed the Texans more than some of the hotter names. Harbaugh raves about him, and others around the league sing his praises. Of course, many coaching hires are praised at the time and turn out to be Gus Bradley.
5) Winning back trust and delegating. The fan base is ready to revolt and wants Easterby's head. It's only going to get worse when the Watson trade happens, even if it turns out to be the right thing to do and a good haul for the Texans. Culley will have to manage that and get the franchise through the transition. If he can be a CEO-type coach who delegates responsibilities to his assistants and focuses on big picture and game management, the Texans could be just fine.
That's asking a lot. Maybe it will all be fine. Coaching hires are always a crap shoot. No one outside the Ravens knows what impact or responsibilities he had. Only the Texans know his plans and vision.
In the end, it's still a 65-year-old first time coach with no track record hired by a franchise that has made one bad move after another.
Hopefully this isn't another one.
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Jul 8, 2025, 12:03 pm
Adding a player of Kevin Durant’s caliber was too valuable an opportunity for the Houston Rockets to pass up, even though it meant moving on from Jalen Green just four seasons after they drafted him second overall.
Durant was officially acquired from Phoenix on Sunday in a complicated seven-team transaction that sent Green and Dillon Brooks to the Suns and brought Clint Capela back to Houston from the Hawks.
General manager Rafael Stone is thrilled to add the future Hall of Famer, who will turn 37 in September, to a team which made a huge leap last season to earn the second seed in the Western Conference.
Asked Monday why he wanted to add Durant to the team, Stone smiled broadly before answering.
“He’s Kevin Durant,” Stone said. “He’s just — he’s really good. He’s super-efficient. He had a great year last year. He’s obviously not 30 anymore, but he hasn’t really fallen off and we just think he has a chance to really be impactful for us.”
But trading Green to get him was not an easy decision for Stone, Houston’s general manager since 2020.
“Jalen’s awesome, he did everything we asked,” Stone said. “He’s a wonderful combination of talent and work ethic along with being just a great human being. And any time that you have the privilege to work with someone who is talented and works really hard and is really nice, you should value it. And organizationally we’ve valued him tremendously, so yeah very hard.”
Green was criticized for his up-and-down play during the postseason when the Rockets were eliminated by the Warriors in seven games in the first round. But Green had improved in each of his four seasons in Houston, leading the team in scoring last season and playing all 82 games in both of the past two seasons.
Pressed for details about why Green's time was up in Houston, Stone wouldn't get into specifics.
“It’s the NBA and you can only do trades if a certain amount of money goes out and a certain amount comes in and there’s some positional overlap or at least overlap in terms of on ball presence,” he said. “And so that’s what the deal required.”
In Durant, the Rockets get a veteran of almost two decades who averaged 26.6 points and six rebounds a game last season and has a career average of 27.2 points and seven rebounds.
Houston loves the veteran experience and presence that Durant brings. Stone noted that the team had arranged for some of its players to work out with him in each of the past two offseasons.
“His work ethic is just awesome,” Stone said. “The speed at which he goes, not in a game … but the speed at which he practices and the intensity at which he practices is something that has made him great over the years and it started when he was very young. So of all the things that I hope rubs off, that’s the main one I think is that practice makes perfect. And I think one of the reasons he’s had such an excellent career is because of the intensity with which he works day in day out.”
Durant is a 15-time All-Star and four-time scoring champion, who was the Finals MVP twice. The former Texas Longhorn is one of eight players in NBA history to score at least 30,000 points and he won NBA titles in 2017 and 2018 with the Warriors.
Now he’ll join a team chasing its first NBA title since winning back-to-back championships in 1994-95.
“Everything has to play out, but we do — we like the fit,” Stone said. “We think it works well. We think he will add to us and we think we will help him.”