Jacoby Jones Clowns DeMeco Ryans Bobblehead Doll

One of my favorite Texans events to attend is the Texans Team Luncheon that the team holds before the start of the season. Each table has a player assigned to it, and it gives fans an opportunity to see the players behind the mask. Coach Gary Kubiak gave a speech, and various players answered questions. (The transcript is here, though it doesn't contain the really funny stuff Kubiak said at the beginning about going on a date with his wife).

This year I sat next to Texans second year wide receiver-returner Jacoby Jones. Quite the fun table to be at. He is a quote machine and a very upbeat guy, and lunch was certainly entertaining, as evidenced by this video of Jacoby Jones discussing how ProBowl linebacker DeMeco Ryans looks like his bobblehead. I didn't think so, but I could sort of see it after Jones broke it down on tape:


Video Link.

A small school product, Jacoby Jones had a brilliant early rookie season last year, but has struggled after he came back from an injury he received in the third game of last season. In this preseason, Jones had troubles holding onto the ball, so special teams coach Joe Marciano told him to carry the ball around with him all the time. He didn't have it at the luncheon though.

Here's various things that came up while we were dining:

* He's very confident and positive that his game will be fine. He says that people build you up too much when you do well and bring you down too much when you do poorly, but he just needs to keep a level head about things. He did say that coach Gary Kubiak has been chewing on him some.

* He thinks that the Texans passing game will be sick good this year. He couldn't say enough about how physically impressive wide receiver Andre Johnson is, that even on a team of good athletes, Johnson is a specimen. (At the luncheon, Johnson repeated he is not feeling any pain and doing practice as usual).

* He loves the Texans rookie class this year. Raved about how tough Steve Slaton is.

* He loves Kubiak, Marciano, offensive line guru Alex Gibbs. (I'm sure he has opinions about the other coaches, but it didn't come up).

* Says quarterback Matt Schaub's passes feel very similar to backup Sage Rosenfels'.

* He spoke a lot about wide receiver Harry Williams, the wide receiver-special teams player who was temporarily paralyzed during the Dallas preseason game. He is close with Williams because they came up through the same conference together.

Williams had surgery to fuse his spine, and is expected to be able to lead a regular life, though not play football. The Texans honored him during the final preseason game. (video) Jacoby said how Williams was always about 10 yards in front of everybody in covering returns, and Kubiak made a point in his speech to say that Williams was going to make the 53 man roster before he was injured.

* He preferred the cheesecake over the chocolate cake they had at the luncheon. At the table, they had alternating desserts and you didn't get to choose. My buddy Mark traded his cheesecake for Jacoby's chocolate cake in exchange for autographing the table name plate.

Jones is an absolutely personable guy, and signed everything for everybody even though he was starving after practicing that morning. He's shown flashes of what he might be able to do in the league, and he is the sort of upbeat guy you really want to root to succeed.

And if Jacoby or DeMeco Ryans is reading this, I'm going to give you a "hi" because you can do that sort of thing on a blog.

Previously at FanHouse:
My Lunch With Eric Winston