Stephen Jones was there on Sept. 8, 2002, at Reliant Stadium.
The expansion Houston Texans beat his Dallas Cowboys 19-10 on ESPN Sunday Night Football as Space City inaugurated a new era of having an NFL franchise. Even though the Cowboys were amid a three-season stretch of finishing 5-11, they weren’t supposed to lose to an expansion team in its first game.
“I think that’s why you don’t take any team for granted,” Jones told “GBag Nation” on 105.3 “The Fan” [KRLD-FM] in Dallas-Fort Worth Friday. “They pay their guys, too. They have really good football players on their team.”
Twenty years later the Texans are roughly in the same spot, although the term for an existing franchise starting from the ground up is “rebuilding.” The Cowboys are in a much better place than the turn of the millennium with a 9-3 record and chasing a playoff spot.
Nevertheless Jones remembers the lesson from 2002 and isn’t counting the Texans out.
“Lovie [Smith] is not by any means a rookie, but he’s coaching, as head coach, the Texans for the first time,” Jones said. “He’s a great football coach. He’s had a lot of success in this league. I’m sure he’s working through like all coaches who get their hand on a team, changing the culture and doing it the way he wants to do it. There’s growing pains.”
The Texans will be turning to second-year quarterback Davis Mills to lead the charge again after giving Kyle Allen two games under center. Mills was benched for his 1-8-1 record and 78.1 passer rating while conducting an otherwise ineffective offense.
Said Jones: “They got really good football players and it blows my mind people think we’re going to roll the ball out there and we’re going to come away with a win. This is going to be highly competitive, and if we don’t play our very best football, then we’ll end up not getting the results we want. We got to go out there and play really well, and I know the Texans are going to improve.”
Houston kicks off against Dallas Sunday at 12:00 p.m. Central Time from AT&T Stadium in Arlington.
