DeAndre Hopkins Apparently Shades Texans After Losing NFL Season Opener to Chiefs

In Friday’s Hot Clicks: DeAndre Hopkins doesn’t seem too broken up about leaving Houston, a weird baseball injury and more.

One word can say a lot more than it seems

The NFL’s curtain-raiser between the Chiefs and Texans gave us our first look at the Houston offense without DeAndre Hopkins, and the results were ... not great.

Will Fuller had a big game with eight catches for 112 yards but Randall Cobb and Brandin Cooks, brought in to soften the blow of Hopkins’s departure, had just four grabs for 43 yards between them. Needless to say, that wasn’t enough offensive output to get past the Chiefs. Kansas City won 34–20. 

Less than an hour after the final whistle, Hopkins sent a one-word tweet that got a lot of people talking. 

Grateful.

— Deandre Hopkins (@DeAndreHopkins) September 11, 2020

Was Hopkins rejoicing in the fact that he no longer plays for a perpetual underachiever? No, of course not, he said. He was just really pumped to be on Jimmy Fallon’s late-night show.

Now, I might be more inclined to believe him if he didn’t have a history of throwing shade at the Texans. In July, after Patrick Mahomes signed his massive contract extension, Hopkins congratulated the Chiefs quarterback with a tweet. 

24 reasons why Mahomes deserves that. 0 Doubts he will win more Super Bowls.

— Deandre Hopkins (@DeAndreHopkins) July 7, 2020

The numbers 24 and 0 are quite obviously a reference to the Texans' blowing a 24–0 lead to Mahomes’s Chiefs in the divisional round last season. 

Hopkins clearly doesn’t miss playing in Houston. While he had a great partnership with quarterback Deshaun Watson, he didn’t get along with coach Bill O’Brien. O’Brien’s decision to ship Hopkins to Arizona in a deal that was roundly mocked surely didn’t improve Hopkins’s opinion of his former boss. So yeah, there was a probably a bit of schadenfreude in watching the Houston offense sputter without him. 

Hopkins better be careful what he wishes for, though. He’s going from a team that made the playoffs in four of the last five years to one that sniffed the postseason just twice in the previous decade. We’ll see whether the Hopkins-less Texans or the new-look Cardinals are the better team this year.

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Around the sports world

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Mixed messages!

The Chiefs are indeed playing the Tomahawk Chop music before kickoff. Fans did their usual chop motion, too.

— Nate Taylor (@ByNateTaylor) September 11, 2020

End racism. #ItTakesAllOfUs pic.twitter.com/IU4G626FvQ

— NFL (@NFL) September 10, 2020

This is exactly why they’re demonstrating

Chiefs fans started booing while the Texans and Chiefs locked arms in unity. 🤨 https://t.co/Z0Ua6HlfsU

— Complex Sports (@ComplexSports) September 11, 2020

That’s a lot of people to gather in one place these days!

Chiefs are announcing crowd as 15,895

— Adam Teicher (@adamteicher) September 11, 2020

Mike Trout did a little renovation at the brand-new Globe Life Field

Mike Trout, doing damage: pic.twitter.com/yPl3hPMvXA

— Fabian Ardaya (@FabianArdaya) September 10, 2020

Zack Wheeler (pants) — OUT

Zack Wheeler has a problem with the nail on his middle finger. He caught his nail putting on pants. "Can't make this up," Joe Girardi said. He won't pitch until Monday at earliest.

— Matt Gelb (@MattGelb) September 11, 2020

Al Michaels has such disdain for the promos he reads

pic.twitter.com/6vndGSybSG

— Sean Fennessey (@SeanFennessey) September 11, 2020

Andy needs a windshield wiper

Even in covid era Andy Reid is a style icon pic.twitter.com/TnLLVM1WVf

— Mike Tunison (@xmasape) September 11, 2020

Did they not run this in Arizona?

First RPO I've ever seen where the RB was fooled at the mesh? Lol #spreadoffense #RPOFootball pic.twitter.com/unAlJ43vt5

— SpreadOffense.com (@SpreadOffense) September 11, 2020

The former staff of Deadspin launched a new site on Thursday and got Daniel Radcliffe to read some very bad tweets

The pandemic led to a perfect storm of sports

What a Time to be Alive!!! pic.twitter.com/mkkcsgBdQ4

— Ramses Sandoval ©️ (@RamsesSandoval) September 10, 2020

I had no idea Lil Wayne was such a tennis fan

I can’t believe it’s been TEN years since I wrote to Weezy on Rikers Island about the US Open and found this in my mailbox a few weeks later. pic.twitter.com/vJi5D0pLfc

— Bryan Armen Graham (@BryanAGraham) September 10, 2020

Not sports

Bruce Springsteen is reuniting with the E Street Band for a new album. ... A Robocop prequel series is in the works, but it won’t feature Robocop. ... Pandemic-related shortages of things like sanitizing wipes and beer were due to packaging shortages. ... M&Ms are coming out in mixed bags that will include multiple flavors.

Footage of San Francisco set to the Blade Runner 2049 soundtrack

Mexican moms rate store-bought salsa

A good song

Email dan.gartland@si.com with any feedback or follow me on Twitter for approximately one half-decent baseball joke per week. Bookmark this page to see previous editions of Hot Clicks and find the newest edition every day. By popular request I’ve made a Spotify playlist of the music featured here. Visit our Extra Mustard page throughout each day for more offbeat sports stories.