A horrific hiring process results in an experienced candidate but shows Texans front office has not learned from their mistakes.
The Houston Texans embarked on a rocky rollercoaster of a head coach search and after three weeks they hire the in-house candidate, defensive coordinator Lovie Smith.
Beloved by his players, Smith's 21 years of NFL coaching experience - with 11 as a head coach of the Chicago Bears and Tampa Bay Buccaneers - makes him the most battle-tested head coach to be hired this cycle.
Smith has been in this position before and the results have been mixed. He had a winning record in five out of his nine seasons with a talented Bears team and most importantly appeared in the 2006 Super Bowl, where they lost to the Indianapolis Colts.
During his second stint, Lovie led the Bucs to an 8-24 record over two seasons, before enough was enough. A common excuse for his lack of results was that Bucs team lacked talent and while I would generally agree, guess what, so does this Texans team.
The same can be said for Lovie's tenure in the college ranks as the head coach of Illinois. Through five seasons he did not have much talent to work with and put together a combined record of 17-39.
My semi-confident don't hold it against me because I don't want it to be true take is that Lovie can be a good head coach if he has a Super Bowl contending roster but he's going to struggle to turn around a rebuilding team desperate of talent.
My overall thoughts on this hire are like going through a maze, frustrated, drawn out and underwhelmed with the results. The Texans could certainly have done worse but this was a chance to accelerate the rebuild and find the coach of the future, I wish I could say Lovie is that guy. Instead, Cal McNair gets a safe hire who can provide continuity and avoid taking a step back under another rookie head coach.