Bill O'Brien on general manager stint with Texans: 'That's really not who I am'

Bill O’Brien was in a reflective mood after he gave an introductory press conference as the Boston College head coach. He can do the on-field stuff, but general manager isn’t in his skill set. That’s what he learned when he was head coach of the Houston Texans.

The Texans represented O’Brien’s second major head coaching job and first in the NFL. To date, it’s his only head coaching job in the league. And he stayed longer in Houston than at any other stop in his nomadic coaching career.

But the Texans job wasn’t really a reflection of who he was. He says the GM job “wasn’t really who I am.”

Let’s go back a dozen years to when the Texans introduced O’Brien as their new head coach. He left Penn State to replace Gary Kubiak, becoming the third head coach in Houston’s 12-year history. O’Brien inherited a 14-game losing streak.

O’Brien coached the Texans through October 2020. But his downfall might’ve started when he took on the role of GM in January of that year.

“Bob McNair hired me in 2014 and I’ll always be grateful,” O’Brien told the College GameDay podcast. “Grateful for that. I mean, we we had some really good teams there. We had some great players. JJ Watt. Jadeveon Clowney. DeAndre Hopkins. Deshaun Watson, I mean, we had some great teams there.

“We didn’t really get to where we wanted to get to, because of a series of events that happened,” he said. “I ended up having the general manager title. Looking back on that, that’s really not who I am. I’m a coach and that’s what I do well. … So probably took a little bit too much on my plate. And it didn’t end very well, but but we had a good run there.”

O’Brien then complimented Texans coach DeMeco Ryans, who helped lead the team to the AFC South division title in his first season in Houston. O’Brien said Ryans “is doing an unbelievable job there.” He also mentioned Texans quarterback C.J. Stroud, who earned NFL rookie of the year. Plus, Nick Caserio, who came over from the Patriots, is the full time GM.

“I’m always very grateful for my time in Houston,” said O’Brien, who finished 52-48 with four divisional titles. “You know, people don’t always agree with how that tenure went for me. But I think we were very successful there. It just didn’t end well. We made some mistakes that didn’t didn’t end up very well.”