Locked On Titans - Daily Podcast On The Tennessee Titans - Locked on Titans: 4 wildcards for the Titans in 2018

Episode Date: July 20, 2018

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Welcome in to another edition of Locked on Titans. I'm Jimmy Morris, joined as always by Terry Lambert. Terry, how are you today? Doing pretty well. What's going on with you? Not too much. We are just a few days, actually, from rookies reporting for training camp, and then the whole team will be on the field on Thursday. So we've almost made it through this dead part of the offseason. Really, it seems like now the only dead part of the nfl offseason is from the end of the otas the mini camps to the beginning of training camps about about a month six weeks there where there's not a whole lot going on but we're almost out of that some teams have are reporting now and like i said the titans will be on the field for the first time on thursday um so today we're going to talk a little bit about x factors guys that, you know, could, if they're good, could put the Titans over the top.

If they're bad, it could spell trouble for the Titans. Before we get into the show, uh, we tell you, we write for musiccitymiracles.com. So you can check us out there covering the Titans for SB nation. Uh, we have a lot of stuff going up there, added some new people to the staff. So it's, it's going to be a, we're gonna have a lot of good coverage this year. So be sure and bookmark that page and check us out every day. You can follow us on Twitter. I'm at jmorrismcm.

Terry is at tlambertfb. Podcast account is at LockedOnTitan. You can also subscribe to the podcast wherever you get your podcasts. Just search out LockedOnTitans, and then you get the latest episodes as soon as they are available. Today we have a new sponsor for the show. It's Core Essentials. That's K-O-R-E, Core Essentials. And they make the best belts you'll

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when you use the code LOCKEDON at checkout. That's 10% off when you use LOCKEDON at checkout. That's Core with a K, CoreEssentials.com, and use the code LOCKEDON to save 10% off your order. Alright, so getting into X-Factors for the Titans this year.

I think the first one that you have to bring up is Corey Davis. And I think he's probably the X factor, in my opinion, because he has the ability you saw in the Patriots playoff game last year. Two touchdowns against Malcolm Butler, a very solid corner that's now obviously with the Titans. You saw the potential that he brings, the upside that he brings. Terry has been the biggest Corey Davis guy since back before the Titans drafted him last year. We didn't get to see as much of him as we would like last year because he was injured,

but you saw flashes of how good he can be when he was healthy and on the field. We've talked a lot about receivers and we'll talk a lot about receivers on this show um there's a lack of depth there so in order for that group to be successful cory davis needs to be really good yeah i agree uh and cory davis is an x factor because nothing was really brought in behind him there's no insurance policy there so uh as you So really he's an X factor as far as health goes. Can he stay healthy? I don't think any of us are questioning the ability.

He started his first game against the Raiders. He's out there mossing people on his first catch. So ability is clearly there. You saw against New England, like you mentioned. You saw the offense really struggle last year, and you saw Mariota and Corey Davis not be on the same page. Now, I don't know how much of that was on Davis, how much of that was on Mariota, how much of that was on Hrabisky,

but clearly something was wrong there. You saw Corey Davis come open several times down the field. Mariota would just miss him. So if they can start hitting some of those deep, deep throws, and Davis can put together a full season of health, the Titans' offense might be in business. Yeah, and that's, like you said, there's a few reasons here that it's an X factor. Part of it is that we don't know.

That's the question. Who was off last year? Was it mariota was it davis wasn't the offense um and and that's that's a question that hopefully will be answered early on this year we'll get to see that hopefully i mean obviously best case scenario was that the offense was just bad and everybody was kind of confused that that's honestly if you watch this team really closely last year i mean that's the conclusion that i came to i think that terry you draw the same conclusion but we don't we don't know for 100 and we'll find out um you know as as training camp gets started up with preseason gets going here in the next month or so but yeah and like you said it's the it's the depth question behind him that makes him even that much more important and i guess we can kind of use that to lead into the next x factor or factors which is tajay sharp and taewon taylor

um i know you had you had mentioned sharp when we were kind of talking about this i mean you mentioned taylor we were kind of talking about this before the show so i'll kind of let you go ahead and and say your piece on him yeah taylor Taylor's just interesting. I think we probably put too much on him as far as expectations go last year. But, you know, I don't think that's our fault either because you look at how the Titans used him in preseason and they were lining him up at fullback, giving him reverses and doing all kinds of things with him. And then you get to the regular season, he was lost.

He didn't know. He supposedly struggled with routes. He couldn't really separate. He's small. He's not very strong. So I don't know what the Titans are going to get from him. I don't think they know what the Titans are going to get from him. But what I do know is he was drafted to be the slot receiver of the future

for this team. And I think he's going to get that opportunity to do that. If he can grow into that, that's a huge development. Because like you were saying, there's not much behind him. What I want to see is Taylor and Taylor go out and get that job. What I don't want to see is the Titans having to play Michael Campanaro What I don't want to see is the Titans having to play Michael Campanaro because Taylor is lost in the playbook or just not performing to what the Titans drafted him to do.

Yeah, absolutely. And, you know, there's a lot of focus on the Tajay Sharp return, right? And part of it, I think, is because two years ago in training camp, he was so good, you know, and was fairly successful in his rookie season. I mean, he had a good year. But when you talk about, you know, him and fairly successful in his rookie season. I mean, he had a good year. But when you talk about, you know, him and Taylor, Taylor was a third-round pick. So, like you said, the Titans drafted him with the hopes of him being the slot receiver. You don't spend a third-round pick on a guy that you kind of hope makes it

or, you know, you think is going to be your fourth or fifth rotational guy. You spend a third-round pick on a guy that you expect to come in and help you. And he wasn't able to do that last year now a lot of people have written taylor off for that i i don't again because i just i think the offense was so bad that everybody was confused that everybody looked broken last year at least at one point or another everybody was confused you know all that stuff going on so they've got a lot invested in him, you know, from a draft capital perspective. So I think that makes sense. You know, and again, I think Tajay Sharp, just kind of along similar lines,

they need somebody to be that third guy, to be the slot guy, to be able to make some plays. They need somebody to be able to step in if, you know, Rashard Matthews or Corey Davis get hurt and have to miss time. Both of them did last year. If you have one or, you know, having both of them down at some point during the season, those guys are going to need to be able to be out there and at least, you know, threaten defenses and make some plays. Because, you know, we don't necessarily want to admit it, but this wide receiver group is really, really thin. And nothing but questions behind the top two guys.

And again, some questions still remain with Corey Davis so they need either Tajay Sharp or Taewon Taylor to step up in camp and establish themselves or you know himself as either one of them as the slot guy as the guy they can depend on so from that standpoint I think you can kind of lump them together in that they don't both have to be good but one of them needs to be good. Yeah, I agree. And I don't know if Sharp is going to play that slot role. They might have an outside role in mind for him being a little bigger.

But still, like we said, they need that depth to emerge. And going back to Tajay's rookie year, I think we had some unrealistic expectations for what he did in camp, for how quickly he kind of took to the offense. There was a point in time where he was the number one receiver. So he came in and was just kind of okay, put up some decent numbers, great numbers for a late-round pick. But, again, just keep those expectations in check with Sharp.

Not a great athlete. He's the definition of a possession guy, but still a valuable piece, especially for a team that's lacking in depth at receiver. Yeah, and that's the thing. Just establish some type of role for himself. And, you know, there's all kinds of stuff they can do with that group. And we talked, too, about Delaney and Johnny Smith being factors in this as well, where they could use them in a similar role, a slot role, or whatever it may be,

where they don't have to have production from all four receivers. But I really think that you need a third guy to come in and be able to be dependable and reliable and make some plays. And it's going to have to be – it's going to have to be Tajay Sharp or Taewon Taylor because, like you said, if Michael Campanaro is out there getting significant snaps, then something has gone wrong in my opinion. I mean, I just don't see him as having the upside over those other two guys. So that's going to be the biggest thing for me to watch in camp.

I mean, we did position battles last week. You know, we talked about guard and all that stuff. But to me, it's how does the receiver battle shape up behind the top two guys? Is there somebody else out there that, you know, the team can count on? Because I know there was at one point during the minicamps where, I guess, Corey Davis and Rashard Matthews were both out for, you know, injuries or whatever. And I think it was Kaharski that mentioned, you know, the guys on the field right now are not able to get any separation.

So somebody needs to step up and be able to make some plays if those guys go down. All right, we've got one more X factor on defense, and we'll hit on that coming up in just a sec. All right, so on defense, it's Harold Landry, right? It has to be. I mean, that's the guy that I think can come in and make the biggest impact. That's the guy they're going to need to come in and at least make an impact. He doesn't have to overtake Brian Rakpo derrick morgan in year one and push one of

those guys off the field he doesn't have to do that but he does need to come in play significant snaps and be a factor in the pass rush yeah i totally agree i think the titans have to be able uh to rush four and get a consistent push with just four because that wasn't the case last year. I thought their pass rush was good last year, but mainly that was because of Dick LeBeau scheming things up. Wesley Woodyard, how many times did he come in through the middle and blow a play up?

So he had to get really, really creative. It's a luxury for a defensive coordinator to be able to get that push with just four. Now I'm interested to see how often he plays. I don't know that he'll get first and second down or rushing down work, I should say. But if he can come in and provide consistent push off the edge, that's going to be huge for this team. And just keep in mind how good this secondary could be, how many additions they made.

That's great. That's one of the NFL's best secondaries, I think. I think you'd have to put them right up there near the top. So if Lander can come in and be any sort of a difference maker off the edge, that's going to be huge. Yeah, absolutely. And it doesn't have to just be. I mean, we could see plays, right?

We talked about this a little bit last week, where you have all three of those guys on the field. You have Landry, Arakpo, and Morgan all on the field at the same time, depending on what they want to do. They talked about being multiple and all that kind of stuff. And, look, we know that if those guys are all being productive and all that kind of stuff and look we know that if if those guys are all being productive and playing well that dean p's are smart enough to know that he needs to work things up to get them all on the field at the same time or you know to maximize that not just say well you

know that we've got two outside linebackers on the field we're you know we're a 3-4 team we're gonna have two of them on the field at the same time i mean you're just i always go back to the thing with kenny britain randy moss about how they played the same position so the Titans couldn't get them on the field at the same time. We know that that's not what's going to happen here if all three guys are playing and being productive. But like you said, I mean, there's a lot of factors that go into a pass rush. Some of it's scheme, some of it's just straight ability, some of it's coverage, I mean, all that kind of stuff. And so with the secondary you know being

upgraded to where now you've got three really good guys at the top and you've got a couple of pieces behind them they can play well if something happens you feel really good about bayard um you know ciprian can hopefully hold up enough um that you know they're going to have opportunity to get to the to the quarterback it shouldn't just be a guys running wide open as soon as the ball's snatched every play like there have been in the last few years with the Titans. So I think all that kind of together, it sets up for a place where Landry doesn't have to come in and be Javon Curse in 1999. They don't need that from him in order for him to have a successful year,

for the defense to have a successful year, for the defense to have a successful year, but they do need him to be a factor, somebody that other offensive coordinators are kind of scheming against. Yeah, and to a lesser extent, I'll throw Rashawn Evans in there. Linebacker

play is linebacker play. I don't know that it really sets a defensive part, but i'm interested to see uh how they use him on these some of these pass rush downs or if they leave him in coverage so that's a guy who maybe his best quality at alabama was that first step and his burst uh a guy that really didn't initially didn't didn't have the uh speed se, but he had that burst. So I wonder if they'll utilize that off the edge along with Landry. So I think a buzzword this offseason has been versatility,

especially for the defense. The defense is very versatile. Now they can do a lot of different things. I'm not sure opposing offenses are going to know what's coming so it's going to be really interesting to see how they attack that uh weeks one two and three before the teams can get a hold on how to beat that that blueprint yeah before the the book is out so to speak right um yeah so yeah absolutely and like you said i mean if you're just talking about a straight inside linebacker um you know they're generally not making that much of an impact on the pass for us.

But we've seen from Rashawn Evans in college, he has the ability to do some of the other stuff as well. So, yeah, I think his success is – I mean, his play is going to go a long way in determining how successful this defense is. And I don't know, you probably feel like me, with these two guys, they're guys that we both of us liked um you know we would have been just fine with them taking landry in the

first round with where they were picking and even when they traded up we would have been fine with landry being that pick to go ahead and get him in the second round it seems more likely than not that they're going to be successful that that you know that they're going to have good rookie years so i mean that's a good place to be but i don they're going to have good rookie years. So, I mean, that's a good place to be. But I don't know. We're probably always kind of like that with rookies. It seems like, you know, as the offseason goes on,

even when you think a pick was bad, the immediate reaction is not feeling good about a pick. We tend to work ourselves up into feeling like these guys are going to be successful. But I don't know. I just feel like with these two guys. And then going back to offense with Corey Davis, it's not – I mean, I think we would say for the number five overall pick that his rookie year was a disappointment but when you talk about the factors that played into that the injuries and in the the offense and all that kind of stuff i don't know i just still have i have a lot of high

hopes for this team and again i think that we can kind of work ourselves into this position you know every year at the end of july when camp's about to open everybody feels good or pretty much everybody feels good about where they are and i felt you know pretty decent about some titan teams that ended up being really really bad i don't know but this year it just seems a little bit different it just seems like there's so many so many guys that have so much potential that you know i feel like of the guys that we listed i i there's no doubt my mind coordinates is going to be good there's no doubt in my mind that your defensive rookies are going to be good the biggest hesitation i probably have is on the you know the depth at the receivers um

i i feel like john robinson saw something in in taylor that's why he picked him there but we didn't see it last year so i mean I think of all the guys that we mentioned, those are the guys that I have the, I guess, the least amount of faith in at this point. I'd probably agree with that. And on Evans and Landry real quick, I think your confidence stems from the situation that they're in. So you look at what's around Harold Landry, you've got Arakpo and Morgan, and all he has to do is really come in and be that additional pass rusher.

So that's a pretty cushy gig year one. Now big things are expected beyond that, but still that's a way to ease him into this league, especially for a guy that might have been banged up a little bit. And the same could be said of Evans. You've got Woodard there. You've got Jayon Brown there. You've got Will Compton there.

So it's like the expectations are not low. That's the wrong word. But they're in cushy spots. There's depth around them. There's experienced players around them. So that might make their transition a little easier. Yeah, absolutely. Like you said, the transition thing, it sets them up to have a better chance of being successful

because it's not like, you know, the team's success is not really hinging on them necessarily. There's other pieces there they can learn from, they can come along, and if they're really good, then that just puts them over the top that much more, so the Titans over the top that much more. So it's exciting, man, and I'm'm excited that we're now, like I said, a week away from having stuff on the field. We made it, man. Yeah, we made it getting rid of all this off-season nonsense

and the things that become stories and get legs that time of year. So next week we'll have actual football to talk about, so that's exciting. All right, so that'll do it for today. Again, check us out at musicofmiracles.com. If you didn't hear the position or the roster battles things that we did, we did offense and defense earlier this week, offense last week. You can go back and listen to those. Check that out.

Kind of getting us prepped for training camp. So early in the week we'll probably maybe circle back and talk about the biggest storylines to follow as we head into training camp, just so we're getting everybody ready. And maybe take a quick look around the AFC South and just kind of talk about where those teams are heading into camp, you know, off-season acquisitions. We've done a couple of crossover shows and stuff.

We haven't spent a whole lot of time really looking at rosters and how they're different than what they were last year for the teams that are going to be in the division. So we'll do that a little bit next week as well. Like I said, between now and then, check out the site. Subscribe to the podcast, Locked on Titans, wherever you get your podcasts and you'll get your new shows. And we'll be ramping it up a lot more.

We'll be cranking out a lot more content coming up here in the next couple of weeks. So it's an exciting time. Like Terry said, we made it. And we've got football just around the corner. So for Terry, this is Jimmy saying thanks for listening to Locked on Titans. And we will talk to you again next week.