D.J. Swearinger praises Gary Kubiak, the coach who was in Houston when the Texans drafted the safety in the second round in 2013. But the Washington safety has nothing nice to say about current Texans coach Bill O’Brien, who cut Swearinger after the 2014 season.
The Washington safety wrote on Instagram this week about how he lost respect for O’Brien after what he called “unprofessional actions” by the coach.
Swearinger said O’Brien told him he would not last more than three years in the NFL.
“My God & grind had a plan and knew that six years later . . . I would make him eat his words!” Swearinger wrote.
The Texans play at Washington on Sunday, and Swearinger can’t wait. It will mark his second career meeting against his former team.
Swearinger remains bitter, though he left four years ago.
He calls a dispute with one of the defensive coaches a “misunderstanding” that helped usher him out of Houston. Swearinger said he once got in trouble while trying to make a helpful comment to another player during a defensive backs film session.
“I remember the day like yesterday,” Swearinger said, via Les Carpenter of the Washington Post. “We had a walkthough, a regular walk-through, and O’Brien called the whole walk-through off and said he wanted to talk to me and all the defensive coaches. That was shocking to me, because I didn’t know what the deal was, and he came to me basically telling me that he was going to bench me. That don’t work; cut me; that don’t work.
“I felt totally disrespected by the conversation, you know. He0 yelled at me in my face for about a minute in front of all the defensive coaches, and I sort of lost a lot of respect for the DB coach at the time and O’Brien because of how that situation went.”
O’Brien praised Swearinger in a conference call with the Washington media on Tuesday.