Bill O'Brien's First Year: Fluke or Sign of Burgeoning Star Coach?

Under the management of head coach Bill O'Brien, the Houston Texans went from 2-14 in 2013 to the doorstep of the playoffs at 9-7.

Most of the discussion about Houston coming into 2014 centered on just how much regression to the mean was due. In other words, if we subtracted all the Matt Schaub pick-sixes and the hideous minus-20 turnover margin, how good was this team?

In 2015, I would argue that we're headed for a discussion in the other direction.

Houston finished second in the NFL in turnover differential at plus-12. It played the easiest schedule in the NFL, according to Football Outsiders' DVOA. Defensive end J.J. Watt had a season for the ages.

And in perhaps the greatest sign that the Texans were playing over their head, their pass offense DVOA improved from minus-19.7 percent to plus-7.9 percent.

They achieved this despite starting Case Keenum twice and having known mediocrity in Ryan Fitzpatrick drop back 334 times.

But what I'd like to introduce into this discussion is a term my former Football Outsiders colleague and current Intentional Rounding writer Danny Tuccitto is popularizing: multilevel modeling.

You can click that link above for the gory mathematical details, but the crux of the argument is that it's not as mathematically consistent to regress certain teams to the mean.

Because the head coach is a huge factor in some of the outputs that we're looking at, a good or bad one can have a lot of influence in a 16-game season. Certain coaches have shown the ability to continually overperform, say, their Pythagorean wins.

An open question for potential Texans regression is just where O'Brien falls on this scale. Obviously, we don't have enough data to really project this forward given that O'Brien has coached just one season.

A remarkable season, mind you. But one season.

For the purposes of hypothetical argument and prediction science, though, it's a key question to have a stance on. How you feel about O'Brien's coaching acumen matters a lot in projecting what will happen to the Texans next season.

Rotoworld's Patrick Daugherty wrote a post ranking all NFL head coaches, and O'Brien came in eighth after just one season:

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It wasn’t just that O’Brien whipped a talented roster into 9-7, however, but how he did it. How did O’Brien land on the coaching radar in the first place? Via Tom Brady’s golden arm. What did he do his final year at Penn State? Dial up 32.6 passes per game with true freshman Christian Hackenberg. So what was his plan in Houston? Lead the league in rushing attempts. O’Brien maximized his roster in every which way, tapping DeAndre Hopkins’ superstar potential while making Jadeveon Clowney's lost rookie year a footnote. 

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And here's where I start to be of two minds on the subject. The Texans were able to cobble together an effective passing game by making the run such a priority that they could dictate some matchup problems.

This created what was, statistically, not a very good rushing attack.

The Texans finished 24th in rushing DVOA at minus-11.6 percent. Moreover, as we discussed last week, rookie back Alfred Blue finished dead last among all qualifying backs in DVOA and DYAR.

The typical discourse I see about the Houston running game is that the offensive line had some issues and center Chris Myers may need to be replaced. What if it was just overuse that made it seem that way?

What happens if that prolific, if not efficient, run game falls further back from the pack in 2015? Does this make someone like tackle Derek Newton a priority to re-sign despite last season being his first good one? Is this model sustainable in the short term until the Texans can develop or find a quarterback who can actually deliver what O'Brien wants at the position?

My basic lean is that the Texans have something in O'Brien. Anyone who can thoroughly trump Mike Pettine the way he did in Cleveland is on to something.

I also think if you can look past the PR-speak the job demands of him, O'Brien comes off as very measured and smart when speaking to the public. His videos with John Harris on the official Texans website are a must-watch for fans of the X's and O's.

I still think the Texans have a little regression in them in a vacuum. The turnover margin should be worse. And while the NFC South was horrendous last year, the schedule should be a bit tougher than it was in 2014.

Changes to the talent level would be enough to convince me otherwise, should they occur in free agency or the draft. A valuable quarterback would be enough to have me touting the playoffs as a possibility.

But just how "sticky" is the improvement O'Brien provided? That's what we don't know yet. If he's as good as Daugherty thinks he is, the Texans could continue to threaten in the AFC South.

All DYAR and DVOA numbers cited are courtesy of Football Outsiders. Learn more about DVOA here.

 

Rivers McCown is the AFC South lead writer for Bleacher Report and the co-host of the Three-Cone Drill podcast. His work has also appeared on Football Outsiders and ESPN.com. Follow him on Twitter at @riversmccown.