Locked On Titans - Daily Podcast On The Tennessee Titans - Crossover Wednesday - Titans vs Falcons

Episode Date: September 25, 2019

Tyler is joined by the host of the Locked on Falcons, Aaron Freeman. They discuss Sunday's game and give their predictions. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome to the Locked on Titans podcast. I'm your host, Tyler Rowland. Titans fans, it is crossover Wednesday, and today we do have Aaron Freeman of the Locked on Falcons podcast on the show to hang out with us. In our first segment, we are going to cover some Titans offense against the Falcons defense. In our second segment, we are going to flip that around

and go over the Falcons offense against the Titans defense and the strength on strength. In our final segment, we're going to do some keys to the game and then give you our final score predictions and how the game is going to turn out. So always love these episodes. Aaron's a really fun guest. Hope you guys to the show. I know you're relatively new to the Lockdown Podcast Network, so I'm hoping this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship as we sort of preview this week four matchup between the Falcons and Titans. Both teams are a little bit reeling at this point in time. Falcons coming off a disappointing loss to the Colts.

You know that heartache and that hardship from losing to the Colts a couple of weeks ago, but then on a short week to sort of lose to the Jaguars. Yeah, it's going to be an interesting week to sort of see, you know, which one of these two teams shows up and takes care of business on Sunday. Yeah, it is one of those games where both teams are kind of wounded. You know, as you were saying, they're reeling. So it'll be very interesting to see if the game gets tight late, which team has more fighting.

You know, in a game like football, it can be all about skill, but there is an element in football of you just got to want it more. I know it's cliche, but it's actually true in football. And I'm curious to see which team will step up because right now I'm just not sure who it's going to be. Absolutely. So, you know, we're going to jump right into this conversation talking about sort of some of the key matchups and the key question marks, you know, we have on one side of the ball.

I'd like to start it off talking about the Titans offense. I feel like there's a bigger question mark with that group. I also think the Falcons defense is kind of a bigger question mark. We can save sort of the Titans defense going up against the Falcons offense strength on strength for the next segment of the show. But my big question with the Titans offense, you know, sort of centers around Marcus Mariota and this Titans offense. And I heard a quote not too long ago about Titans offense coordinator Arthur Smith saying that he wanted to have some continuity from the Matt LaFleur offense, who's now in Green Bay from the 2018 season, so that Marcus Mariota could have some of that continuity for really the first time in his career, given how many different

offensive coordinators and play callers he's had. And, you know, I've heard my own fair share of critics about sort of whether or not that LaFleur offense from 2018 was particularly good. And so I'm wondering sort of what are your thoughts on the possibility that that decision by Arthur Smith is a little bit of a double-edged sword, where you're getting the continuity that Marcus Mariota needs, but at the same time, your offense is maybe a little bit stagnant because it's not a great or dynamic offense. I'm curious, what are your thoughts on that? That's a really interesting point. It is a double-edged sword, and you would find different answers in the Titans community. What I would tell you is exactly that. We want to have continuity, but at what cost? If the offense wasn't good, what is it worth?

I think Arthur Smith has the respect of the guys in the locker room, and Mike Vrabel being a former coach, he's big on being able to relate to the guys, understanding your players, understanding those relationships. And a guy like Arthur Smith, who's been held over by the last four coaches, he really does know every player in that locker room. He knows their strengths, their weaknesses. As a former tight ends coach, he was involved in the run game planning and the pass game planning. So it does make sense to carry him over with the continuity and just with the respect he gets.

But at this point in time, you have to question, was Matt LaFleur – we know that Matt LaFleur wasn't Mike Rabel's first choice. Well, I know, obviously. I follow the team. He wanted Ryan Day, the head coach of the Ohio State Buckeyes he was turned down got Matt LaFleur that never really panned out there's a lot of rumors some some stories you hear where they did maybe didn't get along but yet he chose to keep a coach around for continuity with an offense that he wasn't happy with and that he didn't like so some of the decisions as Mike Vrabel's tenure goes along do get a little more questionable. At this time, the jury is out on Arthur Smith.

I wish I could give you a definite answer, but in my opinion, I don't think that the continuity, the offense, or any of that is really the issue. So I'm sure we'll get to that eventually anyway. Well, you know, since you brought it up, what is in your eyes the issue with this Titans offense? I think, unfortunately, everything is infected is the only way I could say. It's like a virus mentally now. So we'll just cut to it. Marcus Mariota, second overall pick.

He's just supposed to be more. We can argue over whether he's bad or good, but I know as a second overall pick He's just supposed to be more. We can argue over whether he's bad or good, but I know as a second overall pick, he's supposed to be more. And right now, while there's all these other things that are going wrong, the offensive play calling with Arthur Smith is questionable. The offensive line has been porous and just downright bad. And the reality is, though, is that Marcus isn't elevating any of those people with his play

either because he's been equally as bad missing easy throws that if I showed you on tape right we're talking about bubble routes to slot receivers that are you know 15 yards dead straight in front of him just an easy completion in the NFL and he misses them high like inexplicably so he's playing terribly and at some point if you draft a guy second overall, you need him to lift those people around him. Deshaun Watson has a terrible offensive line. And he tends to lift the people around him. So that's just one example. And I know that every Titans fan or person who likes Marcus will yell

about why that example shouldn't be used. But the reality is, as a second overall pick, he isn't lifting anyone around him. So unless everything is perfect, the line blocks perfect, the receivers get good separation, the pass protection was called correctly. It's a good dynamic play with good route combinations. If you don't get that, then Marcus isn't going to be able to be successful. And if that's the case, the reality is you're not winning in the NFL. Either you have an A plus defense, A plus line, A plus weapons,

and an average quarterback who you can drag along with those parts, or you have a quarterback who can drag along some parts when everyone's not playing great. So Marcus doesn't lose games all the time, but he doesn't go out and win them either. And unfortunately, when you have a quarterback like that, and there's numerous ones in the league right now, it makes everybody else around them look bad. Maybe it's not all the OCs and all the coordinators we've ran through. Maybe it's not the head coaches. Maybe it's not the offensive linemen and the receivers aren't good enough. And maybe Marcus just isn't good enough to lift anybody else around him and it makes everyone else look average. Yeah, I think that's an interesting point. And, you know, from I've watched nearly as much Titans

film this year, but I've watched a fair share, probably second nearly as much Titans film this year but I've watched a fair share probably second most of the Falcons this year and that's basically the conclusion I kind of had watching Marcus Mariota as well you must be a Derek Henry fan then I'm curious about that because it sounds like you know from what I think and obviously it seems like you're sort of echoing this, this is a good opportunity for a Falcons defense that's kind of reeling, trying to find its identity, to have a little bit of a bounce-back performance. But the key seems to be that they need to stop Derrick Henry because if they can shut down Derrick Henry,

then they will have some opportunities to sort of feast upon this Titans offense, get Marcus Mariota into a pass-heavy sort of feast upon this Titans offense, get Marcus Mariota into, you know, a pass heavy sort of offense, a one dimensional offense and really get attack a Titans offensive line that has been struggling due to the suspension of Taylor LeJuan and some injuries elsewhere. You know, can this Titans offense survive just being sort of a seemingly one-dimensional run first? The answer seems to be no. Right? The answer seems to be no at this point in time.

I mean, we're talking about 17 points against the Colts, seven points against the Jaguars. Those are good defenses, but still in those circumstances, we're talking about, I mean, in the NFL, you guys, the Falcons, are scoring 20 points per game. That's 21st in the league right now. So when you score 17 points in one week and then follow it up with seven points the next week,

can that offense survive? No, it doesn't appear so. Now, can they turn it around? I hope that when Taylor LeJuan comes back, that allows the Titans to run their offense differently than they have to run it right now, and that allows them to have more success. But luckily, the Falcons get the Titans on the schedule when Taylor LeJuan is not playing.

So we're going to have to run an offense similar to what we've been doing because we're forced to. That's keeping wide receivers into chip, keeping multiple tight ends into block, running backs into block, letting them leak out very late. And it's almost too late at that time. It's hard to play offense when you only have three wide receivers going out for routes in the NFL. It's just going to be hard to do anything. Now, are the Titans going to be able to capitalize on some of the things that the Falcons are giving up 100 rushing yards per game right now.

If Derrick Henry gets to 100 rushing yards, I got to think that the Titans have a good chance to win. He is the focal point of the offense, and I don't even think he's that special of a running back in terms of the talent in the NFL. I just think he's the only dynamic weapon that we can get the ball easily enough to be used often. He's had his struggles as well. So they're going to have to pound the rock and hope that the Falcons give up a lot of

rushing yards. But if not, one thing the Jaguars did, they blitzed all day, make the wide receivers win one-on-one, make Marcus make reads and make quick decisions and good throws. And it just kind of took us off course. Same thing with the Colts. They don't typically play zone or they typically do play zone and they don't bring a lot of pressure like blitzes wise,

but they blitzed Marcus and made him make throws and it was hard to keep the offense going for a lot of the time. So I'm not sure. Obviously, I don't watch the film of the Falcons like you do, but do the Falcons blitz a lot on defense or do they typically try to rush for and drop into coverage? And do you think whichever one they do, they do the Falcons blitz a lot on defense, or do they typically try to rush for and drop into coverage?

And do you think whichever one they do, they will either keep doing that or break that tendency because the Titans offense is so meager, I guess, to say the least. Well, they're not really a blitz heavy team. And when they do blitz, it's, they're not like, they'll bring a corner blitz every now and then. But other than that, they're not really throwing anything at teams that most teams so far this season and sort of historically

against the Falcons see coming. So it's not hard to sort of decipher when they're going to blitz and what type of blitz it's going to be. They're not particularly exotic with that. And one of the running gags I have on this podcast, Locked on Falcons, is that whenever the opposing team is in a slump or whenever you need a boost, you play the Falcons and you're almost always going to get there.

So if you read your opinion, run for 100. Yeah, the Titans are the same, unfortunately. Yeah, so, you know, that's been a problem for the Falcons and they really need to come to play because the biggest beef I've had with the Falcons defense over the years has been whatever the opposing team's game plan is, whatever they want to do, if they want to sort of dink and dunk and establish the run, all that type of stuff, or whatever it is that they want to do, they are generally successfully

able to do so. And so even though you look at the Titans' potential offensive game plan, it may look simple. It's just like be Derrick Henry, get Mariota into some third and manageables and convert and whatnot. It's like, well, you know, other teams have run that exact same game plan, and Minnesota did it pretty effectively in week one to the point that Kirk Cousins barely had to throw. He only dropped back 11 times that entire game. I think they just keep feeding the rock to the running backs. And I'm sure the Titans are going to look at that game plan and say, we're going to do exactly that.

And the Vikings had a lot of success running to the outside. And, you know, I think when I've watched Derrick Henry, he seems, you know, everybody thinks of him more as a bruiser, but he seems to be a little bit better when he's running outside the tackle. You're correct. He's more of a finesse runner. Yeah. So I think the, you know, the Titans will just have to look at the Vikings game plans and let's do that. And there's no reason at this point in time for me to sit here and be confident that they won't be able to have some success doing so. So I think that's going to be an interesting

sort of wrinkle for this matchup. I feel like we're both in the same place mentally right now. I can hear it in your voice. It's like, man, we should probably go out and compete in this game, but I just can't trust you anymore. I honestly thought the Falcons were going to have a good year and rebound because they were so injured last year. Speaking of that,

uh, the Falcons defense was hurt. Uh, Keanu Neal, didn't he, uh, tears Achilles or have a lower leg injury that that's probably going to keep him out for a long time.

Yeah. He's out for the season with a torn Achilles. It's the second consecutive. That's sad, man. Yeah, yeah, you hate to see that. He's a good player. Yeah, yeah, he's our Cam Chancellor, basically. Yeah.

I think when he's been healthy, he's been, you know, I know this is going to sound blasphemous to a lot of people, but I think he's been just as good in Atlanta as Cam Chancellor was in Seattle in those years. And he's going to be a big loss, particularly against a team like Tennessee, who likes to utilize their tight ends in the passing game with Delaney Walker and Jono Smith. And their replacement, the Falcons, basically made the decision today to not really bring in any veterans strong safeties. And they're going to go in-house and they're going to have a safety turned linebacker now reconverted back to safety, Kamal Ishmael, fill in for him. They also have a young backup in Sherrod Neesman, but they seem, for some reason, don't seem to want to give him opportunities.

And they just elevated a guy off the practice squad named Jamal Carter, who was with the Broncos last year. And they're basically going to the tried-and-true formula of next man up. And they did that last year when Keanu Neal got hurt. It didn't really work out until the very end of the season when Neesman started to play pretty well down the stretch over the last four or five games. And it seems, you know, that they're going down that same path again. And we'll have to sort of see if the Titans can sort of exploit that a little bit, because the main thing with Ishmael is that he's not a great man cover guy and he doesn't have the sort of speed and range that you're ideally looking in at that position to be a weapon in zone he's basically a box linebacker or a box safety that's built like a undersized linebacker and in that role he's fine but you

know if if the if the Titans can find ways to exploit that matchup, because I think that's going to be the most favorable matchup in the passing game for them, that could create some problems for this Falcons' defense. Yeah, you'd have to look for Delaney Walker. Even being an older player, he's still talented. You'd have to hope, as a Titans fan, that he'll be able to take advantage of that matchup. All right, well, my name is Tyler Rowland, host of the Locked on Titans podcast. I'm here with Aaron from the Locked on Falcons podcast.

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Blue Chew is the better, cheaper, faster choice, and we thank them for sponsoring our podcast. So Tyler, we're here talking Falcons offense versus Titans defense. These are the two strengths of these teams. And, you know, the Titans have, I think, one of the more talented and more underrated defenses in the league because they have talent at all three levels, D-line, linebackers. And in the secondary, they're probably only going to get better

later in the year when they get Jeffrey Simmons, you know, back. So it's one of those things where, you know, for the Locked On Falcons listeners, I'm curious maybe you could highlight one or two players that you think are underrated and don't get enough national recognition on this Titans defense. The first one is the easiest question I've answered all day, and that's Jayon Brown, the inside linebacker. He came out of UCLA.

He was a fifth-round selection, I believe, in 2016. He came out of UCLA. He was a fifth round selection, I believe in 2016. He started his career behind Wesley Woodyard and Avery Williamson. He was just a third down passing situation linebacker. He is small. He's six foot, slightly over 200 pounds. You know how it goes with those measurements, though they always give them a little. He's probably 5'11 and right past 200, but the guy is a gamer. He's a hawk for the ball. He'll make the most tackles on our team. He plays more downs than any other linebacker. He's become a full three-down linebacker. He's able to hold up in the run game enough to stay out on the field. It's definitely something that he has to improve on his strength, shedding blocks, engaging with his hands, and disengaging with the blocker.

He has to get better at those things in the run game. But in the pass coverage, he's just one of the best in the league, completely underrated. He should have been a pro bowler last year with his performance. With how much teams are running, 11 personnel, three wide receivers, you've got to have linebackers on the field that can cover at all times. You can't just have them come on the field and passing situations anymore. And he is one of the prototypical, perfect examples to look at in a modern NFL linebacker. His division mate, Miles Jack, gets a lot of recognition for being a player in that ilk. But if you look at the stats,

you look at the on-field performance, Jayon Brown is a much better player than Miles Jack. Just nobody knows his name because he's so unheralded and was drafted so late and wasn't a big-time player in college, but Jayon Brown is absolutely one of the best pass coverage linebackers in the league and becoming one of just the best linebackers in the league, period. So everyone should know his name, and if you're a Falcons fan, the reality is you're going to hear his name all day because he has to make tackles all over the field all three downs so he would be the first one the second player I would have to say is Kenny Vaccaro I mean you could call Kevin Byard Deion Sanders played for the Falcons and he called him just a fan on Twitter when he's the highest paid safety in the NFL so at some point but at some point I

can't keep saying Kevin Byard Kenny Vaccaro and I'd say he's name, but with his injuries with the Saints and falling off, taking a break. It's funny, your guys' safety got hurt, and you're a tad maybe frustrated. Maybe I'm misreading that, but maybe a tad frustrated that they aren't going out and looking for somebody in the market, a veteran to help and come in who's maybe a little more talented. Well, luckily the Titans did do that when Jonathan Ciprian tore his ACL last year in the preseason. They brought in Vaccaro.

He's a perfect fit. The Titans run a lot of disguise coverages, a lot of disguise blitzes. They bring safeties in on blitzes a lot. They move the safeties around. They play cover three, cover two, cover four,

man, everything. So when you do something like that, you can't just have safeties who play the deep third and play box like how you guys run your defense which is a very successful cover three defense but the titans just do it differently where everyone on their defense does a little bit of everything instead of having like their defined roles and the defined player archetype that you're looking for in the draft and everything

like that we look for versatility and coverage and complexity and coverage with our cornerbacks and our safeties. And Vaccaro has just meshed perfectly, and his impact and the injuries he had early in his career, I think, have maybe pushed his name down in the conversation when he's still one of the best strong safeties in the league. Oh, yeah. I think those are two great highlights.

When I checked them out. Brown and Evans. There's just so much talent on that Titans defense. The defense is great, but they're wasting it. Yeah, it's unfortunate. The defense is fantastic. And I think that's going to be a problem for this Falcons offense because I don't know when I'm looking at this Titans defense, is there sort of a matchup?

Like, okay, they can attack this guy. The only thing I could possibly say is, like, maybe they can put Julio Jones in the slot and try to get him going against Logan Ryan and sort of use that to create for other guys for this offense. But other than that, like, it's going to be tough because, like, Logan Ryan in the Super Bowl a couple years ago against Bahamas, it pretty much shut him down in that game. So I think if they just have that sort of matchup,

that's going to favor the Titans. Malcolm Butler, I assume, would probably cover more Calvin Ridley than necessarily Julio Jones just because of the size mismatch a little bit there. But, you know, I think Butler's been, at least from what I can tell, Butler's been playing, had a nice bounce back season from a year ago where I think he was a little bit of a disappointment from what I hear. And, you know, he's playing well.

I'm curious, sort of, if you're sort of scouting this Titans defense, where are some of the areas that you think are a little bit concerning that a team like the Falcons may be able to exploit? This is also an easy answer. Adoree Jackson. He has personally been responsible for 14 points scored this year, and I'm willing to go out and say it's his fault. In the Indianapolis game, in the very first possession,

he commits a 48-yard pass interference where he just doesn't even play the ball in the air, smacks the defender's head, and then has the nerve to celebrate afterwards and wave his arms like he caused an incompletion when he just smacked the receiver with his arm in the head and caused a flag. And they got a touchdown the very next play. In Jacksonville, he drops the punt the very next play.

They score a touchdown. We're down 7-0 to start the game in Jacksonville with their crowd just now sitting down in their seats. So Adoree Jackson has the tendency over his career to just make a mental mistake at some point in the game that just kills the momentum of the team or gets them off to a poor start. So if I'm the Falcons, I'm keeping Julio outside because Logan Ryan is one of the best slot corners in the league, and that may take Muhammad Sanu out of the game or render him useless for the offense.

But there's absolutely the chance that Adore Jackson is going to make a huge mistake on somebody like Julio Jones, and it's going to cost the Titans probably more than once. Usually we can limit those to one big costly play per game, but I foresee Julio Jones having a field day on the two outside Titans corners. Malcolm Butler struggled mightily at the beginning of the year last year. He actually was one of the best corners in the league per PFF the last half of the season last year. But early this year, he plays good for such a large chunk of the game.

But in one-on-one coverage in big situations, which is surprising due to the Super Bowl, in one-on-one coverage, man coverage, he just gets destroyed like two or three times a game. And it always costs the Titans. It's always a big miss. It's always a big mistake. So the outside corners of the Titans are definitely where I would attack.

And it looks like the Falcons actually should be able to do that. I mean, the passing offense is almost 300 yards a game, sixth in the league. It's the rushing defense that is, or the rushing offense that's struggling with only 74 yards a game, sixth in the league. It's the rushing defense that is, or the rushing offense, that's struggling with only 74 yards a game. And that's one thing I think if the Titans are able to have success in this game, it's going to be because we know that you have to pass and we can mix up coverages and confuse Matt Ryan, which it seems like he's prone to turn over the ball more this year than before.

That's what I actually wanted to ask you about. The Falcons are currently minus four in the turnover margin, 30th in the league. What is causing all the turnovers on offense? It's interesting because it's like Matt Ryan is making like maybe one or two mistakes a game, which is not a big number, but they just seem to be interceptions. And, you know, he's got six picks this year.

I would probably say off the top of my head, like three or four of them were on him just making a poor throw or making a questionable decision. And, you know, in many of those cases, that was the only really poor throw or questionable decision he made in that game. But for whatever reason, it seems like a high percentage of those are now being turnovers where in previous years and really around the league, you don't necessarily, you know, if you're going to make like eight bad throws over the course of three games or whatever the case may be, normally, you know, maybe one or two of those might get picked off or something like that. But for Matt Ryan, it seems like four or five of them have been picked off. So I think that's the main thing. It's not that he's playing poorly or anything.

It's just kind of bad luck to a lot of extent and sort of the exact cause to why some of these, you know, this one uncharacteristic brain fart that he has in a game like last week, he overthrew Luke Stocker just, you know, threw the ball like five feet over his head. It was a bad throw. It wasn't a poor decision. It was just a bad throw. And that was really the only bad decision that he made that entire game. So it's one of those things where hopefully this is kind of a get right game coming at home, you know,

being in a more friendly environment and being able to get his top two weapons potentially involved from what it sounds like with Julio Jones and Calvin Ridley. One of the issues that the Falcons offense has been dealing with is that they haven't really gotten Ridley all that much involved outside of the week two game. And they won that game. And then the other two games,

he was pretty quiet and pretty a non-factor in those games, particularly early on. And Julio Jones had a quiet start in week one. So if they can get those two guys going, you know, this Falcons offense is really potent and dangerous. All right. My last question for you is the running game. Obviously, like I said earlier, it's about 74 yards a game right now.

It hasn't been able to get going. I know in that kind of offense, the Falcons thrive on play action. Matt Ryan's always been a great thrower in play action. Of course, if you don't have the run going, it's going to limit the success of play action a little bit. Is it the offensive line or have the injuries taken their toll on Devontae Freeman? Who's more at fault or how would you, I guess, assess who's to blame for the lack of success in the run game?

I think it's mostly the blocking up front. I think that was the issue for them last year when they had one of the worst running games in the league for most of the season. And I think that's been kind of the issue this year, that blocking was a little bit better this past week. And, you know, Devonta Freeman broke off a couple of nice runs in this game and seemingly got things back on track. They've had some injuries up front.

They've had some moving parts with, you know, guys that haven't really necessarily been working. So the hope is that they're going to start to gel and things are going to start to click for them. And maybe that began this past Sunday against the Colts. So I think it's mostly the blocking. You know, I don't think Devontae Freeman is sort of the same player that he was at his peak in 2016 and whatnot, but I don't think he's that much diminished coming off of an injury play 2018 season to the point that it's a major, major concern and one of the leading reasons why their running game hasn't been as effective this season. effective this season. So Tyler, you know, we want to round things out by talking a little bit about, you know, some of the keys to the game and we'll sort of focus on that

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Visit mybookie.ag today. You play, you win, you get paid. So, um, you know, Tyler, I'm curious, sort of what are like the three main keys to this game for you coming up? Um, well, I, I guess, um, some simple keys for the Titans. Unfortunately, the Titans are a simple offense and a simple team, a simple organization, it seems. The type of things that we rely on, harken back to the old days, run the football, play tough defense, try to win with three scores or less. It seems like that's just the route that we're going.

So at some point, you got to lean into it. So for me, obvious number one key is get Derek Henry going in the run game. And I think that the Titans have to get the screen game going again to the running backs. It's hard to do that when you're down the way they were in Jacksonville. And no one's really falling for a screen because they're dropping back into coverage in the second half after they've established that lead with the blitzing. So it was hard to get any kind of running back screens going, but we got to get Derek Henry and Dion Lewis loose on screens,

throws that are easy for Marcus Mariota to make. The second key will have to be shutting down the Falcons run. Like I said, the Falcons aren't a great running team. You talked about the struggles they have in the offensive line. So the Titans will need to keep the running game down so that they can focus on the pass because obviously the passing game for the Falcons is excellent. With a weapon like Julio Jones and an experienced QB like Matt Ryan, they'll have to focus on confusing Matt Ryan with different coverages

and different looks and things like that. And to do that, you have to be not worried about the running game killing you. So the Titans have to smother the run game first. And the last key for me to hit all three sides of the football, special teams. Brett Kern, in my opinion, is the best punter in the league. all three sides of the football, special teams. Brett Kern, in my opinion, is the best punter in the league. He's consistently flipping the field for the Titans. We've covered this. The Titans' offense struggles. They play a defensive game. A big part of that is punting the football. So the Titans' punter will need to do a good job of pinning the Falcons' offense deep, giving them long fields, making them make long drives and given Matt Ryan more opportunities to make

that critical mistake in that critical turnover. So the punter Brett Kern and special teams in general is a huge factor in the way the Titans play football. Unfortunately, fortunately, whatever you want to call it. So those are three keys. My prediction for the game. I would say that the Falcons do win this ballgame 28-13. The Titans' offense is just struggling mightily right now.

Hopefully, when Taylor LeJuan comes back, I can expect improved production. But right now, I just can't have faith. And the Falcons are at home. I think it'd be closer if it was in Tennessee. And with the Falcons coming home and just having the experience, talent that they have, I think they'll find a way to get right and win this game. Absolutely.

For me, the first key point, the Falcons got to protect the football. The Titans have been very effective at scoring points off of takeaways. That was a big reason why they seemingly blew up the doors off of Cleveland in week one. The Titans, looking it up, they scored 24 points off of their five takeaways this year. And the Falcons have given up 33 points off of the seven giveaways that they've given up this year. And so, you know, this is going to be a game where the Falcons are going up against a pretty good Titans defense. And it's going to be hard for them to put up a ton of points in this game.

And if they're giving the ball away, that's going to help the Titans out in all ways imaginable. They cannot lose that turnover margin. The second thing is I think the Falcons defense has to win up front. They got to stop the run. They got to keep the clamps on Derrick Henry and they need to get the Titans in these third and long situations where I think they will have an advantage with their secondary going up against these receivers with their pass rush being able to pin their ears back against, you know, this titans offensive line and sort of do the same thing the colts did

in the um jaguars did last week by really getting after mariotta and forcing him to make some mistakes so i think they have to control the line of scrimmage on the defense side of the ball and the third thing i think is protecting matt ryan and controlling the line of scrimmage on the offensive side of the ball i'm not expecting them to be able to get the running game really going, but I'm hoping that it can be like somewhat effective. But I think the main thing is not getting in situations where the Jarrell Casey's and the Cameron wakes and the Harold Landry's and all these guys can be able to pin their ears back and get after the quarterback,

because I just don't have confidence at this offensive line, given their inconsistency this year, is going to be able to keep Matt Ryan upright. And if that's the case, as we've seen in some of these games, if he's getting pressured and that's going to lead to more opportunities for turnovers and interceptions and sack strips and all these various things that will get the Falcons into, you know, a bad situation. But I think, you know, as far as my final prediction here, I think the Falcons, this is their get-right game. I don't expect this offense to put up a ton of points, but I'm thinking, you know, a final score, something along the lines of like 23 to like 16 or something like that, where I think the Falcons can, you know,

get out to an early lead and sort of control the pace of this game at home and force the Titans to play a little bit left-handed if they can't get their running game going. Yeah, I definitely understand your prediction. It makes it, if the Titans are able to maybe hit a long screen or get a turnover or something like that at some point, I definitely could see them putting a couple more points up on the board. So that's a pretty good

prediction. We'll see how it turns out. Yeah. Well, Tyler, I appreciate you joining me on this crossover Wednesday episode, and we'll have to sort of see which team, you know, emerges from this game, building up a little bit more confidence and moving forward and can sort of get their season you know what we're both one and two so you know this is you know it's hard to say a a week four game is a must win game but for both of these teams that i think had high expectations going into the season falling into a one in three hole would be very problematic for yeah two and two definitely two and two definitely feels a lot different than 1-3, especially for the Titans with LeJuan coming back

and that being like the carrot that everyone thinks will turn the season around. Be a lot better to go 2-2 into that than go into 1-3, and I'm sure the Falcons will feel the same way. Absolutely. They're going to continue their AFC South tour next week against Houston, and no offense to the Titans. I think Houston at this point, I think most people would agree, it looks a little bit better at this point.

We'll be rooting for you guys. Titans and the Colts, it's going to be a lot harder to get that win on the road against Houston next week to sort of get another win back in the win column. But yeah, man, it's been fun talking with you today, and we'll hopefully get another opportunity to do it again before four years is up. Right?

Yeah. That would be a great news. If we were able to do this again later this year, I think it'd be a good situation for both of us, man. Thank you for having me, Aaron. I appreciate it.

And good luck with you guys. Okay, guys, that was Aaron Freeman from locked on Falcons. Had a really great time talking to him. Hope you guys enjoyed the conversation as well. We did offense versus defense, defense versus offense. Gave you our keys to the game and then gave you some predictions at the end.

Once again, going to be doing this every single week on Crossover Wednesday with that week's opponent. Please follow the show at Locked On Titans. Follow me at Tic TacacTitans on Twitter. Please subscribe to the show if you want right now on Apple Music, Google Play, Spotify, wherever you stream your podcasts. I guess it'd be Apple Podcasts, not Apple Music,

but you guys know what I'm saying. Really appreciate you joining me. I am your host, Tyler Rowland, and this is Locked on Titans.