Locked On Titans - Daily Podcast On The Tennessee Titans - Locked on Titans: Bucs/Titans joint practice notes

Episode Date: August 16, 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, what's going on tonight? Not a whole lot, man. What's going on? Not too much. I got the opportunity to go out and watch the Titans practice against the Buccaneers today, so that was pretty cool. We'll get into a little bit of that, kind of what I saw, and get some opinions on what that stuff means. But before we do all that, we will remind you we write for musicofmiracles.com and recover the Titans for SB Nation. So you can check us out there. You can follow us on Twitter. I'm at jmorsmcm. Terry is at tlambertfb.

And you can get the podcast wherever you subscribe to podcasts. iTunes, Stitcher, Spotify. Just search out Locked on Titans and you can find us there. If you subscribe, you'll get the newest episodes as soon as they're available. We appreciate that. Rate and review, all those good things. All right, so like I said, I was out there today.

I actually got a media credential, so not for the Titans, to let us have a few of those during training camp. But I mainly watched the defense. If you're not familiar with St. Thomas Sports Park, you've never been out there. They've got three fields now. The Titans offense is going against the Buccaneers defense on the closest field

to the gate where everybody comes in. They did some special team work and stuff on the middle field. Then on the far field, that's where the Titans defense was going against the Buccaneers offense. I decided to watch the defense today just because I'm really interested in the secondary. There's been a lot of hype about those guys throughout camp. And so I figured enough people will be watching the offense, we can get a report on that.

But I wanted to go over there and see what the defense was doing. Now, you know, they started out doing one-on-one drills with just the cornerbacks lined up against the receivers for the Buccaneers. The Buccaneers receivers won pretty much all of those. But in one-on-ones, that's always going to be slanted toward the receiver. You're going to see that. That wasn't any big deal. They moved to

seven-on-seven, and I thought Titans defensive backs held up pretty well. The Buccaneers actually have a pretty good receiving core with Deshaun Jackson, Mike Evans, Chris Godwin. They've got some talented guys over there. They completed passes, but they didn't hit any big shots down the field,

and that's something that you're always worried about with the Buccaneers, especially with Deshaun Jackson. Titans were able to keep up from doing that. Now, I mean, Mike Evans was pretty much unstoppable. They could get the ball to him whenever he wanted it. But, you know, in that kind of scenario where there's in the seven on seven there's not a pass rush obviously they're not they're not game planning they're not scheming to take anything away so i mean yeah mike evans they got in whenever he wanted him gonna be good

coverage and all that stuff but again like i don't take that as any slight or whatever to what what this offensive backfield is going to be. My main thing with watching, are they giving up big shots? They weren't doing that. Is Mike Evans just wide open and they're hitting him? And there were guys with him every time. So I don't know. I think that some people took away a little bit differently than what I saw today. But I didn't think it was a disaster for the Titans' defensive backs.

Yeah, it's always interesting just following on Twitter because you seem to get the highlights of those one-on-one battles that don't mean a whole lot. You can take bits and pieces here and there. But for the most part, they're geared towards the receivers. Receivers are always going to win those. So I wanted to talk a little bit about Malcolm Butler. You saw him get beat.

I think it was a one-on-one so against Deshaun Jackson so like I just said they're geared to the receivers but how did he look out there maybe in a team setting we saw him get beat deep the other night just seemed to be just a little bit of uneasiness about him on Twitter today yeah and he looked fine I mean again there it was one of those things where when you're watching it there weren't a lot of balls hitting the ground they weren't jumping a lot of routes and picking stuff off i'll be interested to see if there's more of that tomorrow just with a little bit of more familiarity and again you know you have to keep a couple things in mind when you're talking

about what the titans defensive backs have done so far in camp one the titans receiving core is you know not great and especially when cory davis hasn't been out there richard matthews hasn't been out there um you know those days when neither one of those guys are there the defensive backs are going to have uh an advantage you would hope they would because there's a lot more talent on that side of the ball it's like i said when those two guys are out and then plus once you you know the titans once they go against each other for so many days, defensive backs kind of know the routes.

They can kind of see things coming. They can cheat a little bit and all that kind of stuff. So, you know, not surprised they didn't look as good against the Buccaneers receivers as they have against the Titans receivers. But at the same time, Malcolm Butler held up well. I mean, again, I didn't see in all of the the 7-on-7 and 11-on-11 stuff, the Buccaneers didn't hit any big plays. So, you know, the thing with Malcolm Butler, again, like you said,

that was a one-on-one. And the other night, I mean, we talked about it a little bit after the game. But it was a great route by Devontae Adams, a great release. You know, once he saw the ball coming, he created that space. And so, yeah, sure, you want your big-ticket cornerback to be able to shut that down. But those kind of plays are going to happen from time to time. I thought he held up well. Again, it's just so ridiculous when you watch these guys go up against Mike Evans

because there were times all three of the Titans' top guys, Butler, Logan Ryan, Adore Jackson, there were different times where they were guarding Mike Evans like on his hip. Ball comes in, they get a hand in, Evans just rips it away and, you know, runs up the field. He's a different caliber player, really, than anybody on that field and anything the Titans have.

I mean, hopefully, you know, Corey Davis can get to a similar level of that. But overall, like I said, I thought they held up pretty well. The pass rush, you know, you don't – obviously they're not rushing in seven-on-seven. They did a little bit of team stuff. There were a couple plays where guys got in the backfield. Jarrell Casey had a play where he got back there and disrupted the Buccaneers' timing. So that was good to see.

But, you know, overall, I thought it was just thought it was just a good enough day for the defense. Like I said, I'll be interested to see kind of what it looks like tomorrow when they've got a little bit more familiarity with the guys they're going up against. Yeah, Adore Jackson seemed to stand out today. Again, just following from afar. Jameis Winston even singled him out in his press conference after the game. Called him a rookie, but, of course, he's a second-year player. But said he was really special.

He saw a report that he lined up on O.J. Howard out wide and blanketed him and took him out of a play. So that's a really good development. I mean, if there's going to be one guy that really emerged from that secondary, I want it to be a Dory Jackson. You know, the Titans have invested in that first-round pick there. I think he's got the most upside out of anybody. So if he can come along and take strides like he did in the last season,

this secondary, man, it's going to be so much fun to watch. Yeah, and keep in mind, too, that the Buccaneers are a good team for the Titans to go up against because they have a lot of weapons. I don't know how good they're going to be. I think you've got all the stuff with James Winston and the four-game suspension, and I don't know if the Buccaneers' defense is going to be that good. But they've got a lot of weapons when you talk about, like I said, you've got Evans, you've got Deshaun Jackson, two different types of receivers. I mean, polar opposites, but they're both good players. You've got O.J. Howard and Cameron Brate. They don't have as much on a run game as maybe some other teams do.

But it's a good team to kind of measure yourself against and see what you've got. And like I said, overall, I thought they held up well. So like I said, we'll see what happens tomorrow. And then obviously they'll play on Saturday. But I think that probably for what the coaches and everybody are trying to take away from this week, I think the practices are probably more important than what actually happens in the game on Saturday. Because the Titans, you'd think the starters are probably going to play a quarter and a half.

I mean, they asked Mariota after practice today, somebody did, if he has been told how much he's going to play, and he said he didn't know yet. But generally, you'll see, you know, a few series maybe into the second quarter. So you're not going to learn as much from that as you are from what's been going on out there. All right, coming up in a second, we'll talk about kind of what we saw from the offense and kind of how that measures up. Before we do that, I'll tell you about NordicTrack. You know, as well as I do, we get busy.

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using the offer code locked on. Again, visit nordictrack, that's N-O-R-D-I-C-T-R-A-C-K dot com slash locked on and use offer code LOCKEDON during checkout to save $75 off of your purchase. So the offense, you know, same one-on-one drills again that are slanted towards the receivers. You saw Taewon Taylor over there making plays. One thing I will say, you know, I saw, and again, I was over there watching the defense,

so I didn't see as much of this. But the one play that where Taewon Taylor, I mean, the ball was kind of under the throne, and he came back and caught the ball. I think that's something that you can take away from a drill like that and make an adjustment on the ball, going around the cornerback, making a play. I think you can get something away from that other than, hey, this guy just ran out of the field and beat this guy. So, I mean, it's good to see him stepping up and making plays, again,

against guys that are, you know, not the same guys you see every day, going out there and being able to make some things happen. And, you know, a lot of people have given up on Taylor, people that aren't really familiar with everything that went on here last year. And he's a guy that was slow picking up. We talked about this last week a little bit. The offense, you know, through the spring. But in training camp, he's really showed up, showed up today.

And if he can be good, if he can be a legitimate threat, and then you add that to Rashard Matthews, to Corey Davis, to Delaney Walker and Johnnie Smith, that's the type of thing that's really going to put this offense over the top yeah he he showed exactly what you want to see out of that uh out of that drill and that's that's route running put a foot in the ground and go not a lot of dancing you know you want to be realistic you can't run a seven or eight second route uh like I saw Mike Evans do a couple times today. So he won what he was supposed to win. That contested grab was big for me because that's been something I've been

saying all summer. Can he win down the field? You know, it's great that he can run, but can he go win a football? So, yeah, he kind of came back to the ball, broke off his vertical route, and still managed to catch that ball. So, now, the Tampa Bay secondary is really bad. If you follow fantasy football, if you follow any fantasy analysts, they'll tell you that the Tampa Bay secondary is horrible,

and it's one that you should target all year if you're playing DFS. So, kind of keep that in the back of your mind, but kind of through all the crap of training camp, through all the injuries, Corey Davis stepping up and delivering a big day. He was the talk of camp, clearly. Somebody said he was the best player on the field today. So that's a good sign, regardless of who you're going up against.

Yeah, absolutely. And, you know, we've talked so much about this, and obviously, you know, Marcus Mariota is the key to all of this. But I think the next most important guy here is Corey Davis. And the good thing is that consistently when he's been on the field, that's what everybody's been saying, right, that he's the best player out there, that he looks different than everybody else all that kind of stuff and so that's the thing that i think is the most encouraging because yeah you never know what's going to happen with injuries right

i mean he obviously missed most of the year last year uh with the hamstring injury but when he was on the field you saw how much of a part of the offense they they tried to make him um you saw the the two touchdowns in the playoff game against the Patriots. So, I mean, the good thing is when he's been available, he's been really good. So I think people, you know, there are some people that will rush the judgment of these types of things because he didn't, you know, have that great rookie year that we all hoped he would have. But, you know, when you look at the circumstances surrounding that,

the injury, the offense, all that kind of stuff. And look at, you know, remember in that draft there were three what top 10 wide receivers yeah and it was him mike williams with the chargers and john ross and cincinnati and none of those guys had did much of anything last year injuries and john ross had some other issues but you know all three of those guys are looking to bounce back this year and so yeah you'd love for your guy to come in and be a stud from day one. But that wasn't the case. He didn't put up the numbers that you want him to last year.

But to me, the most important thing is when he's available, he's dominating. And he's been available all this week so far, knock on wood, and hopefully he's able to play in the game on on saturday and that's just more time with marcus all that stuff and you can just tell that they're starting to develop a chemistry and that that to me is an important thing them having the time out there learning this offense together coming up in it together um i mean i don't know i'm still there there's been nothing that i've seen so far from cory davis that has lessened my optimism about how good I think he can be. Yeah, absolutely.

And, yeah, there's another part of this. Rashard Matthews, we still haven't seen him. So when you see these reports that the Titans receivers aren't very good, just remember that's a pretty solid piece of the receiver's room. So I understand that you got eyes on him today can you report anything to us did he did he run did he do anything physical at all i did see him jog from the practice field into the building and he looked fine i mean he wasn't you know in a dead sprint but he's out there there's no he's got no braces on anything like that he was

out there pretty much the whole time today um standing around with the ones it was interesting today because you know mike braybill had said before that um when guys aren't practicing that they're not going to be out there standing around and you saw a lot of richard mackinty out there today you saw a lot of jack conklin again not practicing but standing around and i think it's probably just kind of you know in this type of scenario scenario, being out there, hearing the stuff that's going on and all that stuff. But, I mean, I'm just – and, again, we've beaten this horse into the ground, right? But, like, I don't understand what's going on.

I mean, he looks healthy. He's running around. He's running around before practice. But there's still – we still don't know what it is that's hurt. But he looks okay. Another point about that, so to ron davenport if you're if you haven't started following him yet on twitter you need to do that he's the new titans guy for espn um really really good but he made a note today in his you know list of observations

about how much the titans were in 12 personnel meaning two tight ends out there with delaney and johnny and i wonder do you think any of that changes when Rashard Matthews gets back? Like, is that something, I mean, I still think they're going to do it a lot because those guys are both really good and they present matchup problems. But do you think that the amount of time that they're in that right now has something to do with Rashard Matthews not being out there? You know, I don't think it does because I could be wrong on this, but I'm pretty sure the Rams played a bunch of two tight end sets.

They drafted a couple, and their names escape me right now. But, you know, as Teron pointed out, it gives the defense another gap to worry about when you're running that zone, that outside zone with Derrick Henry. So I think that's going to be a base formation for this team and look johnny smith is going to be a big part of this offense you know that's a guy that maybe we haven't talked about enough but you know the guys that are out there every day jim wyatt uh guys like that just continue to say hey he's going to be really involved in this offense so

i don't think that's tied to Rashard Matthews at all. You know, maybe it's why Taewon Taylor's getting the looks on the outside because you won't have a slot receiver in that formation. So maybe that's something you can read into there. But, no, I don't think that changes at all. Yeah, so it's going to be just a watch. You want everybody healthy. You want them to have all the weapons at their disposal

so they can do a bunch of different things that you want to see. And like you said, we haven't talked a whole lot about Jonu, but every day you hear people saying positive things about him. And I can't remember. I think it was I was listening to the Official Titans podcast, the OTP with Mike Keith and them, and he was talking about when they're interviewing Marcus, Marcus Mariota, and Marcus is very standard in his answersx mariotta and like he's you know marcus

is very standard in his answers i mean he's very you know doesn't show a lot of emotion answers questions all that stuff but somebody asked him about johnny smith one day and he kind of lit up and like talked about you know kind of went into detail on the things that he's been doing so yeah he's a guy that's going to be interesting to watch and we'll just see um you know as the preseason progresses and the ones get more time in these games uh you know what we can see from him all right so uh coming up we'll talk a little bit about what the rest of the week is going to look like for us and then i'm going to just kind of ask a couple of questions from some observations that were that were made today and we'll see if

they're a big deal or not all right so one thing that I've seen a bunch, and I saw, so the only time I saw a Titans offense today was at one point they brought both teams together on that front field and ran, I think it was about 14 plays, seven with the ones, seven with the twos, where everybody was together. And so that was like i said that's the only time i saw the titans office well in one of those plays today jason pierre paul beat uh

lawan got to mariotta mariotta actually tripped over his own feet he said after practice and he went down of course that was a thing and then taylor one was in jason pierre paul's face after the next play but um the buccaneers tweeted out a thing about you know jb putting somebody on skates or whatever and then i'm just scrolling through my twitter later on and people are like oh no lawan's you know whatever and he's taking plays off now and all this stuff and i'm just like you know the things that people make a big deal out of i mean you know what taylor lawan's gonna get beaten this year right i mean, it's going to happen. He's not going to be perfect.

He's going to give up a sack. He's going to give up some pressures and that kind of stuff. But I think it's just funny how people overreact to these types of things. Training camp Twitter, it might be the worst Twitter. You're reacting to – No, no, no. Free agency Twitter is the worst. Yeah, probably. You're probably right. But, okay, close second. So you're reacting to things that

you're not even seeing on your TV. You're reacting to a tweet that you're reading. So, yeah, I mean, Taylor wants to get beat. It's gonna happen. It's gonna happen multiple times. It's just funny that, you know, they dragged the contract into this. Oh, he got paid, so he's gonna shut it down.

So, yeah, I don't think you're going to have a Hainsworth with a Redskins situation here. I think LeJuan has submitted himself to Nashville, and he calls himself dad. So, yeah, I don't think you're going to have to worry about LeJuan. Yeah, it's just funny. And then these other receivers uh deontay burnett darius jennings deontay burnett made another play today uh darius jennings i heard him on the radio midday 180 uh driving after after practice um we've talked a little about this but like what what's the ceiling for whoever that fifth receiver is, that sixth receiver, whatever those guys are?

I mean, what do you think the ceiling is for any of those guys in this offense? Zero. I mean, you know, that's the unpopular answer. You know, you always want to give a guy a chance. But it just seems like we see it every year. You know, and this year I'm guarding against it. I'm just not buying it. You know, maybe it's a new staff, so maybe I shouldn't do that.

But like Deontay Burnett, you hear so much hype about him, and then he doesn't play until, what, the start of the fourth quarter last week? So that was – maybe I'm reading too much into that, but, man, I just have no expectations for any of these guys anymore. I've just been burned too many times. Yeah, so, I mean, mean i think like you said that's another one of the you know training camp twitter things everybody gets all fired up about some of these guys and then i mean you know hopefully they can find a guy out of that group that can be serviceable and can help them but really if those

guys are getting significant playing time it means somebody else is hurt and you know that's not a good thing. So, anyway, that was kind of what the takeaways from today. Like I said, tomorrow night we're going to have Rhett Bryan on, who is a part of the Titans radio broadcast team. He also did the July 4th McNair special that they ran all day on 104.5, which is really good. If you haven't heard that, I think they've got it available on the website,

so you can check that out. But, anyway, he's been watching practice. I talked to him a little bit this morning before practice. He's been watching practice all camp long with Dave McGinnis. He's picked up a lot just by sitting around and listening to him talk about practice. So it'll be good to get his perspective. And like I said, he said he's watching the defense today. He's going to watch the offense tomorrow, so we'll kind of get his takeaway.

That's supposed to be able to go up there tomorrow, but I've got a meeting at my real job that I can't get out of. So unfortunately, I won't be able to be out there., but I've got a meeting at my real job that I can't get out of. So, unfortunately, I won't be able to be out there. But, anyways, that'll do it for tonight. Like I said at the top, museummiracles.com. Check us out there. You can read my full recap of the Titans defense there. I posted it earlier today, and we'll have a bunch of stuff.

And if you want to follow one thread with all the guys that will be at training camp, we'll have that up on the site in the morning. So you can check that out. Follow us on Twitter at jmorrismcm, at TLambertFB, and subscribe to the podcast. Just search out Locked on Titans. For Terry, this is Jimmy saying thanks for listening, and we will talk to you again tomorrow.