THE WINNING GAME PLAN
Meet one of the most influential people to help write the story of pro football in Houston
Oct 30, 2020, 5:15 pm
THE WINNING GAME PLAN
Football players, coaches and general managers have come and gone, but only one person has been running the business side of the Texans, well, even before they were the Texans. Jamey Rootes has been President of the Houston Texans since 1999, when an NFL team in Houston was still just a gleam in owner Bob McNair's eyes. That's before the team adopted the name "Texans" in 2000, before there was NRG Stadium, which opened as Reliant Stadium in 2000, and before they became serial champs of the AFC South, six titles between 2011-2019.
The precise date was Oct. 6, 1999 when NFL owners voted 29-0 to award the NFL's 32nd and newest franchise to Houston. Not only that, Houston was awarded the 2004 Super Bowl. Rootes, 34 years old with no NFL experience, had his work cut out for him. Before taking the job in Houston, Rootes was team president, general manager and CEO of selling peanuts and popcorn for the Columbus Crew of Major League Soccer.
Major League Soccer, with all due respect, is not nearly a national obsession like the National Football League.
"I wasn't intimidated," Rootes said. "There's a quote that I love, 'Do the thing you fear and the death of fear is certain.' I've always been a purpose-driven person. As for the step up to the NFL, I went from knowing nothing at the start of my time in Columbus to five years later thinking, OK, I've got this sports thing down. Actually, I had a very significant reduction in my responsibilities in Houston. When I was in Columbus, I ran the stadium, I ran the team's business, I was the general manager so I did the talent side of it, too. When I came to Houston, all I had to do was the business, so that was great."
Rootes has captured his remarkable journey from the soccer team at Clemson to grad school at Indiana University to the business world at IBM and Proctor & Gamble to the Clemson Crew, to ultimately being named President of the Houston Texans in his new book, The Winning Game Plan: A Proven Leadership Playbook for Continuous Business Success, available next week.
I've known Rootes from his day one with the Texans, but I still had to ask: everybody knows what the general manager does, and what the head coach does. What exactly does the President of an NFL team worth $3.3 billion do?
"I like to use the parallel of a pharmaceutical company to describe my job. There are two sides to that company. First you put scientists in one building and you leave them alone. They create products, which is what our football team is. The football side has a coach and general manager and all the people who prepare the team to play on Sunday. But getting that product to market is done by the business side, traditional business disciplines. Those are the things that fall to me. Basically, everything between the white lines is run by the football side. Everything outside of those lines, I do," Rootes said.
Between 1999 and 2002, when the Texans played their first game (let the record show the Texans defeated the Dallas Cowboy, 19-10), the team was essentially a massive start-up project. First orders of business for Rootes involved building a new stadium, developing relationships with suppliers, contractors and government officials, preparing for a Super Bowl and, most important, developing a relationship with fans.
Rootes began writing The Winning Game Plan last March, but it's really an accumulation of lessons learned and behind-the-scenes stories about building the Texans from scratch into one of the most admired and valuable franchises in all of sports.
"I've always been a meticulous note-taker. I've kept every presentation I've ever done. I took all of my notes and concepts and put those down on paper," Rootes said. "To be a good leader, you need a wild imagination. You can show me a blank piece of paper, but I don't see it as blank. To me, it's a finished product that hasn't been created yet," Rootes said.
Rootes lays out his leadership strategy in seven chapters: Are You a Manager or a Leader, Get the Right People on Your Team, Build a Winning Culture, Create Raving Fans, a Winning Playbook for Adversity and Success, Your Leadership Playbook and Play to Win.
He learned lesson No. 1 the hard way. A friend once counseled Rootes, "your staff doesn't like the way you're all up in their business, you need to back off." Rootes took that advice to heart.
"It was an epiphany. I wasn't a leader. That's when I truly began thinking about leadership. I say this all the time, I don't do anything. All I do is create an environment where exceptional people can be their very best self. I know what's going on. I'm fully informed. I leave every game day exhausted. I get there early. I do the things I need to do. I kiss babies. I shake hands. I present checks. I entertain clients. I'm dialed in. It absolutely wears me out because I love this organization so much. I am so proud of what we've been able to do for this great city of Houston."
I asked Rootes, as someone who lives for Game Day and a packed NRG Stadium, are you devastated by 2020, the year of COVID-19 and small crowds limited by Centers for Disease Control guidelines?
"I don't look at it that way. I think there's a song by 10,000 Maniacs that said, these are the days that you'll remember. I told my staff, I know you're all going through hell right now, but later on in life, you'll talk about this year. Things that are important are memorable, for the positive and those things that leave a scar. You learn from adversity and you're a better person for enduring it. Victor Frankl said 'We can discover meaning in life in three different ways, by creating a work or doing a deed, experiencing something or encountering someone, and by the attitude we take toward unavoidable suffering.' Suffering is part of life. He should know, he survived a Nazi concentration camp," Rootes said.
H-E-B President Scott McClelland wrote the forward to The Winning Game Plan. Rootes dedicates the book to late Texans owner Bob McNair. Rootes' book is a fun read. All I kept thinking was, where was this book when I needed it? And before you buy too much into Rootes as a leader, consider that Rootes admits that he had to ask for wife Melissa's permission before he could accept the Texans job.
Personal note: I believe that a big part of leadership is the ability to keep a promise. Several years ago, I was riding my bicycle with my dog Lilly on a leash. It was the only way I could keep up with her. Well, one time Lilly saw a squirrel and pulled me off my bicycle. I tumbled a few times and rolled next to the curb. When I looked up, there was Jamey Rootes. I told him, "There's no need for you to tell anybody about this." He never said a word.
While the rolling Astros have a week of possible World Series preview matchups against the Phillies and Cubs, it’s the Rockets who made the biggest local sports headline with their acquisition of Kevin Durant. What a move! Of course there is risk involved in trading for a guy soon to turn 37 years old and who carries an injury history, but balancing risk vs. reward is a part of the game. This is a fabulous move for the Rockets. It’s understood that there are dissenters to this view. Everyone is entitled to an opinion, including people with the wrong opinion! Let’s dig in.
The Rockets had a wonderful season in winning 52 games before their disappointing first-round playoff loss to the Warriors, but like everyone else in the Western Conference, they were nowhere close to Oklahoma City’s caliber. While they finished second in the West, the Rockets only finished four games ahead of the play-in. That letting the stew simmer with further growth among their young players would yield true championship contention was no given for 2025-26 or beyond.
Kevin Durant is one of the 10 greatest offensive players the NBA has ever seen. Among his current contemporaries only Stephen Curry and Nikola Jokic make that list. For instance, Durant offensively has clearly been better than the late and legendary Kobe Bryant. To view it from a Houston perspective, Durant has been an indisputably greater offensive force than the amazing Hakeem Olajuwon. But this is not a nostalgia trip in which the Rockets are trading for a guy based on what he used to be. While Durant could hit the wall at any point, living in fear that it’s about to happen is no way to live because KD, approaching his 18th NBA season, is still an elite offensive player.
As to the durability concern, Durant played more games (62) this past season than did Fred VanVleet, Jabari Smith, and Tari Eason. The season before he played more games (75) than did VanVleet, Dillon Brooks, and Alperen Sengun. In each of the last two seasons Durant averaged more minutes per game (36.9) than any Rocket. That was stupid and/or desperate of the Suns, the Rockets will be smarter. Not that the workload eroded Durant’s production or efficiency. Over the two seasons he averaged almost 27 points per game while shooting 52 percent from the floor, 42 percent from behind the three-point line, and 85 percent from the free throw line. Awesomeness. The Rockets made the leap to being a very good team despite a frankly crummy half-court offense. The Rockets ranked 21st among the 30 NBA teams in three-point percentage, and dead last in free throw percentage. Amen Thompson has an array of skills and looks poised to be a unique star. Alas, Thompson has no credible jump shot. VanVleet is not a creator, Smith has limited handle. Adding Durant directly addresses the Rockets’ most glaring weakness.
The price the Rockets paid was in the big picture, minimal, unless you think Jalen Green is going to become a bonafide star. Green is still just 23 years old and spectacular athletically, but nothing he has done over four pro seasons suggests he’s on the cusp of greatness. In no season has Green even shot the league average from the floor or from three. His defense has never been as good as it should be given his athleticism. Compared to some other two-guards who made the NBA move one year removed from high school, four seasons into his career Green is waaaaaay behind where Shae Gilgeous-Alexander, Anthony Edwards, and Devin Booker were four seasons in, and now well behind his draft classmate Cade Cunningham. Dillon Brooks was a solid pro in two seasons here and shot a career-best from three in 2024-2025, but he’s being replaced by Kevin Durant! In terms of the draft pick capital sent to Phoenix, five second round picks are essentially meaningless. The Rockets have multiple extra first round picks in the coming years. As for the sole first-rounder dealt away, whichever player the Rockets would have taken 10th Wednesday night would have been rather unlikely to crack the playing rotation.
VanVleet signs extension
Re-signing Fred VanVleet to a two-year, 50 million dollar guarantee is sensible. In a vacuum, VanVleet was substantially overpaid at the over 40 mil he made per season the last two. He’s a middle-of-the-pack starting point guard. But his professionalism and headiness brought major value to the Rockets’ kiddie corps while their payroll was otherwise very low. Ideally, Reed Sheppard makes a leap to look like an NBA lead guard in his second season, after a pretty much zippo of a rookie campaign. Sheppard is supposed to be a lights-out shooter. For the Rockets to max out, they need two sharpshooters on the court to balance Thompson’s presence.
For Astro-centric conversation, join Brandon Strange, Josh Jordan, and me for the Stone Cold ‘Stros podcast which drops each Monday afternoon, with an additional episode now on Thursday. Click here to catch!
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