For now, though, there is plenty to keep Capers busy. Capers spends most of his day on the telephone. Since being hired by the Texans on Jan. 21, he has received countless calls from well wishers, job seekers, and representatives of organizations in and around Houston looking for Capers to be a featured speaker at their banquet. But I still have probably in the vicinity of 200 phone calls that I'm behind. You try to respond to as many of those as you can, but it becomes physically impossible.
Capers has experience on the ground floor of an expansion team.
In 1995, he was the first coach of the Carolina Panthers, and guided them through the 1998 season. Back then, Capers didn't have the luxury of a full year to prepare for his first season as a head coach. The Panthers didn't hire him until after the Pittsburgh Steelers, for whom he served as defensive coordinator, lost to San Diego in the '94 AFC Championship Game. Hopefully, it enables you to do a better job in the decision-making process. And having had the chance to go through this before, hopefully you will learn from both the good and bad of your experience and you can make better decisions the second time through.