Have you ever heard the saying, “Don’t judge a book by its cover?”

It means you should not decide upon something based just on outward appearances on what it looks like at first. For a lot of Houston Texans fans and local sports media, that is exactly what was done before Texans head coach David Culley ever took the field to coach one player.

Now, to be fair, although coach Culley had 27 years of NFL coaching experience with his last job as wide receivers coach with the Baltimore Ravens, no one knew if he was ready to take over as a head coach. His introductory press conference felt more like an appreciation speech to the McNair’s and first-year general manager Nick Caserio.

I am here to say that after observing what I have seen in Texans training camp so far, we all have been wrong up to this point. Coach Culley brings a passion to the field that is unlike his demeanor when he is in front of a microphone.

The Texans had NFL referees at camp on Saturday as they went through an organized scrimmage in front of fans and the loudest voice that could be heard was coach Culley’s. Especially when the offense was called for pre-snap penalties. He could be heard on multiple occasions screaming, “Get him off the field” to the player who caused the offense.

“I wanted us to be mistake free from the standpoint of pre-snap penalties and that didn’t happen tonight,” said Culley after practice. “We had fewer than we been having, but one is too many. Our goal is to be not that type of football team and tonight it killed us three times on three drives. We can’t play football that way. We won’t play football that way.”

One player who knows coach Culley’s fiery demeanor from their days together with the Kansas City Chiefs is wide receiver Chris Conley, who was removed from the field by him for committing one of those three pre-snap penalties.

“One thing you know about coach Culley is, he is not shy on telling you how he feels,” Conley said during his press conference after practice. “I had a pre-snap penalty during the scrimmage, and he let me have it. That is no different than the coach Culley that I had when I was a rookie and I dropped two catches against Minnesota, and he benched me in the middle of the game. He is going to demand what he needs, but ultimately he is going to give you the tools to get better and help the team succeed.”

What the Texans outcome will be at the end of the 2021 season, is still to be determined, but one thing that is becoming clear is that coach Culley is going to make sure that the team is prepared every time they take the field. Maybe it’s more to the “Book of Culley” than just the foreword.