Houston Texans fire vice president of football operations Jack Easterby

While no one knows just how Jack Easterby rose to become vice president of football operations for the Houston Texans, the former “character coach” has now been let go by the organization after four seasons with the team, according to Adam Schefter.

Easterby first started as an operations intern with the Jacksonville Jaguars back in 2004 before being hired on as a character coach for the South Carolina Gamecocks from 2005-10. Although instead of working with their football team, Easterby worked closely with their men’s and women’s basketball teams as well as their baseball teams that participated in the College World Series in 2010 and 2011.

Following the murder/suicide of former Kansas City Chiefs linebacker Jovan Belcher, the organization decided to hire Easterby as a team chaplain for one season.

Then, another tumultuous situation emerged in New England, this time with Aaron Hernandez. The Patriots hired Easterby to be their character coach and to help with team development from 2013-18. During his time with the team, Bill Belichick’s crew won three Super Bowls.

In 2019, Easterby got another chance when former head coach/general manager Bill O’Brien hired the South Carolina native to be the executive vice president of team development for the Houston Texans. Starting in 2020, Easterby was also tasked with handling the football operations of the team and even operated as the general manager after O’Brien was let go in 2020.

While Easterby may be back looking for a new gig once again, many were mystified over how he found himself as an executive VP of an NFL organization to begin with, as there are several other football evaluators who are far more qualified. No disrespect to the man, but this move was likely a long time coming.