What's in the Texans booth?
 

The Moats' fumble yesterday is not the first time the Texans have lollygagged after a potentially reviewable play. I'm curious what the Texans have in their booth. Do they have a TV with the same feed as the rest of us? Anyone know?

I don't know, but you can pretty much count on at least one bonehead coaching gaff and one bonehead Schaub pass per game. It's to be expected.

Schaubs pass was not nearly as "boneheaded" as that wounded-duck the Colts thru up towards the sidelines which became Pollards second interception. That pass bordered on wierd ?

To answer the original question, I don't know if there are tv monitors for the coaches upstairs and I would guess the only requirement is that both staffs have to have access to the same information so, IOW, they both have monitors or neither do. Where and how convenient probably varies from stadium to stadium.

I do recall that the Redskins actually hired a "replay coach" whose one and only job was to watch the monitors and advise Joe Gibbs whether he should throw a challenge flag or not. In great comic fashion, the "replay coach" was chronically wrong and I can't remember if he even lasted the whole season.

Schaub said this morning that the staff told him thru his headset to slow down & run the clock down to the two minute warning. He later said that from the Texan's coaches view point, they saw that the Indy defender was down, out of bounds, which they interpet that they are both out of bounds. Either way, we need to hang on to the damn ball, as it should not have come to that.

So it sounds like the answer is "yes, we did see the replay, but we didn't know the rules well enough to know this was a possible fumble." Outstanding.

Further, we've all seen plays get overturned on review that left us scratching our heads. Even if you think you're right, why let it get to that?

re: Moats fumble, I don't think anybody at the time thought it was a fumble. Not until the replays started showing did things start getting iffy....

I haven't rewatched the game, yet (and might not rewatch it), but it seemed to me, Moats had the ball, butt hit the ground, and a few hundredths of a second later, the ball came flying out. Replay showed he still had possession albeit precarious possession with the ball trapped on his hip. The officials ruled he landed on top of the defensive player and therefore was not down when the ball came flying out.

I believe the coaches in the booth get at least the network feed possibly more. Each stadium is responsible for providing the visiting coaches with a decent replays/monitors although I've heard rumors some home teams provide their coaches a little more...

FWIW, the Texans have been better this year in overturning a few (a couple?) replays this year and Kubes was asked why. He responded that having Bruce Mathews up in the booth was one of the reasons....

Maybe you didn't, but quite a few people (including myself) did where I was. They showed a replay immediately after the play. I was at Nick's Place and several of us immediately started saying that it was possibly a fumble and the Texans need to run a play before the Colts decide to challenge it. Once the Texans got up to the line of scrimmage, we were screaming for them to snap it. When Schaub walked away to allow the clock to run down to the 2 minute warning, several of us then predicted that the Colts would challenge after being given the 2 minute warning to watch more replays. That's what infuriates me. This wasn't an after-the-fact conclusion. Half of Nick's Place saw the potential for a fumble in real time; i.e., before the Texans even walked up to the line of scrimmage for the next play. The Texans staff should have at least seen the possibility as well. Bottom line is that on close plays, you can't give the other side that much time to ponder what to do.

It was reported the coaches thought Moats was out of bounds. Obviously, Kubiak and the sideline guys don't have cameras/monitors. Right or wrong, the coaches in the booth didn't think it was a fumble either. The ruling at the time on the field was "no fumble". They were in a conundrum in that they didn't want to leave Peyton more time than they had to if they scored. Hence, letting the clock run down to the 2 minute warning. Given the Texans troubles in the red zone, they took the 2 minute timeout to discuss. In hindsight, they should have run a play but I don't think it was criminal that they didn't.... JMO....

Not trying to jump you but I was watching the game over a freaking sling box feed and I was immediately concerned that he'd fumbled. It was way too close for the team to be nonchalanting around.

Like everyone else I don't know whether the coaches in the box have access to a video feed or not. I'll try to look on the 23rd in Reliant, but from my vantage point it's almost impossible to tell. For example, I know perfectly well that the radio guys have video but I can't see their monitors from where I sit.

Well, that's just the whole crux of it right there. You and many others felt they needed to rush a play - the coaches thought there was nothing wrong and saw no need to.

Fans 1, Coaches 0. Hindsight is wonderful.

On another note, Kubiak mentioned yesterday on his radio show that they submitted a case to the league regarding this play. I would not be surprised if this play shows up on the NFLN show with Mike Pereira later this week...

Here, from the Chron:

The first or second drive of the game where he threw into triple coverage for an INT was pretty boneheaded, IMO.

If there's any doubt, which judging by Kubiak's presser comments "we knew Moats fumbled, but assumed he was out of bounds" there was, you still get up to the line quickly and a run a play. Most teams would have done that (I bet the Colts would have) instead of lolly-gagging around or worrying about leaving Peyton too much time. Sure hindsight is wonderful, but someone should have been smart enough to recognize the possibility of a fumble there (Moats, Schaub, the coaches on the field or booth...) and taken appropriate measures to ensure we kept possession of the ball. That one play might have lost us the game.

Agreed. You have the ball on the 2 freakin' yard line. You cannot leave a questionable call up to the refs if you have the ability to control your own destiny. And I agree that Manning would have definitely ran a play, as I've seen him do it numerous times after close calls. That's what good teams do. Winning and losing in the NFL is regularly decided by these sorts of things and we need to get better at getting them right.

I mean, what this boils down to was we were willing to trade potentially turning the ball over on the 2 yardline so we could run 5 extra seconds off the clock. That's a terrible tradeoff.

man, i don't know how anyone can defend what the texans' coaches did on this one. if there is even a 1% chance it could be overturned on a challenge you do everything you can to avoid that. especially when you are down 13 to the colts IN indy. not to mention that was the first drive they actually moced the ball. the only people who didn't think that they should snap the ball before the 2 minute warning was the texans sidelines . . .or i should say the coaches. dunta said in an interview that there were several players on the texans' sideline yelling at them to snap the ball as well because it was too close to chance

Kubiak said "we knew Moats fumbled, but assumed he was out of bounds", basically tells the story: takin along with what I "assume" was a report from his people upstairs who had to see what we all saw on the TV replay should have been sufficient enough for him to quickly instruct Schaub to run a play, but he and his-staff apparently just wern't nimble enough to make that happen.

I don't think that was the actual quote but yeah, that's what Kubiak meant. It doesn't help when the refs initially rule "no fumble". (Again, watching it real time, I didn't think it was a fumble or even that close. Not till the replays started coming did I "see" it). Any replay would have to have conclusive proof to overturn it. And according to the refs, there was conclusive proof.

I just don't see it as the boneheaded play some of you do. IMO, it was just a little perfect storm of bad fortune....


Yeah, or it could have been the six 1st downs the Texans gave Indy via penalty. Or the missed K Brown FG. Or the Schaub INT's.... The Texans didn't lose the game on one play.

The deal is, what can you do about it now? If you're the Texans, you learn from it and move on...

what I heard Coach Kubiak also clarify on 610 Monday evening, is they felt like the safety who Moats was on top of, touched the ball while he was out of bounds, ie. the ball was touched out of bounds and that established the fumble out of bounds.

If they are correct on the out of bounds touch, then it is defensible and refs blew it. I guess film is sent to league for review.

And, that would be consistent with the call on the field at the time, which was overturned.

Other than that, hope it's a good learning experinece for all in the future.

And, we need to stop turning over the ball, hard to win if you loose the turnover battle.

I'm not saying that was the ONLY play that cost them the game. You can go back in any game and find numerous plays that could have changed the outcome had it gone differently. However, this was one play that was big enough to potentially (likely) be a 7 point swing that could have easily been avoided had someone been paying attention and thought through or reacted to the situation.

Of course, there's nothing we can do about it now other than look at an important notch in the L column and hope we can steal one from them at home. As for learning, how long does Kubiak et al need to figure this stuff out? IMO, this was modern-day NFL Football 101. If there's any doubt, get up and snap the damn ball and let the chips fall where they may!! There shouldn't have been any thought to it. It should have been common reaction. Judging by the fact Schaub let ~7 seconds or so run off the clock while standing there with the offense lined up at the LOS, the Colts were not prepared to throw the flag until we gave them time to look at it.

I don't know... I can understand how Kubiak and crew screwed it up, and yes, there's noting we can do about it now, but it's frustrating nontheless.

I guess my point is that this is just the latest in a fairly long line of screwups by the coaching staff. Also, I try my best not to be a Monday morning QB who complains about a call only after it doesn't work. However, in this case, I (and apparently a lot of other people) knew, in real time, that Moats may have fumbled and were screaming at the TV to snap the ball. This wasn't hindsight.

Sadly, this isn't the first time I've screamed at my TV for the Texans to do something. Reminds me of the Jags game last year when I was screaming for them to call a timeout when we had our punt unit on the field when the Jags had their starting offense out there. I don't claim to be smarter than Kubes and the rest of the staff. That's why it is so mindboggling to me that they don't see the stuff that even I can see.

Again, there was just as many people thinking "nothing wrong".

The coaching staff thought they made the right decison at the time. (And apparently they still do as they have sent in a report to the league office).

Coaching screwups, bad play calls, misuse of the clock - stuff like that happens to all coaching staffs. You hope your team makes as few blunders as possible. (How about the Colts calling timeout and giving K Brown a second chance on the missed the FG? Or taking the ball out of Peyton's hand and letting Reggie Wayne chunk it? How dumb does that look?) You have to get use to a little bit of it.... Doesn't mean you have to like it - but you should be able to tolerate a certain amount...

I don't place this particular incident squarely on the coaches - rather it was a "team" fail. Moats/Schaub/someone other than a few voices on the sidelines could have said "f*** it, we gotta run a play now". Of course, I say this in hindsight....

I get what you're saying and maybe other coaching staffs make as many blunders as ours and I just don't know it because I don't watch them as closely. However, I tend to doubt it. In my opinion, Kubiak has been outcoached far more times than he has outcoached someone else.

Also, you're right that reasonable minds could differ as to whether it was a fumble, but that's kinda the point. If there is even a small chance that you are wrong, you can't risk it. I don't care if the coaches think it was a fumble because that should not be what they were deciding. Put another way, their job wasn't to give their ruling on the fumble, because they don't have any ability to make that call anyway. Their job was to decide whether the ruling was in some way questionable and suspectible to review. I don't see how anyone could come away from the replay and not realize it was at least possibly reviewable. At that point, you do everything you can to avoid the review, regardless of how you think the review might ultimately come out because you can't take the chance.

What concerns me is that we continue to make these gaffs. Why can't we be more on top of the situation? And I didn't have to use hindsight on the play. I saw Moats with his elbow flying and started thinking, here we go again. The ball started coming out right then ,he rolled over Bethea, the ball bounced off Moats middle, but stayed in bounds. The other defender saw what happened, quickly jumped back in bounds, by which time the ball had wriggled onto the white line for the endzone, and picked it up. Weird, but that is the reason Indy got it on the 20 as a touchback. Kubiak and his crew just blew the time afterwards, resulting in Indy getting the ball. :(

Hmm, I guess it is just my perception, I think the coaching decisions in general are better this year and getting better all the time. We seem to be learning what plays work on offense and defense. We seem to be making more good calls when we toss the flag. Clock management seems to be improving. I'm not sure this particular scenario has ever come up before for any coach, exactly as presented anyways.

Overall game management comes with a maturing staff and players both, being together for a while.

Maybe we need a rule like a coach has 1 minute to throw the red flag, after that it is the same as the next play has been run. this time it took a long time to get the red flag thrown.

And, you guys could also complain about all the bad ref's calls. How about the horse collar on JJ they didn't call? How about motion penalty they called about 20 seconds after play was over rather than as play started.

Well, if they had ruled it as fumble initially, we wouldn't be talking about it because the texans wouldn't have had the opportunity to quickly snap the ball

you are missing the point here. it doesn't matter if they thought it wasn't a fumble or not. if it is close enough that the other side could challenge it you DON'T PUT THE DICISION IN SOMEONE ELSE'S HANDS"

if they snap it, the worst thing that could have happened is they scored immediately and left a few extra seconds on the clock for indy. if they let it run down and were wrong, they give up the ball when they had it on the 2 freaking yard line

you are missing the point here. it doesn't matter if they thought it wasn't a fumble or not. if it is close enough that the other side could challenge it you DON'T PUT THE DICISION IN SOMEONE ELSE'S HANDS

if they snap it, the worst thing that could have happened is they scored immediately and left a few extra seconds on the clock for indy. if they let it run down and were wrong, they give up the ball when they had it on the 2 freaking yard line

For the umpteenth time, the coaches thought: Still our ball, no problem, let's go on to the next play. Had it been ruled a fumble initially, I think you would have seen the Texans throw the red flag.

No, I understand the point quite well, thankyouverymuch. One more time: the coaches nor the players on the field thought it was close. Got it?

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Here's the video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EoitRyfqmUA

Interesting that the announcers didn't mention fumble until the different replay angles started showing....

Check out the Colt tackler - out of bounds? Or does it matter?

I want to hear what Mike Pereira says on this one....

Arky,

At this point, I think it's safe to say that we must agree to disagree. However, there have been reports that Dunta said after the game that several players on the sideline wanted to run the play to avoid a potential challenge. If this is true, your claim that the players didn't think it was close simply isn't true. If you have some quotes from players, please post as I would like to see them.

As for Pereira's ruling, little good it will do us. But, yet again, that's the point. People make mistakes and everyone knows it. We didn't have to give them the chance to make it.

Finally, the explanations appear to have evolved some since Sunday. First, Moats didn't fumble, then he was out-of-bounds, and finally, they thought the Colt player touched it while he was out-of-bounds. For the booth to see all of that suggests they were studying the replay like it was the Zapruder film. Again, I think that makes my point. If their final opinion required going through 3 steps; i.e., (1) yes, Moats fumbled, (2) while he was in bounds, but (3) the ball glanced off the defender's arm while he was out-of-bounds, that is just too damn close to leave to chance.

Two thing have come out that clearly demonstrate that the reffs blew it.

1. There is a still photo that clearly shows the defender under moats laying out of bounds and his hand/arm is touching the ball. - Ball out of bounds by rule.

2. There is a youTube that has sound. It clearly shows/demonstrates that the reffs blew the ball dead well before the player picked up the ball. - End of play by rule.

Add to all that the reffs said it was out of bounds no one thought anything of it. It took 3-4 replays before the guys in the booth were even sure it wasn't out of bounds.

The first review didn't happen until 5-6 seconds before the 2 Min. warning and Matt is walking back towards the sideline per the coaches request. They were trying to take as much time off the clock as possible because they didn't want PeyPey to have to much time. By the time the booth had enough info, the 2 min. was in play and the Colts had enough time to see enough reviews. Did anyone note that they weren't any to sure about throwing the red flag and took max time to reach a decision? It wasn't near the cut and dried situation some seem to think it was.

These people calling for a quick play and blaming people for not doing it are just too full of themselves thinking that is what they would have done if they were on the field and not on the couch.

I'm going from what I heard Winston say on his show on Sportsradio610am this afternoon and just the general sense of no-urgency I observed from the players on the field. If Dunta said there were players on the sidelines wanting to run a play, then all I can say is they should have made their case a little louder. Kubiak never got the message from the field, the sidelines or the coaches booth and didn't feel the need to rush a play. I highly doubt he would just ignore someone in that situation.....

Yep, and little good it does yapping about it on an internet forum. The only difference I see in our debate is that some of you place it all on the coach/coaches. I see it as a *team* fail....

Check out what AJ Burge says on the subject and also look at the reader comments. He makes a case that the officials may have blown it even after review....

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I'm done with this until Pereira has his say... :)

Edit: Thank you, edo, that's what I've been trying to say.

again, the point isn't whether anyone thought it was a fumble or not. the point is that if there was a chance that a red flag could be thrown and you are that close to the end zone, then you run a play to make sure you can keep the ball instead of worrying about leaving an extra couple of seconds on the clock.

further, arky, i don't think anyone is saying the entire loss was the coaches fault. as a matter of fact, i am certain that nobody has said that. there were clearly pleanty of other issues that went into it, but this thread is about a consistent issue the coaching staff has had over the years. it doesn't matter if the league comes out and says "yeah, we blew it". it just comes down to the fact that if there is a chance that there could be a review in a situation like that, they should have done everything they could to keep that review from happening

And I know you don't like this answer but here it is again: they didn't think there was a chance it could reviewed. They didn't think think there was a chance it could be reviewed and overturned in favor of the Colts.

This was a red flag thrown by the other team. The other team throwing a red flag hasn't been a "consistent problem" to my recollection. With the Texans, the problems in the past have been when we have thrown the red flag. In the past, I think we've all seen Kubiak throw the red flag and know that there wasn't a prayer of overturning the play.

IMO, up until the Colts game, challenges haven't been an issue this year. I couldn't find any stats on replay challenges but the Texans haven't had that many challenges this year. They've had at least one maybe two successful challenges this year, so my inference is that (up until the Colts game) they were getting better at it....

Kubiak:

I think we've probably exhausted this issue and I apologize for being one of the ones who kept it going this long. The Texans didn't think the replay showed a reviewable play. Some agree with their thinking, others (like me) don't see any way you could watch that play and not at least think a review is possible. That's where we're at and there's no point arguing any further, IMHO. Go beat Tenn. and Indy and it's water under the bridge.

However, I will reiterate my original question and would still like to know what the Texans have at their disposal when making these decisions.

Well, if that's the case we have some very big problems, because if we know one thing about replay, it is that sometimes the rulings don't make sense.