Chilly

Jordan Matthews DVOA: 2016: -13.2% (Rank #75 in NFL) 2015: -1.8% (Rank #41 in NFL) 2014: 11.6% (Rank #23 in NFL) Yikes.

I can't make the trades make any sense. We traded a #1 WR for a guy who is a #3 at best. We traded a #1 or #2 CB for a guy who just had the 5th worse CB season of the past decade. In return, we got a 2nd and a 3rd. Success rates for 2nd and 3rd round picks are significantly lower than 50%. If we keep the picks, the most likely outcome is that we will not get talent anywhere near the talent we traded away. If we trade everything to get a QB, that QB is then setup to fail with a 30 year old McCoy and our only WR is Zay Jones. Both of these are worse than keeping our talent and having the option to franchise Sammy after the year.

That's how I heard it too. He sounded really down just base off of tone. In addition, things like: Q: "Were on initially onboard or did you have to be convinced about this trade?"  A: "Well, I'm always going to listen when presented with options..."

I was listening to SiriusXM Radio over the weekend and they were talking about how Jordan Matthews can't even beat out Agholor this year. Sigh.

Pobrecitas.

Another vote for Rao's

It depends on the industry you are in; Most of Texas is growing quite a bit right now and all the major cities are doing well with lots of jobs and low unemployment. Austin - HUGE tech hub, called silicon valley lite a lot. Tons and tons of tech startups, we have one of the best startup incubators in the country (Capital Factory), and we have everyone from Cisco, Microsoft, Dell, IBM, Samsung down to small startups. Great place to live and work if you are in tech. Lots of Government & Education jobs in Austin as well. Unemployment rate in Austin is half the national average and job growth Year over Year is consistently double. Austin has consistently been in the top 5 (and #1 in a lot of years) as the fastest growing major city in the country. I personally work for a web hosting startup and run a Customer Experience Operations team responsible for Customer Data, Analytics, Scaling Initiatives, Project Management, and Customer Support Systems. San Antonio - Military City, USA. Also a lot of medical and financial services companies. Small but growing tech scene. Price of living costs are low and controlled because of how much military is in San Antonio. Unemployment rate is still pretty low but not as low as Austin, job growth is slightly higher than national average because of the other industries, but most of the SA economy is very military controlled. Dallas - Pretty diverse, fast growing economy. Of the 188k jobs added in Texas in 2015, 92,300 were added in DFW (almost 50%). Fort Worth is pretty manufacturing and energy based (but not as much as Houston), while the Dallas area is fairly diverse (tech, education, health, construction, hospitality, transportation. Fort Worth is leading Texas in job growth in the first half of 2017. Houston - Oil, Gas, and Petrochemical hub. Most of the Fortune companies referenced earlier are in the Energy or Petrochemical business, it makes up a huge portion of the Houston economy. Depending on the state of Oil and Gas, Houston's economy fluctuates greatly; it's had some issues lately because of the downturn in the energy industry but that's rebounding this year. In 2013 it was a huge job creator after rebounding from the downturn, struggled the past couple of years (lost 80,000 jobs), and now is turning back up again. Houston is booming in the first half of 2017, only 2nd in job growth behind Fort Worth. Here's an article about it: http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2017/jul/3/houston-business-owners-upbeat-about-oil-economy-o/

I don't like Juan all that much either, and don't know many people who actually go there. Austin Tex-Mex is kinda weird - the places that are names or get hyped for tourists or by some locals aren't all that great - I'm guessing she took you to something like Maudie's. San Antonio's Tex Mex is significantly better for the most part, but there are a decent amount of places in Austin that are very good if you know where to go, but they tend to be the more hole in the wall places, and overall I think breakfast is Austin's strongest Tex Mex meal. Haha, I lived in SA for 5 years and liked it (didn't love); Austin is just my first love (I like the tech culture, the pretty accepting atmosphere, dogs, UT, and everything going on in a small downtown) and I'm in tech, so it's a great fit. San Antonio had a pretty cool culture but was semi-boring. DFW has pockets of neat areas that feel small but combine to make a collection of lots of different areas. Houston just feels... different. It's massive, sprawling, and feels way different. I've never found a pocket when I've visited that makes me go "this is awesome, I can walk around this town and have fun and a great day"; rather, it feels like I'm always driving to do anything. I'm sure there's probably cool areas I haven't seen, but I have a good amount of friends around Houston, and whenever I go I never find that I really like it.

I was there a few months ago and it still sucks.

Yikes on the Tex Mex, you clearly didn't go to the right places, sorry to hear that!

I live in Austin, happy to answer any questions. Austin & San Antonio are great, I like Dallas too. San Antonio gets the most visitors of any city in Texas, has good attractions like Riverwalk, Alamo, and Sea World. Austin has a great music and bar scene, plus if you like college sports UT is a fun place to watch a game. Dallas has some good stuff too (JFK assassination, Perot museum, etc) but probably isn't as good as Austin / San Antonio. Austin has the best BBQ scene in the country. San Antonio the best Tex Mex.

I can confirm it was miserable in Austin today

Hey Guys, Just wanted to call some attention to the guys at Cover1.net, they did a really good training camp podcast and have a media badge this year. Different from what you're hearing in the old Buffalo media, I suggest giving it a listen/view: https://www.grandstandsportsnetwork.com/2017/07/31/episode-28-training-camp-observations/

Haha I think Rudy's brisket and sausage are terrible. But I'm glad you loved it! Never tried Kerlin BBQ, but I do like Veracruz. Next time downtown, check out Terry Black's BBQ on Barton Springs. No lines and a tremendous experience. Cooper's on 2nd is good too. My favorite is Louie Mueller's but it's a bit of a drive.

Definitely! I just ate at OneTaco today and it was fantastic, and a food truck at Little Woodrow's. Austin's food scene is fantastic!

Rex might not have been the right fit, but I'm damn sure Marrone wasn't either.

The one I've heard a ton about but haven't tried yet but near downtown is Way South Philly: https://www.yelp.com/biz/way-south-philly-austin

Hunter2

LOVE is great, glad you saw that. Just now seeing this thread - I'm in Vegas prolly 4 times a year, have fun!

You're in Austin too, right, Azalin? Try this place out sometime, their cheesesteak sub is fantastic, and almost everything they make is great. Lots of homemade lunch meats too. https://www.yelp.com/biz/hoodys-sub-shop-round-rock

I saw Baby Driver, was pretty good.

Hopefully this is more than lip service. I would love to have access to a true giant NFL stats DB and be able to create a neural network to help answer football questions. I think it would help as lot as long as people were open-minded, realized that it's not the end-all be-all strawman that always gets argued against in these threads, and decide to not be analytics crumudgeons (I'm looking at you Doug Marrone).

I never liked Jeff Dunham (the guy with the puppets) until I saw him live. He was hilarious at planet Hollywood

This is an interesting question, especially because you can get wildly different perspectives. Tosh on Tosh.0 is okay, Tosh in a real life standup show is awesome. Patton Oswalt's live standup shows are great, same with Gabriel Iglesias. For me, the worst standup show I've ever seen was Tracy Morgan, and I love the guy on TV. He sat on stage and talked into a mic about how much he loved having sex for an hour. I also recently saw Ralphie May and he basically did the same thing, but at least had a couple jokes. Both of them were god awful, which is disappointing because Ralphie May's TV CC Special was hilarious, and same with Tracy on SNL/30 Rock.

White American Cheese & Pretzels. It's delicious.