The Houston Texans tried. After firing general manager Brian Gaine after one season, they put all their focus on plucking one of the NFL’s most respected and coveted front office men in New England Patriots director of player personnel Nick Caserio.
Led by vice president of team development Jack Easterby, the Texans made an all-out push to hire Caserio. The Patriots blocked all attempts, with owner Robert Kraft settling on the threat of tampering charges to take away their employed, general managing protegé.
Before their Week 13 matchup with Caserio’s Patriots, Texans coach Bill O’Brien spoke on the matter, using 134 words to say, it is what it is.
“I think in the NFL — there’s only 32 teams,” said O’Brien. “Sometimes you work in an organization where you know a lot of people and you have a respect for their jobs and what they do and at the end of the day you try to do the best you can to, at times, communicate and maybe you get a chance to work together. In that instance it didn’t really work out. Whatever happened, happened. There’s no hard feelings.”
“We have a lot of respect for the Patriots,” said O’Brien. “I have a lot of respect for [coach] Bill (Belichick). I’m very grateful to Bill for the opportunities he gave me, and then obviously I have a lot of close friends on the staff over there that I worked with. So, there’s none of that, not on our end.”
Ultimately, the Texans chose to entrust O’Brien and four others as general manager. Since, the O’Brien-led front office has made their fair share of team-altering trades, including shipping off a treasure trove of picks to South Beach for tackle Laremy Tunsil and receiver Kenny Stills.
If O’Brien and Co. remain interested in Caserio, he will be contractually available soon. However, not until after the 2020 NFL Draft.
