Locked On Titans - Daily Podcast On The Tennessee Titans - CROSSOVER WEDNESDAY - Titans v 49ers: Injury Updates, Tannehill Criticism & Predictions

Episode Date: December 22, 2021

It is CROSSOVER THURSDAY on WEDNESDAY!! Brian Peacock from Locked on 49ers joins the show to get you ready for this Thursday Night Football matchup! First, Tyler and Brian discuss the injury situation for both clubs. Will AJ Brown play and what defensive backs will he be going against?? Next, Tyler talks to Brian about Ryan Tannehill's recent struggles and the Titans dire situation on offense. Brian discusses the 49ers offense and how they deploy star Deebo Samuel. Finally, both hosts give their game and score prediction for this primetime matchup.Follow Tyler on Twitter @TicTacTitansFollow the show on Facebook @LockedOnTitansPodSubscribe to the Locked On Titans YouTube channel:https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCP3332GMOh4y5PX3q9NFybwSupport Us By Supporting Our Sponsors!Built BarBuilt Bar is a protein bar that tastes like a candy bar. Go to builtbar.com and use promo code “LOCKED15,” and you’ll get 15% off your next order.BetOnline AGThere is only 1 place that has you covered and 1 place we trust. Betonline.ag! Sign up today for a free account at betonline.ag and use that promocode: LOCKEDON for your 50% welcome bonus.StatHeroStatHero is the first of its kind Daily Fantasy Sports platform where it’s YOU vs. the HOUSE in head to head fantasy matchups - winner take all. Sign up for FREE - RIGHT NOW - at StatHero.com/LOCKEDON and use promo code LOCKEDON for a One Hundred Percent Deposit Match. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It's another crossover on the Locked On Podcast Network. Titans, 49ers, Thursday night football week 16. Short rest. Who's even going to be available for these teams that are both fighting for a playoff spot in January of 2022? I think we're going to see both these teams and we're going to see a lot of them Thursday night. Let's talk about it right now.

You are Locked On Titans, your daily Tennessee Titans podcast. Part of the Locked On Podcast Network, your team every day. Welcome in to another Crossover Wednesday. That's right, we have to preview a Thursday night football matchup between the Tennessee Titans and the San Francisco 49ers. I am Tyler Rowland, host of Locked On Titans. We got Brian Peacock, one of the hosts of Locked On 49ers, going to get you ready to go for this matchup.

Before we get into it, do want to let you guys know that this episode is sponsored by Stance Apparel. Stance believes that the perfect fit matters more than fitting in. Enjoy the color and comfort of a life less ordinary with Stance. Also want to thank you guys for making the Locked On Titans and Locked On 49ers podcast your first listen every single day. If this is your first ever listen to our shows, make sure you subscribe on whatever platform you do stream.

You can find both the Locked on 49ers and Locked on Titans podcast on every platform and always free. Also, follow me on Twitter at TicTacTitans. Follow Brian at BBPeacock. Let's kick this thing off. Brian, I'm going to ask you this question first. What is the injury status of some of the key 49ers? What's the health of the team looking like right now

going into this late season matchup? Well, for a short week, Tyler, the 49ers are actually putting out a pretty short list of injuries right now, which is a very good sign for this team. They have a couple of key names on there, namely Nick Bosa and Elijah Mitchell that are on that list. Nick Bosa did leave the game for not very long, a couple snaps, and he had to kind of go into a concussion protocol last week.

He got back onto the field and passed everything at the facility again after the game. So Nick Bosa looks like he's good to go. Elijah Mitchell is the one that's going to go all the way up to game time, it looks like. And he'll be the main running back that the Titans will see if he's available. And for the most part, Kyle Shanahan has not shied away from players who are game time decisions and might be a little banged up. If you're ready to go, if you put on a uniform, he will use you.

And so this has happened before with Elijah Mitchell. And he goes out there and you think, think oh maybe he's going to share snaps nope 27 carries Elijah Mitchell he's the best running back the Niners have going so if he's ready to play I assume he will play a lot but it is a short week and he wasn't ready to go last week so we'll see that probably goes up to game time uh Jaquiski Tartt strong safety for the 49ers day-to-day with an ankle injury like Bosa he left the game briefly last week came back so we'll see if that gets worse on him he might not play but he's going to be probably a game time decision and his backup at strong safety the rookie from USC Talanoa Hufanga

who's been a nice player for the 49ers he's also got a sprained knee and it's probably a little bit less likely than Tartt is to play so the 49ers could potentially be down to their third strong safety which would be Tavon Wilson in that case. So that's what they're looking like with the injury report. One really key player, Emmanuel Mosley, cornerback, is still out, and the 49ers don't expect to get him back. Maybe the last week of the regular season and hopefully for the playoffs, if they do make it into the playoffs, which looks pretty good for them right now. But that's a much shorter injury report than the 49ers had this time last

year. So I guess that's good news going into a short week. But travel is always rough on these Thursday games. So it's going to be an interesting one. Yeah, no. And I agree. And one thing that people don't think about, not only is it a short week, but some of that time when you're talking about a week as short as Thursday night football presents for teams, and then you have to travel from the West Coast all the way over to the East side of the country. That is valuable time getting on the plane, being on the plane,

getting off the plane on the bus to the hotel, all that that's valuable time that, you know, teams would typically spend preparing or nursing their injuries, rehabbing all that stuff. So that matters a lot too. And it's funny that you mentioned that the 49ers are kind of in a better spot injury wise than, than they've been in quite some time. The Titans are in a similar spot while the injury list is still very long. The Titans have had a historic

number of injuries this year. So right now just having the people that they have on the injury list, it's one, two, three, four, five, 6, 7, 8, 9 people. That's about the smallest injury list that they've had, an injury report that they've had all season. You talked about some injuries in the secondary, at cornerback, and at safety. Well, that kind of goes perfectly with the injuries that the Titans are watching the most, and that's at wide receiver because Titans star wide receiver A.J. Brown, who's been on IR for a month. He was designated to return on Monday. So he got back to practice and he's practiced in full. And it looks like, although I'm a bit hesitant about playing A.J.

without a full week of practice, it looks like he's going to be ready to go. And I don't think that Julio Jones is going to be ready to go because he hasn't played coming off another hamstring injury. Evergreen, another injury for Julio Jones is going to be ready to go because he hasn't played. Coming off another hamstring injury, evergreen, another injury for Julio Jones to that hamstring that has to basically be falling off the bone at this point. So the Titans will probably be with A.J. Brown, will be without Julio Jones. But outside of that,

Titans starting left tackle Taylor LeJuan hasn't practiced two days in a row with a back injury, but I have a feeling that he's going to play in that game. The Titans will probably be without their starting inside linebacker, David Long, but with the addition of Zach Cunningham and then normal starting inside linebacker, Rashawn Evans, coming back two weeks ago and playing some good football recently,

the Titans are probably good to go at inside linebacker with a trio of Jayon Brown, Zach Cunningham, and Rashawn Evans. Good to go at inside linebacker with a trio of Jayon Brown, Zach Cunningham, and Rashawn Evans. So generally speaking, the Titans are in a pretty good spot if they do get A.J. Brown back. If he doesn't come back and they decide to wait until next week for him, then it's going to be really tough sledding for the Titans. But with A.J. Brown back, they definitely have a chance

to be healthy enough to compete in this game. So that's where things kind of stand. From the Titans side of things, we're going to continue breaking down the game, talk about some positions to watch, some matchups to watch maybe, get a little bit more acquainted with each team as well from either side of the spectrum. These are two teams that don't get to play each other very often. Before we continue the conversation though, I do want to tell you guys about On Location. Super Bowl 56 is at SoFi and it's less than 100 days away.

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That's onlocationexp.com slash SB56 or search Super Bowl on location. All right. Crossover 49ers Titans style Thursday night football. Doing it early for you guys. It's actually to pull the curtain back a little bit. It's Tuesday evening as we record this podcast. So there might be some late news breaking with who's going to be available on a short week and stuff like that.

But look, it's the holidays and we're breaking this thing down and we're getting it done early so we can get it out to you guys on YouTube and on your favorite audio platforms here. I did not like one thing you said a little bit earlier, Tyler. I did not like one thing you said a little bit earlier, Tyler, and that was that A.J. Brown might play in this football game because I was watching the Titans in recent weeks thinking, okay, we're hitting the Titans at the perfect time. If you're the 49ers and you're looking for a good matchup, no Derrick Henry, no Julio Jones, no A.J. Brown. It's been a very different team without those guys,

and I was looking at some numbers earlier, and the first half of the season, the Titans offense was scoring something like 28 and a half points per game and it's all the way down to 19 something points per game uh and that's a huge drop in the nfl to drop 10 points per game on offense and it's been tough points have been tough to come by even with foreman last week rushing for 100 yards um it was still not an easy situation for ryan and tannahill in the offense to move the ball. Look, if you get A.J. Brown out there, and I'm sure they're going to put him on the rookie Ambry Thomas, who's in there starting at left cornerback now with the Emmanuel Mosley injury,

that's a matchup I do not like, and I'm sure a matchup that the Titans will go to often. And I want to talk about the guy who's going to be throwing the ball to A.J. Brown if he is indeed playing. How has Ryan Tannehill looked, and has it been as tough as it looked from the outside for him to sort of put the team on his back lacking all these weapons and it sounds like he's maybe taking some heat maybe some unwarranted heat trying to do it all by himself leading that Titans offense well I think it you know the conversation around Ryan Tannehill has been incredibly toxic within the Titans community over the last few weeks,

and losing will do that. But I think that there are certain realities that are bigger than just Ryan Tannehill realities about the NFL. And the reality of the situation is, as you guys in San Francisco know very well, there are about five elite quarterbacks in the NFL that are going to be able to carry an offense for a couple of weeks without their studs, the Pat Mahomes, the Tom Brady's, the Aaron Rodgers of the world.

And even Tom Brady, we saw in his last game, he lost his top running back and his two top wide receivers, and they didn't score a point. A little more difficult. So that's the best quarterback of all time. What do you think is going to happen when a guy like Ryan Tannehill has that happen? I think Ryan Tannehill is a second tier quarterback. Now he's probably at the low end of the second tier, maybe at the high end of the third tier if you're a little more

critical. But as people can say what they want about Jimmy G, I think when he's playing good football, he's about in the same area. And if you don't have one of those elite quarterbacks, then you better have an elite cast around him so that he doesn't have one of those elite quarterbacks, then you better have an elite cast around him so that he doesn't have to be an elite quarterback. And Ryan Tannehill is the same guy now that he was when the Titans were scoring 30 points a game in 2019 and 2020, except now he's got guys like Nick Westbrook-Akina, Cody Hollister,

Racey McMath, Anthony Ferkser, Dontrell Hilliard, Jeremy McNichols, the San Francisco fans listening, have you ever heard of any of those guys? They're practice squad level guys. And the Titans' pass protection has been awful.

They're bottom five in the NFL in sacks allowed. I believe they're up to 41. They gave up 24 sacks all last year. And they're up to 41 already. So things have crumbled around Ryan Tannehill and the Titans have still moved the ball consistently, if not for a combined 13 turnovers in three of the last four games, the Titans would have beat the Texans. The Titans were up 13-3 on the Steelers and then turned the ball over three times in the second half. The Titans

win those games without the turnovers despite all the crap around Ryan Tannehill. So Ryan Tannehill has one of the least amount of times to throw in the NFL. He's got one of the worst, I would say he has the worst cast of weapons around him in the NFL as currently constructed. And here's just some stats

to kind of put that out there for you guys. With Julio Jones, A.J. Brown, and Henry on the field, the Titans averaged 27 points a game. With A.J. and Henry alone, they averaged 36 points a game. With none of them, they averaged 13. So, Ryan Tannehill isn't an elite quarterback, but he's just as good as he has been the last few years. He's just got nothing supporting him right now,

and no, he can't carry the team. But when you're the 13th highest paid quarterback in the NFL, you shouldn't be expected to carry the team like you're an elite quarterback. So that's kind of where I'm at with Ryan Tannehill. No, he hasn't been playing at an elite level, but he never has. He had an elite cast around him, and he played point guard. And now without those guys around him, he can't really do it as well. But he hasn't been making outright. it's not his fault that all these

practice squad guys are fumbling. Yeah. I mean, that's really – and the buzzword around San Francisco and the 49ers and Jimmy Garoppolo is complementary football, and it's hard to play complementary football, especially when you're the quarterback, if you don't have any compliments around you. Yes, you don't have any.

That's what's going on with the Tennessee Titans right now. Right. Yeah, Anthony Ferkser, it was not a – he was a Ferks round pick, not a first-round pick in fantasy football leagues around the NFL. Right, right. I say that he was undrafted. And he was the leading receiver, if I'm not mistaken, last week. And then there's – is it Akini, the Westbrook Akini?

Yeah, Nick Westbrook Akini is that how you nick nick nick westbrook akina uh i gotta be honest with you the akina just showed up out of nowhere everybody called him nick westbrook for the first like year that he was on the team and i guess he went in and corrected everybody but yeah furxer was expected to be a a bigger help in fantasy football he has been an absolute disappointment this year. He's been dropping passes. The big thing that every fan knew about Anthony Fergster is he had sure hands. He'd catch anything that come his way. He's had a ton of drops this year. He's fumbled multiple times this year. He's been even worse as a blocker than he's been before. I think he's another guy that when

you have Julio Jones and you have A.J. Brown and you have Derrick Henry around you, all of a sudden, Anthony Fergster's a little more open. But without those guys, they're like, ah, we're not letting that guy win. We'll let Cody Hollister, who the Titans picked up off the street three weeks ago. We'll let Rayce McMath, an undrafted free agent rookie who's really only a special teams player. We'll let those guys catch the ball and we'll guard Anthony Ferkser over the middle. But he hasn't played well either, so it's been a little bit of a disappointment, but again, if the Titans get A.J. Brown back in this game, just one of those guys, I mean, going off the numbers that I was telling you earlier, when the Titans just have A.J. Brown in the lineup, they at least score 18 points a game

above the 13 that we talked earlier, so if he plays, it just totally changes what the Titans are able to do on offense, and it looks like he's trending to go that way. I wanted to ask you about a wide receiver on the 49ers, Debo Samuel. He has just been a do-it-all weapon, practically a running back. And I'm going to say this and Titans fans aren't going to like it, but Debo Samuel is who Titans fans think A.J. Brown is. Wow. That's the facts of the matter right now. You're going to get some heat on that. is who Titans fans think A.J. Brown is. Wow.

That's the facts of the matter right now. You're going to get some heat on that. I hope the 49ers fans will fight you on that. Debo's been unbelievable this year in his third year, really taking that next step, and he's been kind of dogged by injuries his first couple of years. You knew all the way back to South Carolina he was going to be awesome with the ball in his hands. He's a really good, dynamic player with the ball in his hands.

But what's blown me away, so all the wide receiver stuff i'm not really surprised about and crocker and i earlier this offseason kind of warned fans like well pump the brakes a little bit on brandon iuk he's not just ordained to be this number one wide receiver debo samuel pretty good in his own right and uh and that's even more so than i expected that is definitely what's come to fruition here in the 2021 season and him being healthy has been huge aside from one game, but the thing that's blown me away, so the wide receiver stuff, not surprised about. The thing that's blown me away is how good he is as a true running back, not just a guy who gets carries. He's in the backfield taking handoffs, running a counter, and he's magic at getting to the corner and not getting tackled. Now,

a lot of that is Kyle Shanahan doing some really good things and movement and uh his touchdown run last week was just really well drawn up and you see the the wide receiver go in motion and when the wide receiver comes back and goes back in motion the other way the safety just kind of comes with them a little bit and that one step was the difference between that player making the play and tackling Debo Samuel before he got to the corner and into the end zone or not. So Kyle Shanahan playing a numbers game on offense up front. He's using the defense's rules against them. And those 11 players, he knows what they have to do.

So when you go out there with 11 personnel and all of a sudden that becomes 21 personnel with the same guys on the field, he knows he has an advantage somewhere. So that's why he likes positionless football. That's why he likes the Debo Samuels of the world and Kyle Juszczyk of the world that can help you out in the passing game. And George Kittle, obviously, is one of the best tight ends in the NFL and is on a historic run the last three weeks, even though he was a little bit disappeared from the game plan at the first half of the season.

So right now the 49ers offense is really hitting. The 49ers defense is really hitting. And Jimmy Garoppolo is playing some efficient ball. And it all came together last week against a team that I think wasn't as good as their record in the Atlanta Falcons. I'll grant you that. But if they play a complete game like they did last week, they're a pretty tough team to beat right now.

And Debo Samuel is really the magic sauce in all of that on offense. Yeah, you can tell. I mean, he seems to be a, uh, the straw that stirs the drink. I am interested to see how the Titans defend Kittle as well. I have, you know, some more questions that are kind of game specific for you, what you think the 49ers might do and all that. And we will get to that to, uh, close out today's show before we let you guys know a little bit more about, uh, one of our sponsors. Yeah, let's, uh, we'll, we'll get to some projections and some more, uh, some keys to this game, but I want to tell you folks about our friends at built bar in a brand new flavor

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Have a high-protein treat that's low in sugar, delicious, and healthy all at the same time. And you can get a 15% discount on those Bilt Bars at Bilt.com. Go to Bilt.com. Use promo code LOCKED15 and get 15% off your order. That is promo code LOCKED15 for 15% off at Bilt.com, use promo code LOCKED15 and get 15% off your order. That is promo code LOCKED15 for 15% off at Bilt.com. All right. I think I have a good feeling, Tyler, in this football game, how things are going to go when the Titans are on offense

and the 49ers are on defense? I think it's much more interesting on the other side of the ball with the Niners on offense and the Titans on defense. And a guy who's not getting talked about nearly enough nationally in the middle of that defensive line for the Titans. And if the Titans can take away the running game from Kyle Shanahan, how does that start to look if you put Jimmy Garoppolo in a bind? So tell me about that line.

Simmons, I really liked Harold Landry coming out of college. He's having a career season for himself right now. Future 49er, probably they'll sign him in the offseason. Sorry. No, you can't have him. That should have been the move the Niners made when they traded up for Dante Pettis. They should have got two picks higher than Harold Landry been the move the Niners made when they traded up for Dante Pettis they should have got two picks hiring Harold Landry I don't know what

the hell they're thinking they need an edge player you fell all the way there in the second round but anyway anyway yeah yeah tell me about that run defense and uh how you think the Titans will defend those 49ers well the Titans uh had a couple things happen in recent weeks that really has taken their run defense uh to level. So the Titans have allowed 43 rushing yards in the last two weeks. And the big things that happened here was linebacker Rashawn Evans, who Rashawn Evans is probably not going to be a Titan next year. They're going to let him go. They didn't pick up his fifth year option, which is fine. He's an early down linebacker, but he's pretty decent early down linebacker. He's an early-down linebacker, but he's a pretty decent early-down linebacker.

He's real aggressive, will shoot the gap, play with physicality, and not only did they get Rashawn Evans back after having him injured for a month or so, they signed Zach Cunningham off waivers from the Texans, last year's leading tackler. So when you have a defensive line with Danico Autry, Jeffrey Simmons, Bud Dupree, who just came back from IR last week against the Steelers, Harold Landry, even their rotational guy, an interior nose tackle, an undrafted free agent, Naquan Jones, has been fantastic in recent weeks. I do a ton of film work and a ton of film study on Twitter.

If you're a 49ers fan, you want to see what you're up against, go to my Twitter account, check those out. Jeffrey Simmons, though, is the star. And he bench presses people on the weekly. You should see the hit he put on Pat Friermuth this week. Unreal, the physicality and aggression and athleticism that he plays with at 6'5", 300+. It's just really impressive to see the stuff that he does every week. So it starts with Simmons dominating his matchup up front.

Harold Landry and Bud Dupree, incredibly physical, set a great firm wall. And then the Titans have guys like Zach Cunningham and Rashawn Evans and even Kevin Byard at the safety position. Elijah Molden, who's actually going to miss this game on COVID, but he's their slot cornerback on early rundowns, and he plays with great physicality, a rookie out of Washington who people up in the Northwest might know. So when you have all those elements, you have people flying around at the second level,

but then you have dominant, strong guys up front. I do think it's going to make it tough for San Francisco to run. And I was going to ask you, what do you think, I guess, what do you think the 49ers do if they're unable to really get that run game going? Let's say the Titans limit them to under 100 yards rushing around, you know, 90, 88, something in there. What do you think the plan then would be for the 49ers after that? Well, the plan will be to find whatever way to get their space guys in space so

and that's kind of i i think that's one of the big reasons why debo's kind of playing running back anyway when you don't have your starting running back out there and jeff wilson's a good player and he brings some thump but he doesn't have as much speed and a breakaway ability as some other shanahan running backs have had in the recent past so bringing debo back there add some speed gets him out on the edge and gets him a little bit more in space and when he was a receiver that's his game you know short catches make him go along um uh george kill same way and and then that that's probably where the 49ers will go to if they're not getting anywhere in the run game they're going to try to get and they'll probably already be trying to really get outside of Simmons and make him less of a factor and and uh and then spread things out

and get their playmakers on short catch and run stuff um Jimmy's been really good on third downs but those have those third downs been pretty short recently because they've been able to run the ball if those are third and longs instead of third and shorts that might make life pretty difficult for the 49ers and to be honest with you, Tyler, looking at this game, and we do have to make some predictions in this game, hearing you talk about the Titans' defense and with the way the 49ers' defense has played recently and how banged up the offense is for the Titans,

Niners favored by 3.5 on the road on a short week on a Thursday night game makes me worried a little bit. That's for an away team that's only 8-6, and the Titans have a better record overall than the niners still the titans are five and two at home even though the niners are five and two on the road and have been road warriors this year the the um the road favorite scares me a little bit but the more i talk about it the bet to make is the under right 44 and a half yeah i'm not sure if that's low enough because it sounded like points are going to be really hard to come by and those thursday night games start traditionally pretty slow too

these guys are yes and banged up and yeah their bodies aren't ready going yeah absolutely i think it could be pretty low scoring i mean i even think that we could see like 17 16 you know 20 to 17 somewhere in there 21 17 i think that's absolutely a possibility. I guess, you know, to kind of get us rolling here, get us rolling to cap off the show, for a prediction, I've been really back and forth on this because, you know, with what the Titans have going with their offensive weapons, it's just destitute.

And what really scares me is something we didn't hit on. The Titans' offensive line has been god-awful. I mentioned earlier 41 sacks, but 52% of Ryan Tannehill's dropbacks, he's had less than two and a half seconds before the pressure is on him. It's pretty wild how bad the pass protection has been, especially right tackle David Questenberry,

who quite frankly is not an NFL starting level player. He's just a good guy with a good story. And the Titans botched a draft pick in the second round with Dylan Radins, who should be playing right now, but just isn't good enough to do it. When you got guys like Spencer Brown, who has been starting for the Bills all year, who was drafted after Dylan Radins, it just makes you think, what the heck are they doing with offensive tackle after Isaiah

Wilson and now Dylan Radins? And Questenberry has been a sieve. He's killed the offense, quite frankly. And I show multiple film clips and multiple breakdowns in my Tic Tac Titans film thread on Tuesday showing where Questenberry just single-handedly killed the Titans offense. So if you put Nick Bosa over there, the Titans are screwed. There's nothing they can do to stop him. They've tried to chip.

Titans one play. The Titans used a tight end to chip TJ Watt. And Questenberry still was late to get to Watt. And Watt destroyed Tannehill. Like they gave the man a chip and he still couldn't touch his assignment. So you put Nick Bosa over there and it really makes me worry, regardless of whether A.J. Brown is back. So with that in mind, if I had to give a prediction,

I don't see the Titans scoring more than about 10 points in this game, considering that. So I am going to go 16-10. San Francisco wins the game. Three field goals, one touchdown. They'll get that one touchdown off a Titans inevitable turnover. So 16, 10, 49ers. That is a drag them out.

And that is a Thursday night game that we've seen too many times. And it's why I think those Tuesday night games should become, or those Thursday night games should become Tuesday night games. I think it'd be better for the league overall and not having a problem watching these tuesday night games that are actually happening over there right now as we're doing this podcast um yeah bosa has been moving around this year a lot more and it's basically up to him where he wants to go and so i imagine he's watching the film and seeing that and not only quest and barry maybe not being a starting caliber player he's not a tackle anyway right like so that that's just a rough assignment for him back to back to go against

tj watt and now nick bosa and i'm sure he'll be over there quite a few times and uh bosa's been doubled and chipped but his motor doesn't stop and he still has 15 sacks in the year so that's going to be a heck of a matchup and i really like how the 49ers are strong up the middle at linebacker and safety with some really good veteran players there to match up against a non-A.J. Brown type receiving group, you know, the first of the world. And so I think that does match up well. My my only worry is A.J. Brown, if he does play on the rookie Ambry Thomas and even on the veteran on the other side, Josh Norman, who's, you know. Oh, yeah. A.J. Brown should toast Josh Norman. Right. So absolutely. One match should toast Josh Norman. Right.

Yeah, absolutely. One matchup that worries me. So I think I'm going to go a little bit higher on my prediction. But I have the 49ers winning this one as well. And I'm going to go 24-17 Niners. So reluctantly, I'm going to go with the 49ers and give up those three and a half points if we're betting on this thing. But, man man i think the under is a stronger bet than the over here and it's going to be a knock and drag out fight two

teams that want to play things the same way before we go tyler i just want to say i believe that derrick henry got hosed in mvp voting last year and i think it's a shame that it's a quarterback award because derrick henry probably deserves it and i think this's a shame that it's a quarterback award because Derrick Henry probably deserves it and I think this year we're seeing why he deserved to be the MVP last year yeah and and you know a lot obviously I had a strong take on that earlier this week saying you know it's asinine to have Jonathan Taylor in the MVP conversation when Derrick Henry didn't get a single vote he went for over 2,000 yards it's only happened eight times in NFL history. The Titans were 11-5. They won their division. They got a home playoff game. Derrick Henry went for like 250 yards in the last game of the season when the Titans were in a tough battle with the Texans.

It's just absolutely insane that Derrick Henry didn't even, I'm not saying he has to win, but he didn't even get a vote. So for the national media to be driving this Jonathan Taylor narrative that he deserves to be MVP, the Bill Simmons podcast, Kenny Mayne is out here, Trey Wingo's out here, all these people are talking about Jonathan Taylor's MVP case. Where were these people when Derrick Henry went for 2,000? Derrick Henry had one less game and has been more productive yards-wise than Jonathan Taylor was in the same spot right now.

And the Colts aren't even leading their division. They may get a wild card spot. So how in the world does that make any sense? Now the reality here is it's not Jonathan Taylor's fault. Jonathan Taylor does deserve to be in the MVP conversation and does deserve to get votes and maybe win. But the real point is Derrick Henry should have won MVP last year. And it's just ridiculous that he didn't. And not even to get a vote, it makes it, it's absurd. It's absurd.

Yeah, I knew that was going to get you fired up too. Sorry for like, we're getting up your blood pressure here. It's been that kind of week. And hopefully, I mean, look, and hopefully your blood pressure makes it through thursday if the game goes the way we both think it could go on thursday night with the 49ers at the tennessee titans hopefully we don't have a bunch of covid cases popping up or anything like that in this

game right now we're looking okay on that front so uh it's gonna be fun tyler always a pleasure chatting with you i appreciate you jumping out out with me and doing this crossover podcast to all the listeners out there. Thanks for making locked on 49ers and locked on Titans. Your first listen every single day. I've got another podcast on the network. If you want NFL wide coverage, the Peacock and Williamson NFL,

my favorite ad read, baby. I love the Peacock and Williamson ad read. And now you guys get to hear the sultry, smooth voice of Brian Peacock himself. So you can't miss the Peacock and Williamson podcast. Absolutely. Or if betting is your thing, go listen to Q and Lee Sterling. And they're doing a good job over there at Locked On Bets as well.

For your second listen right here on the Locked On Podcast Network. For Tyler Rowan at Tic Tac Titans. For Brian Peacock at BD Peacock. Appreciate you joining us on this very special week. 16 Thursday night football locked on podcast network. Thanks for watching!