DAVID BARRON
CBS’ top NFL team chimes in on Brock Osweiler.
As the Texans continue to struggle on offense, ’tis the season to bash Brock Osweiler. Fa-la-la-la-la, etc.
Phil Simms, who will call the Texans-Packers game Sunday from Lambeau Field alongside Jim Nantz, joined this week on CBS Sports Network’s “Monday NFL QB” in the jolly chorus taking aim at the Texans’ beleaguered quarterback.
“I don’t think the Houston Texans can win with Brock Osweiler as their starting quarterback,” Simms said. “Brock Osweiler is just not a natural thrower of the football.”
Steve Beuerlein, on the same program, cautioned that Osweiler deserves more time to prove himself but said that the quarterback’s height may be a disadvantage.
“How many 6-foot-8-inch quarterbacks have you seen be successful in the NFL? I can’t think of any,” Beuerlein said. “It is very hard for a man that big to have the mobility and the agility and the delivery in the pocket to be consistently successful.”
Since we’re talking sports and TV, of course we have to offer a dissenting opinion. And for that, we offer Jim Nantz, Simms’ CBS Sports sidekick, who sounds as if he’s ready for a spirited debate with Simms on the Osweiler issue.
“It seems like everybody is taking their best shots at Brock,” Nantz said. “I’m going to go the other way. It’s too early to draw conclusions. I’ve seen him play a number of times in Denver when he was placed in very trying situations, and he performed at a high level.
“I would not be surprised if the Texans rally this week and Brock plays a big role in that. … I have faith in his ability. He may not be the most natural thrower, but guys change. He’s playing Sunday against a guy who changed his throwing motion in Aaron Rodgers.”
This will only be the fourth time in their history the Texans have drawn CBS Sports’ top NFL broadcast team for a Sunday afternoon game and the ninth overall (including three Thursday night games, a Thanksgiving game in Detroit and a playoff game).
CBS, as the NFC carrier, doesn’t get a chance to do many Packers games, but this will be the third visit to Green Bay in two months for the Nantz-Simms team. Oddly enough, the storyline for Texans-Packers — two teams badly in need of a turnaround win — mirrors Nantz’s last trip to Green Bay on Nov. 6 for a Colts-Packers game.
Much like the Colts were when they played Green Bay (and beat the Packers), the Texans need a win to keep their perch atop the AFC Central and to stanch some of the recent criticism of Osweiler and the team in general.
“The Texans seem to be a lightning rod for criticism,” Nantz said. “The way some people talk, you would think they were 2-9 or 3-8 rather than leading a division.
“The calendar has turned to December, and this is the time of year every season where one or two teams take a different turn and go on a run, and things that were perceived to be problems go away. Houston could be that team this year.”
Verne’s SEC farewell
Verne Lundquist calls his final Southeastern Conference football game for CBS when Alabama and Florida play for the league title Saturday. As was the case in their previous four years in the SEC, Texas A&M will not be represented in the game, and the question this week for Lundquist and broadcast partner Gary Danielson concerned what it will take for A&M to make it to Atlanta for the title game and how the SEC has worked for the Aggies competitively as well as economically.
“I thought when they were invited to join that it was an almost a perfect fit,” Lundquist said. “There had been long, ongoing tension between the University of Texas and Texas A&M, and then they went 11-2 in their first year (in 2012) and won at Alabama, which has not happened all that often. To accomplish what they did as an intriguing entry into this very tough conference.
“I still think they belong in the SEC, and I hope they can get their late-season act together and become more of a factor.”
Danielson said the 2012 season with Heisman Trophy winner Johnny Manziel proved to be “fool’s gold” for an A&M team that under coach Kevin Sumlin is still adjusting to what it takes to play in the SEC.
“Kevin realized after three years that the style he was successful with as a coordinator at Oklahoma and as a head coach at Houston and what he brought into the league ultimately was not going to be a style that works in this league,” Danielson said. “It was like Chip Kelly discovering that his spread-it-out style wouldn’t work in the NFL.
“This is the league that most replicates the style of the NFL. You have to build from the line of scrimmage. … I don’t think (A&M) fans will be happy to hear this, but I think that instead of being five years into this building job, they’re really only two years in.
“If I were paying a guy $5 million and said he was two years in, I’d go crazy too, but Kevin has just now realized that they have to be built differently. I am confident in Kevin as a coach, but this is a tough league.”
As for Lundquist, he will call the Army-Navy game for CBS next week and then call college basketball and golf for the network through next summer before taking a break for back surgery in September 2017 that will require lengthy rehabilitation.
Resetting Bedlam showdown
Perhaps in a parallel universe, Spencer Tillman joined Tim Brando last week in Norman, Okla., as I said they would do in this space last week, to call the Oklahoma State-Oklahoma game.
On this astral plane, however, the game is at 11:30 a.m. this Saturday on KRIV (Channel 26). Sorry about the error.
At any rate, Tillman, the former Oklahoma running back, expects the Cowboys to give his alma mater a good challenge with the steady quarterback play of Mason Rudolph and the thunderand-lightning ground combo of Chris Carson and Justice Hill.
The ground game, Tillman said, “has made (wide receiver) James Washington even more lethal, and (Oklahoma defensive coordinator) Mike Stoops will have to determine how to defend them. You don’t have a mobile quarterback in Mason Rudolph, but he can hurt you with his arm. Oklahoma State is a very, very dangerous team.”
Oklahoma, meanwhile, will need an afternoon of good decisions from quarterback Baker Mayfield.
Looking elsewhere, Tillman said he is happy for Tom Herman and disappointed for Charlie Strong and for the University of Houston with the recent coaching change at Texas.
“Charlie should take a year off, take a deep breath and recalibrate,” he said. “As for Texas, if we have learned anything, it’s that I don’t care who you are, even (Texas booster) Red McCombs. You don’t undermine a coach you just hired in a public way like (McCombs) did (to Strong).”
Finally, since he does KTRK’s (Channel 13) Sunday night Texans show, a bonus Tillman opinion on the struggling Texans in the wake of their loss Sunday to the Chargers.
“It wasn’t just Brock (Osweiler),” he said. “It was the offensive line. With that kind of protection, they’re going to turn him into David Carr. Lack of protection can take a promising quarterback and make him less than he could be.”
Four DVRs, no waiting
Texans ratings continue to lag in the midst of the Osweiler era. Houston’s loss to the Chargers on Sunday registered a 21.0 Nielsen rating on KHOU (Channel 11). … The Cowboys’ win over Washington on Thanksgiving Day had a 16.9 rating on KRIV (Channel 26) and drew 35.1 million viewers nationwide, the largest audience ever for an NFL game on Fox Sports. … Michigan-Ohio State drew 16.647 million viewers on ABC, the largest college football audience of the year, the most-watched 11 a.m. kickoff game on record and ABC’s second most-watched game since 1991. The teams drew 21 million for a 2:30 p.m. kickoff on ABC in 2006. … ESPN, meanwhile, had its first 2014-to2015 ratings bump for “Monday Night Football” with an 8.9 Nielsen overnight for Packers-Eagles, up from 7-4 for Ravens-Browns a year ago. The game rated 8.5 in Houston. … Elvin Hayes will launch a weekly show titled “In the Post” on David Gow’s SB Nation Radio, hear locally on KGOW (1560 AM), at 11 p.m. Saturday with a re-air at 4 a.m. Sunday. Joe George will host with Hayes, the former University of Houston standout and NBA Top 50 honoree. His first guest: the great Oscar Robertson. … Former HBO Sports president Ross Greenburg returns to the sports documentary realm with “Running For His Life: The Lawrence Phillips Story,” on the late former Nebraska and NFL player who died in January while awaiting trial on murder charges. It will air at 8 p.m. Friday, Dec. 16, on Showtime. … For those who have asked, the Astros have no update on their search for a new TV play-by-play voice to succeed Bill Brown. Expect an announcement anywhere from late December to late February as spring training approaches. … Speaking of Brown, he’s written a Jose Altuve book titled “Breathing Orange Fire” that is available via Amazon.com and other book outlets and in stores.