Houston Texans: Pros, Cons of hiring Brian Flores or Lovie Smith

Lovie Smith brings an incredible defensive history, but the same cannot be said for the offense.

Pros

Lovie Smith is the man who orchestrated the rise of the mid-2000s Chicago Bears and ultimately culminated in a Super Bowl XLI appearance. Smith has an 89-87 record as a head coach, with stops in Chicago and Tampa Bay.

Smith is a highly respected coach around the league, and a handful of Houston Texans players have expressed their hope that Smith gets the job. Smith has elevated defenses everywhere he goes- earning the respect of the players he coaches.

Cons

Smith hasn’t been an NFL head coach since the 2015 NFL season, so there may be a bit of rust in that fact itself. Smith spent time at the University of Illinois from 2016-2020 as their head coach, but it wasn’t anything to write home about.

Another big concern is the offense his teams have failed to produce. His teams that he’s coached on only had a top-ten offense in terms of points and yards just three times in 15 years. Yet, Smith didn’t see anything wrong with Rex Grossman and stuck with him at the quarterback position.

Smith ignored  Grossman for the second half of the 2006 season in which Grossman threw multiple three-pick-plus games. Looking at what was the weakest part of the Texans game last season? The offense, specifically the running game.

Houston ranked dead last in rushing yards last year. Smith has only had five times during his entire coaching career where his squad made it into the top ten of the league. That’s an average of 20th in the league.

Teams nowadays can overcome a bad defense, but not a bad offense. So who’s the right candidate for the job?