Locked On Titans - Daily Podcast On The Tennessee Titans - Locked on Titans: A disappointing end to 2018

Episode Date: December 31, 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? Doing pretty good. What's up, man? Well, we got to talk about the end of the Titans season, which was, you know, sad. But, you know, once the announcement was made Sunday morning that Marcus wasn't going to play, not really all that surprising. Titans made an interesting game, at least into the fourth quarter. Titans made an interesting game, at least into the fourth quarter. So they had that going for them before the last drive. It was an absolute debacle with like 16 penalties and three snaps or whatever.

So we'll get into all that. Before we do, remind you to go right to museummiracles.com. Cover the Titans for SB Nation. Check us out there. You can follow us on Twitter. I'm at JimMorrisMCM. Terry's at TLambertFB. And you can get the podcast wherever you get your podcasts.

Search out Locked on Titans. We will still be here doing multiple shows per week. From now, we've got free agency, the draft, all that kind of stuff. So we'll still be pumping stuff out. So subscribe to the podcast. A lot of good stuff. We'll have draft people on and all that. So keep tuning in. We'll still have plenty of stuff to talk about here for the next few months

at least Titans fall to the Colts 33-17 now what 0-10 against Andrew Luck in his career it's one of those things where I guess I'm not ever going to believe they'll actually beat him until I see it like I said

you can't be surprised by the result last night once it was announced that Marcus wasn't going to be able to play, we've seen full games from Blaine Gabbert. You kind of know what you're getting there. You hate to end it that way, but when you're out there in your final game, without two of your three, at least, best offensive players,

Marcus is not out there. Delaney hadn't been out there all year, obviously. Without your best offensive player in Jarrell Casey, without your best at least, you know, quarterback in Logan Ryan, I guess an offense as hot as the Colts, Andrew Luck, you really shouldn't be surprised when they lose that game. It's tough because you had the ingredients there. You had the big defensive plays, Jalen Brown, just massive game last night. Pick six, you know, just kept the Titans alive,

shot an arm that they needed. And then you get to the fourth quarter, you get to crunch time, and, you know, Blaine Gabbert just kind of did what we all expected him to do. He just kind of floundered when the lights came on. So it's frustrating because you put Marcus in that situation and you feel pretty good about it because time and time again, Marcus has produced when everything's been on the line late in the game. So, you know, those two interceptions.

The first one was just soul crushing. The Titans were doing everything right. Derrick Henry finally got going. Gabbert throws the touchdown to Luke Stocker. Harold Landry comes back with a sack. Titans get off the field. You get the ball back

only to throw the pick. That was just crushing. I tweeted this last night. It was just a microcosm of being a Titans fan. So that was just crushing. You know, I tweeted this last night. It was just a microcosm of being a Titans fan. They just do just enough to really string you along, get you excited again, and then just crush you. I think you tweeted something similar. So it's just kind of been the past decade. Just disappointing.

You know, we can get into Marcus Mariota, but just didn't have enough out of Blaine Gabbert. Marcus is going to be here next year. A high-level backup quarterback is high on my initial needs list. Yeah, absolutely. Before we get into all that, Jayon Brown, man, what a game from him. And we talked last week about if Blaine Gabbert's going to be started in this game, which obviously he ended up being,

you're going to have to have somebody step up and make some plays, somebody that you're not necessarily expecting to do that, to make some game-changing plays. And Jayon Brown made two of them. That guy needs to be in the Pro Bowl. Hopefully there's enough guys, whether it be in the Super Bowl or whatever, that miss so that he gets to go because he deserves to be there. And, you know, I'm not one of these guys that's like,

oh, we need all the Titans there, you know. But, like, J.M. Brown legitimately deserves to be in the Pro Bowl. He's been such a good player for this team this year. And, I mean, you look at his numbers. I mean, I don't think he has necessarily the tackle numbers that some of their inside linebackers do. But when you look at sacks and just game-changing plays and making two of them last night

the biggest game of the year, he absolutely deserves that. Good for him there. Yeah, I mean, it's like, I don't know, I feel like Gabbert has a little bit of Fitzpatrick in him. And I guess maybe this is the story of being a backup quarterback, right? A guy that's

just kind of a career backup. It just makes some plays where you're like, okay, this guy can do it kind of a career backup. It makes some plays where you're like, okay, this guy can do it. We can do some things with this guy. And then two plays later, throws it inexplicably right to a Colts guy. It's just like when they showed

the Taewon Taylor I guess it was the second interception. The one where he was trying to throw to Taewon Taylor. You see it happen. It's hard when you just see the play on TV happen, and it's hard in, like, you know, when you just see the play on TV, it's kind of hard to see everything that's going on. And I saw somebody say he had Taewon Taylor wide open, and I'm like, okay, I want to see the replay, see what he missed. And he was trying to throw it to Taewon Taylor.

He just, you know, didn't see the guy standing between him and Taewon, and so he just threw it right to that guy. So, I mean, you know, listen, there were some things early in the game. I mean, he had some – there were some throws that if Gabbert made them early in that game, it could have been a different game. At least it would have been, you know, more competitive early. And like I said, I mean, they ended up having it at game. You know, they were only on a touchdown at the start of the fourth quarter,

but that was based on a lot of defensive plays. I mean, that's kind of what got them there. That was based on a lot of defensive plays. That's kind of what got them there. Listen, I understand Deion Lewis and his role on this team. I understand that he's a third down back. I don't understand him being on the field at this point in the season. It's third and three, and you bring Deion Lewis out there,

you're tipping your hand. They know you're going to throw. I just don't, it with as well as derrick henry's been on the ball lately as good as he looked at times last night even um i don't understand why they don't at least keep on so he can catch the ball dion lewis is running routes anyway it's not like he's staying in the block so i don't understand it seems like one of these things where you've got a guy and he has a role and that was the role he was brought in here to play and so it kind of seems like regardless of what else is going on, they were still playing those roles.

And I don't know. I just feel like in a game like last night, you need your best weapons on the field all the time. And Deion Lewis is just not that at this point in the season. I don't know what happened there. It seemed like as the season went along, he lost a little bit of his explosiveness. I don't know if his confidence, you know, kind of the same thing Derrick Henry went through early in the year. But I just – that was something that I didn't understand like last night.

Keep Derrick Henry on the field when it's third and three. I mean, you know, at a certain point on the field, give it to Derrick Henry on third down. See what happens. He might pick up the first down. If he gets two, go for him on fourth down. I just – There were some things and we'll get into this as we review the season over the next few weeks, but

there are just some things that Matt LaFleur did throughout the course of the year that I didn't really understand and that was one of them last night. Yeah, it wasn't a huge deal to me, but I certainly get it. The biggest thing was the Titans had the ball for 19 minutes. Colts had the ball for 40

So it still got Derrick Henry 16 carries and that You know, I saw some tweets last night Why don't Derrick Henry have 30 carries Tyson have the ball because they couldn't get off the field on third down. So I don't have a real big problem with that. It's not like they were wasting carries with with Deion Lewis. It certainly seemed like Derrick Henry had morphed into that feature back that we've all wanted him to be.

I'm with you. I don't know what happened to Deion Lewis because I get it. Guys leave New England and they're not the same player. I get all that. The guy just seemed to evolve into nothing and just produced a ton of negative plays every time he touched the ball.

So, yeah, that's something going into the offseason that's really interesting because he signed a fairly big deal for a veteran running back. And I'm not sure you're getting your value out of that. So, will the Titans kind of shift gears and go somewhere else? You know, you can find running backs anywhere. You can find them late, day three on the draft. So that's kind of an underrated thing heading into this offseason. But Derrick Henry's evolution, it was the biggest story of the season to me.

And it happened so late Really out of nowhere That Jacksonville game just seemed to revive his career So totally just kind of flipped the franchise Flipped the whole attitude Flipped the whole direction Now you kind of think they have an identity going into 2019 And it's exciting

So it just seems like this team is going to build around Derrick Henry, going to build around this offensive line, regardless of what happens with Marcus Mariota, which we can get into, we'll get into all offseason. I think Derrick Henry in the run game will be the primary focus going forward. Yeah, absolutely. And to your point about, you know, they only ran, what, 45 offensive plays. They couldn't stop the run game, which, again,

shouldn't be surprising of the Colts. But, you know, the Colts ran the ball 36 times last night, averaged 4.4 yards per carry. And they were just – they were doing whatever they wanted to do on offense to Colts. And when you can't stop their running game, you just – you know you're in trouble. I mean, Andrew Luck threw the ball 35 times, 24-35.

It was just one of those games where they were just overmatched, quite frankly. Get into all that, the problems with the defensive line and that kind of stuff. These are all conversations that we'll definitely have over the next few weeks. When we come back, we'll talk

about the whole thing with Marcus Mariota. So, obviously, it came out Sunday morning that Marcus Mariota was not going to play. Chris Mortensen had the report that they had talked to an independent spine neurologist, whatever, an independent spine neurologist, whatever, and basically said that if there was more damage to that nerve, that it could affect his ability to

throw the football going forward. Okay? So, you know, I've got people on my timeline which never ceases to amaze me, all the doctors that are on Twitter. But also, guys like, who cares about the future? They've got to win now. Listen,

this team is not winning the Super Bowl. I hate to break it to you all. I know we get feedback. We're not positive enough. That team was not going to win the Super Bowl. That defense without Jor-El Casey, without Logan Ryan, that offense without Delaney Walker, with Marcus Mario

not going to be at 100% any time in the near future, they're not winning the Super Bowl. So it's more important for next year even, and not talk about what happens because we don't know what's going to happen with Marcus here down the road, but it's more important next year for him not to damage his arm long term. And listen, if you're a human being, But it's more important next year for him not to damage his arm long term. And listen, if you're a human being, and I understand that we cheer for this football team,

and it's important to us if they win or if they lose. I get that. Trust me, nobody understands that more than I do. But I don't want Marcus to not be able to grip his hand for the rest of his life. It's not worth him going out there and trying to win for this football team for that to me now you know whatever else and then there's these reports that you know are not even reports there are people that are being irresponsible like clay travis for instance saying he didn't want to play he should have been out there listen i you you have seen nothing official from obviously not from the team. The team's not going to say it even if they did.

I mean, listen, you know, Vince Young refused to go back in that game however many years ago. And Jeff Fisher, who allegedly hated Vince Young and didn't want anything to do with him, he protected Vince Young up and down on that thing. So even if he didn't want to play, the team's not going to say that. But you're not hearing from any of these sources. Ian Rappaport, who, by the way way tweeted that he was going to play Saturday night and then has to backtrack on Sunday morning. But you're not hearing from anybody that

has any knowledge of the situation saying that it was Marcus' decision not to play. When they talked to Taylor LeJuan about it after the game, LeJuan said something to Eric I don't know the guy's last name the Titans beat writer for the Tennessee and Baccarat or whatever his last name is,

had a video with Taylor LeJuan on Twitter. And LeJuan basically said that Vrabel made the decision. He said something along the lines of, I'm proud of Vrabel for making the decision, taking it out of Marcus's hands, because Marcus probably wouldn't have made the smart decision. So again, that's a guy in the locker room that knows what's going on saying something like that. So I can't understand why all these people think they know better

and think that, oh, well, Marcus just doesn't want to play and Clay Travis with his millions of followers out there, get this guy off my team. He doesn't want to be out there in the biggest game, blah, blah, blah. That's so stupid and irresponsible. And I just can't – I don't know. It just – it gets me a little bit tired. Listen, if you listen to this podcast, you know that we like Marcus, that we've supported Marcus, all that kind of stuff.

And I still think that – I still think he has a chance to be a quarterback, whatever. But in this instance, I just think that people need to take a step back and look at the whole situation before just jumping to some conclusion that Marcus Mariano didn't want to play in the biggest game of the year. Yeah, and what Clay referenced, what a lot of people referenced was that he practiced during the week. So that made things look bad, but I get it. I get the frustration. I really do. I was crushed when I saw that because you knew what was coming. But you can't fault a guy.

This nerve issue has been there since week one. It didn't go away. Apparently, it did not go away. We'll never know what really happened. Maybe we will, but probably not. So I have no problem with him shutting it down. I have no problem with a doctor telling him to shut it down. It's bigger than one game.

Like you said, this team wouldn't win the Super Bowl anyway. They're too banged up. You think this team is going to go to Arrowhead and beat the Chiefs? It's just not going to happen. So that's the hard truth there. It sucks for Marcus. You talk about a guy who has shown the ability to play at a very high level, but at every turn his body has failed him. You go back to the MCL, his rookie year, the Dolphins took a cheap shot at him.

You go back to the broken leg in Jacksonville. at him. You go back to the broken leg in Jacksonville. Now you look at this week one nerve deal that stuck with him the entire season. So my whole thing is, how do you evaluate Marcus Mariota? Because clearly this affected him for the entire season. I think it got better in the middle portion, starting with that Chargers game You started to see him find a little bit of a rhythm you started to see him look like his old self But after that Colts game it was all back downhill, so we don't know how much it was bothering him So you talk about well, what do we do with Marcus Mariota long-term? I don't know that you can really evaluate him, at least for this season. So you've got to see how he comes back next year.

He's going to be back next year. You just hope that that gets fixed. That's kind of a tricky deal, losing feeling in the entire right side of your body. I was just shocked at how many people took that and ran with it, who said it was his decision. And look, if I hear one more Steve McNair and Marcus Mariota comparison,

man, I saw somebody say there's no way a stinger would keep Steve McNair out of this game. Well, sure, I'm sure both guys want to play, but you pay those doctors for a reason. They've got to make those tough decisions.

I've got no problem with it. You've got to protect the player long-term. Yeah, and we talked about this last week. The whole McNair thing has gotten – the legend has really outgrown what actually happened. The guy was banged up his whole career. He did play a lot. He did miss a lot of starts too, though. And if you go back and look at what happened And if you go back and look at what happened, you know, if you go

back and look at the numbers, he didn't play in as many games as people think that he did. Yeah, it's just, it's disappointing. Sure, like you said, I mean, when I saw that, I got that update on my phone the first thing yesterday morning, and you're like, well, this sucks.

Like, it's whatever, 8.30 in the morning, and this team already doesn't have a chance to win. The game's not for 12 hours. So, yeah, I get it, but let's just try to put our frustrations in the right place.

Again, I can't all the support that this guy has, Marcus has from his teammates, that doesn't happen if the guy doesn't want to be out there. So, you know, and it's the biggest question probably that we had coming into this season. What do you do with Marcus Mariota? What is he long-term? And unfortunately, we still don't have the answer.

That's the good thing about the way the NFL rookie contracts contracts are set up now they've got this fifth year option that he'll play under you let it play out and you see what happens um like you said high level backup i think is the answer if you want to go sign joe flacco you want to go sign nick foals i mean i had a lot of that yesterday on my timeline whatever man joe flacco is terrible nick foals somebody's gonna pay nick foals 100 million dollars i do you want to do that like it's just you know i think we need to be reasonable with our takes and and what we're what we're thinking about here so that uh you know that's just kind of that was kind of my whole day yesterday was uh logging into twitter periodically and arguing with a couple people and then just jumping back off. So it was a lot of fun.

But anyway, all right, so we'll – coming up to end this, we'll probably just – or we'll put a little bit of a bow on the season and kind of talk about some just quick takeaways that we have and what we can look forward to going into the offseason. So like you said, I mean, I think the biggest revelation for this team probably all year was the derrick henry success um you know he really came on at the end of the year uh whatever happened with him and you know getting on the trade block reportedly or he flew ellen getting carries and the conversation with a george i mean there's a lot of things around that situation but whatever it was something sparked with, and he became a different guy.

And so I think in a season where it seems like we have more questions than answers about a lot of things, I think we know now that they can build a run game around Derrick Henry. And like you said, that gives them something to kind of center their offense on, and then you add a few pieces here and there, and you can have a successful whole of an offense. But at least now you have something that you know you can do well. Look, just kind of as more of a general point,

Titans just went 9-7. Think about everything that happened from week one in Miami, the Marcus injury. Marcus wasn't right all year. Losing Delaney Walker week one in Miami, the Marcus injury, Marcus wasn't right all year. Losing Delaney Walker week one. Dean Pease had a heart attack. You know, just losing players down the stretch. Jarrell Casey, Logan Ryan, Johnnie Smith.

The hits just kept on coming. Rashard Matthews leaving the team. Through all of that, they found a way to win nine games. And they were, you know, just a couple of breaks. You look back to the Nick Williams drop in Buffalo. They were just a couple of breaks away from making the playoff. So I know everyone is upset. I know everyone's mad at the Marcus situation, but you go back to big picture here. It's a pretty impressive opening season for Mike Vrabel's staff. Anything can happen, but I'd guess that most of these coaches return,

and I think that's a bigger deal, and we're not really talking about it. Marcus needs continuity above everything else. This offense needs continuity. We can't be bringing offensive coordinators in year after year after year, which is what the Titans have done for the past decade. You keep this staff together. You aren't learning a new offense. You're not learning a new defensive scheme,

that could be a big deal going into 2019. So you kind of look at it from a big picture. If you just get some breaks with Marcus Mariota, this injury luck should kind of bounce back. It seems to kind of level out from year to year in the league. If you get some more breaks, this is a really talented football team, talented enough to go win a playoff game as we saw last year. So obviously it all hinges on Marcus Mariota, but hopefully, hopefully Marcus can put together a full season next year.

I'd love to see where that takes the Titans. Yeah, and that's the second point I was going to make is, you know, like I said, I've got issues with some of the things that Matt LaFleur did at different points here in the season. But you have to respect the job this coaching staff did this year with everything that they went through. With, you know, from, you know, losing Delaney Walker in week one, which is the guy that you were going to, I mean, he was going to be the best, at least, pass catcher on this team and probably the guy that they had worked on really revolving their offense around.

And then having an issue with Marcus Mariota from that same game throughout the rest of the year. Like you said, I think at some point between really London and the first Colts game, his arm got better, but I don't think it was ever 100% right, and then we saw what happened from there. So for them to do what they did to navigate, which wasn't an easy schedule.

I mean, they played a pretty tough schedule this year, much tougher than the schedule they played last year, didn't have the injury luck they had last year, didn't have the – last year they put a bunch tough schedule this year, much tougher than the schedule they played last year. Didn't have the injury luck they had last year. Last year they put a bunch of backup quarterbacks, a bunch of bad quarterbacks that weren't backups, all that kind of stuff. They didn't have all that this year to go 9-7. First year with the staff, like you said, I'm sure there will be a couple changes, but I would expect everybody mainly to be back. I guess you have to wonder about Dean Pease, his health.

You know, he had the one thing in Indianapolis, but seemed fine other than that. But, you know, I'd be good with bringing most everybody back. You know, like I said, offensive line, you got some questions there, whatever. But continuity for Marcus, that's the biggest thing. You'll have now a whole year in the system, get him healthy in an offseason. Kind of see where it goes from there. I'm excited about Mike Vrabel as the head coach. I think he did a great job of being a guy that was able to keep the

franchise stable when a lot of different things were going on around him. I don't think enough can be said about that, about the job that he did. Again, you know, and just look at the organization as a whole. The first time that they've had three winning seasons in a row since they moved to Tennessee. You know, there's a lot of positive things here. There's a lot of questions, sure. But I think you can definitely say that things are trending

in the right direction. And if you get a couple of key acquisitions here and there, have better injury luck. You're in the mix next year. Now, the AFC South is scary at this point. I mean, you've seen that this time last year, there were questions whether

Andrew Luck would ever throw a football again or not. And you saw, obviously, what he's been doing this year. Deshaun Watson is back healthy. The Jaguars are a dumpster fire, which is awesome. But, you know, you've got two really good teams in this division and the Titans. So, I mean, it's like it's going to be tough, but I think there's a lot to build on here. But I think there's a lot to build on here. And if a couple of things go their way this offseason,

then I think you've got a chance to be in the mix again next year. And look, it's three years in a row where they've at least gone into week 16 with a chance to make the playoffs. And listen, look around the league, and there are not many teams that can say that. So that is positive, and there are a lot of things to take away from this season Even with the way it ended last night Above all else you got to find some consistency. I think that yeah look at the crowd last night And the crowd was outstanding atmosphere was outstanding. Why don't we get that every week? I For me, I think it's just the crowd never knows what Titans team is going to show up. You finally buy in, and they go out up in Indy and don't show up.

You look at the Baltimore game. You look at losing to the Bills. But then you've got the highs of beating the Eagles like they did and beating the Patriots like they did. So somehow, someway, they've got to find some consistency. They've got to get that consistent effort. That's the biggest thing for me, and I really think that's why this fan base has kind of struggled to really wrap their arms around this roster, this team.

It's been that way for the past couple years. It's really strange. I know there's ups and downs in the league, but I don't know. It just seems like the Titans are way more up and way more down than anyone in the league. So that's what I'm looking for. There's no reason to walk out there and play like you did against Baltimore, play like you did against the Colts the first time around. That's what I'll be looking for in 2019.

Yeah, absolutely. Hopefully we can get some of that. Like I said, overall, I think that you've got a more consistent group than you have in the past. Like you said, from week to week, you just kind of don't know what's going to happen. All right, that'll do it for today. I hope everybody has a great New Year's Eve. We will be back probably Tuesday night with another episode,

so keep an eye out for that we'll have a lot more on this game Mike Vrabel I'm assuming will have a press conference today which is Monday kind of wrapping up the season you'll get players exit interviews and that kind of stuff so we'll cover all that on musicmiracles.com and we'll talk about things that were said

Tuesday night when we record so again you can follow us on Twitter at jmorrismcm and at tlimbertfb for Terry this is Jimmy saying Happy New Year and thanks for listening to Locked on Titans