It appears that Cal McNair is disrupting the mold after recovering from the loss of his father, Houston Texans owner Robert McNair, who died on Nov. 23, 2018. On Monday, the new CEO and chairman dismissed Jack Easterby, the executive vice president of football operations, in a decision that McNair is saying was mutual.
“We have mutually agreed to part ways,” McNair said in a statement. “We acknowledge Jack’s positive contributions and wish him and his family the best in the future.”
Jack Easterby was hired as the EVP of team development in 2019 and became a prominent figure in the organization through the eyes of McNair. Easterby started his career as a character coach with the Kansas City Chiefs before relocating to New England where he worked with Bill Belichick, the head coach and general manager of the Patriots, and began to learn more about football operations under the revered veteran.
Despite Easterby being under the tutelage of Belichick, in Houston he proved to be not as impactful as the legendary, game-winning coach. There, Easterby would join head coach Bill O’Brien, another Belichick disciple, along with Romeo Crennel, Nick Caserio, and many other former Patriots, helping the Texans earn the moniker, “Patriots South.”
The lack of experience that Easterby possessed reared its ugly head in the Spring of 2020 when he and O’Brien thought it was an advantageous idea to trade a top 3 wide receiver, Deandre Hopkins, to Arizona for a running back who had not played in the NFL for over a year — deemed the “Worst Trade In NFL History” by many stunned pundits and athletes around the league. Even Skip Bayless of Undisputed asked the question, “What in the Bum Phillips is going on in Houston?”
The circus was just getting started. After trading Hopkins to Arizona, the Texans would start the season 0-4 and the man who helped bring Easterby to Houston, Bill O’Brien, was now being terminated by Easterby and replaced by interim coach, Romeo Crennel. Meanwhile, the Texans finished with an abysmal record of 4-12.
With O’Brien out of the way, Easterby was able to grasp more power and the ear of McNair as it pertained to decision-making for the team. Texans were on the market for a new head coach and general manager, granting quarterback DeShaun Watson input into the process.
McNair even went so far to hire Korn Ferry, paying the consulting firm hundreds of thousands of dollars to sift through candidates. Korn Ferry came up with two qualified candidates, Louis Riddick and Omar Khan, both men of color who possessed experience in drafting elite level players.
Feeling that his power would be usurped, or worse, he would be terminated, Easterby was able to convince McNair to hire Caserio, a person that did not even make the cut on Korn Ferry’s list of candidates. The move caused a rift between the franchise quarterback and owner.
A team that was once on the rise and talked about as a few pieces away from being a Super Bowl contender has now been reduced to playing for a top first round draft pick with nowhere to go but up due to the questionable decisions of one man who has finally received his walking papers. In the words of Sam Cooke, “It’s been a long, a long time coming, but I know a change” has come.
