Boston Dynamics has created a robot dog that can open doors. Boston Dynamics/Facebook

My Monday evening was going along just like any other Monday. I was sitting on my Texas Mattress Makers bed (shout out to my man Youval) going back and forth between catching up on “60 Days In” on television and a day’s worth of mentions that I had missed on Twitter.

Draft question. Answered. Comment about the Rockets. Liked. Comment about something that we said on the radio show. Answered and liked.

Then, I came upon a twitter mention that had no commentary. It was just a retweet of a video (above) and I was tagged in the retweet. I clicked on the video and there it was - a video of a “robot” that was built in the likeness of a dog’s body had taught itself to open a door and walk about (along with another robot dog friend). My first thought was to recall how eerily similar this robot looked to a killer robot dog in a Black Mirror episode entitled Metalhead. This episode was truly terrifying and should be watched immediately.

I retweeted the video and mentioned how terrifying it was. And it is. We are literally teaching these robots to become smarter. Wait… it’s not “we,” it’s Boston Dynamics. This group has also built a robot that looks like an astronaut in full space suit. This robot has been created to do box jumps and backflips. They’ve basically built robot J.J. Watt but with fewer selfies and a more durable back.

(Just a robot with sick hops who can also do a backflip. No big deal.)

Boston Dynamics Must Be Stopped

There is no question that we are watching passively as Robot Murder Dogs and Assassin Bots are being created in the Boston Dynamics labs in Waltham, Massachusetts. All I can think of is that we need to stop them. We need to come together and stop these f*cking robot makers or we will all be wiped out! It starts with the robots learning how to open a door and before you know it, they are cutting your brake lines and putting crushed glass in your oatmeal. Nah, fam. Not me.

Well I’ve got good news and bad news. The bad news is that they’ve already built 11 different type of robots that all do different things. Cheetah can gallop at 28 MPH, RiSE can climb up the side of building and trees with micro-claws, SandFlea can jump 30 feet vertically, and Handle who is 6 feet tall, runs 9 MPH and has a vertical of 48 inches. We are basically already dead.

Here is how this plays out (according to movie storylines I’ve seen from the '90s.) Bad guy hackers get into the Boston Dynamics database and find a way to alter their Artificial Intelligence so that they learn to kill us. Do you even watch Westworld? You might want to start because they are just laying this sh-- out there right now about how this is going to go down.

The Only Solution

Oh yeah, I gave you the bad news a little earlier, but I forgot to give you the good news! I think I have figured out how we can keep robot dogs and backflipping super Assassin Bots from wrecking our sh-- permanently. We make even more of them and start a sports league. Honestly, I don’t even care which sport it is, let’s just create a focused vision for what we are going to do with them.

I’m sure Boston Dynamics will be down with this because they are probably Patriots fans and are responsible for Tom Brady. Forty year old MVP? FOH, Robot! They might be down with creating more and more robots with different sizes and skills (like they already have) that can eventually populate football, or basketball, or baseball. No more concerns about CTE. No more concerns about escalating ticket prices due to athlete salaries. No more concerns over off-field issues with a robot (unless they are involved in an assassination, of course).

The Netflix show, Black Mirror, is usually spot-on regarding what we might be able to expect in the future from a technological standpoint. Well they were beaten to the punch on this one. In 1990 the game Cyberball 2072 came out where football was played by robots that would collide into each other and throw pass and catch it and do a lot of football things. What made this game so amazing (despite a Metacritic grade of 41%) was that robots were doing football and not doing murdering and hunting of humans. Robots in sports? I say yes.

Most Popular

How undefeated streaks collide in clash between Texans and road warrior Lions

Can Joe Mixon help the Texans remain undefeated at home? Photo by Tim Warner/Getty Images.

With the Texans coming off their sorry second half showing at the Jets and the Detroit Lions coming to town riding a six-game winning streak, it has the look of pretender vs. contender Sunday night at NRG Stadium. The 7-1 Lions are obviously the better team but that is no guarantee that they will be the better team Sunday night. The point spread is only three and a half points. It’s not as if a Texans victory would be a stunning upset. The Texans knocking off the Lions would not balance the books for the Detroit Tigers having bounced the Astros from the baseball playoffs last month, but it would be one of the better regular season wins in Texans’ history.

If not upsetting, it certainly isn’t uplifting that Nick Caserio made zero consequential moves before Tuesday’s trade deadline. If you’re a Texans fan it is upsetting, though shouldn’t be infuriating. Claiming off waivers an offensive lineman (Zachary Thomas) who was getting about 10 snaps per game on one of the very worst o-lines in the NFL (New England Patriots) does not qualify as consequential. It’s not as if Caserio could snap his fingers and make a great deal for a legitimate starting left guard. But his job is to build the roster and he made nothing that qualifies as even a modest upgrade to the most glaring weakness on the team. Play can’t be much worse than what Kenyon Green was providing at left guard before his season-ending injury. But Kenyon was only playing because the staff considered him better than Kendrick Green and Jarrett Patterson. Or, Kenyon was getting unwarranted extended run to prove conclusively he was a waste of a first-round draft pick in 2022.

If Caserio believes the Texans are a bonafide threat in the AFC, adding nothing is a clear fail. Any gurgling about “we believe in our guys” as justification for inertia should be scoffed at, unless Caserio or anyone else believes the Chiefs, Bills, Steelers, and Ravens didn’t “believe in their guys.” All those AFC contenders made clear upgrades. This is not talking about the Texans trading high draft choices. Last week the Minnesota Vikings acquired Jacksonville starting left tackle Cam Robinson for a conditional fifth-round pick.

Tale of the tape

As for Sunday, NBC has to be hoping the Texans being 4-0 this season at NRG Stadium bodes well for them, at least giving the Lions a good game. The Texans are with the Chiefs, Bills, Commanders (!), and Bears (!!) as unbeaten at home. On the other hand, the Lions are a perfect 4-0 on the road. The Chiefs and Falcons have also yet to lose on the road.

While hoping that Aidan Hutchinson makes a complete recovery from his multiple leg fractures, the Lions’ beastly defensive end’s absence sure helps the cause of the Texans’ feeble pass-protecting offensive line. Hutchinson was the early leader for Defensive Player of the Year with seven and a half sacks in five games before he went down. The Lions traded for DE Za’Darius Smith from Cleveland this week. It’s unclear whether Smith makes his Detroit debut chasing C.J. Stroud.

The Texans have topped 30 points in a game once this season. The Lions average an NFL-leading 32.3 per game, topping 30 in four of their last five games, only coming up short last Sunday in a rain-soaked 24-14 win at Green Bay. Over those five games quarterback Jared Goff has completed an absurd 83.8 percent of his passes, with 11 touchdown passes and no interceptions. For the season Goff is completing 74.9 percent. If he maintains that number, he’ll break the NFL record of 74.4 that Drew Brees posted with the Saints in 2018.

Third time's the charm?

Only once in their history have the Texans managed three consecutive winning seasons. They went 9-7 in each of them under Bill O’Brien in 2014, ‘15, and ‘16. They did so with three different quarterbacks leading them in passing yardage: Ryan Fitzpatrick, Brian Hoyer, and Brock Osweiler (really!). The Lions are two victories from securing their first back-to-back-to-back winning seasons since 1993, ‘94, and ‘95. That was the heyday of the great Barry Sanders at running back. Three different quarterbacks led the Lions in passing yardage those years. You’re probably fibbing if you claimed “I know them: Rodney Peete, Dave Krieg, and Scott Mitchell.”

For Texans’ conversation, catch Brandon Strange, Josh Jordan, and me on our Texans On Tap podcasts. Thursdays feature a preview of the upcoming game, and then we go live (then available on demand) after the final gun of the game: Texans on Tap - YouTube

The Astros are always in season for discussion. Our Stone Cold ‘Stros podcasts drop Mondays: Click here to watch!

_______________

Fans of Houston sports and Houston food can now score tickets to The Tailgate, CultureMap's all-out party devoted to everyone’s favorite way to get in the gameday spirit. The event, presented by Verizon, goes down from 6-9 pm November 11 at 8th Wonder. Tickets are $75 for VIP and $50 for General Admission. For a limited time, we’re giving you $10 off; use code SPORTSMAP at checkout. Get your tickets now!

houston texans lions nfl texans

Most Popular

Listen Live

ESPN Houston 97.5 FM