Former ASU WR Jaelen Strong rips the Texans’ Bill O’Brien

Former Houston Texans receiver and Arizona State product Jaelen Strong isn’t taking the road that former teammate DeAndre Hopkins did on Wednesday morning.

Hopkins shrugged off the contents of an interview on ESPN in which Hall of Famer Michael Irvin revealed a shocking story about the soured relationship between Hopkins, the new Arizona Cardinal, and his former head coach, Bill O’Brien.

Irvin said Hopkins told him that O’Brien compared Hopkins to convicted murderer and former NFL tight end Aaron Hernandez.

Hopkins tweeted that the story was being “blown way out of proportion” and added that he has “the utmost respect for Coach O’Brien and that will not change.”

Strong did no such thing.

The former Sun Devil, who is expected to join Arizona Sports’ Doug & Wolf  Thursday at 7 a.m., made it clear that he does not like the current Texans head coach.

This is who Bill O Brien is. Y’all thought it was my fault I wasn’t seeing the field. The man simply didn’t like me because I was a product of my environment. PERFORMANCE means nothing. He wasted my first 3 years ultimately ruining my NFL career. I never knew how to kiss ass 🤷🏾‍♂️ https://t.co/CzLaB3pxPq

— Strizzy (@JaelenStrong) March 18, 2020

Irvin said on Get Up that O’Brien commented to Hopkins during a meeting that he was not happy with the mothers of the receiver’s children visiting the Texans’ facilities. In that same meeting, O’Brien allegedly told Hopkins that he last needed to have such a serious meeting with Hernandez.

“(Hopkins) told me, ‘Michael, it was a bit of a power struggle there because Bill O’Brien thought … (Hopkins) had too much influence over the locker room,” Irvin said. “He called DeAndre Hopkins in a meeting to talk about this and to kind of, I guess, hash it out.

“In that meeting, he started the meeting telling DeAndre Hopkins this — which blew my mind when DeAndre told me this — he told DeAndre Hopkins the last time I had to have a meeting like this was with Aaron Hernandez.”

O’Brien, who also serves as the Texans’ GM, has been in hot water this week just for his football decisions.

He got poor reviews for a trade sending Hopkins and a fourth-round pick to Arizona for running back David Johnson, a second-round pick and a fourth-round pick. That was widely viewed as a steal for Arizona. It looked even worse when the Minnesota Vikings soon after traded another top wide receiver, Stefon Diggs, for a huge haul of draft picks, including a first-rounder.

Some might believe Strong is just bitter.

But former Texan Braxton Miller also appeared to confirm Wednesday that the story of O’Brien’s shocking comments wasn’t a one-off.

Yessir. https://t.co/U6g6BO60fJ

— BRAXTON MILLER (@BraxtonMiller5) March 18, 2020

Strong, a 2015 third-round pick by the Texans, has not played in an NFL game since 2017.

After being drafted, he didn’t play in the first four weeks of his rookie season but finally got an opportunity in Week 5. Strong caught two passes in his debut: an 11-yard touchdown and a 42-yard touchdown.

He only received one target the following week and caught just two more touchdowns in his career.

Strong made 31 catches for 330 yards in 19 appearances before an ACL tear in one game playing for the Jacksonville Jaguars ended his 2017 season.

Strong spent 2019 training camp with the Cleveland Browns but was released in August.

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