Texans CEO Cal McNair alleged to have made anti-Asian comment

The Houston Texans are in an ugly period and a comment alleged to have been made by boss Cal McNair is only making things worse

The ugly situation surrounding the Houston Texans got messier on Tuesday.

A report by Michael Silver of Bally Sports says Houston Texans Chairman and CEO Cal McNair made a racially insensitive comment at the team’s charity golf tournament in May.

Per the report:

McNair, addressing more than 100 attendees at the Houston Texans Foundation Charity Golf Classic at River Oaks Country Club, spoke into a microphone just outside the pro shop …

At the end of his brief remarks, according to two witnesses who asked to remain anonymous, McNair – whose family has owned the Texans since they were founded in 1999 – told the crowd, “I’m sorry that we couldn’t get together last year, because of the China Virus.”

As McNair and his wife, Hannah, looked on smirking, some audience members were stunned by the reference to the COVID-19 virus, which had forced the 2020 tournament’s cancellation.

This comes with the Deshaun Watson masseuse scandal hovering over the organization and after an offseason that saw the quarterback in a contentious battle with management.

Watson has not played a down while waiting for the situation that has seen 22 civil lawsuits and 10 criminal complaints of sexual misconduct lodged against him.

And more background from the Silver report:

After Cal McNair’s comments at the golf tournament, according to one attendee, Hannah McNair joked about her husband’s use of the term “China Virus” to several people who had been present for the remark. The previous week, according to an organizational source, Hannah McNair — the vice president of the Texans Foundation — had made a public-facing visit to a local Asian community center.

McNair has been the Texans’ Chairman and CEO since his father, Bob, died in November 2018. A multimillion dollar contributor to Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign, Bob McNair had been the source of organizational turmoil the previous fall, when ESPN reported that he had told other NFL owners that they “can’t have the inmates running the prison” during a meeting to address player protests about police brutality.