Locked On Titans - Daily Podcast On The Tennessee Titans - Locked on Titans: DeMarco injury, odds and more

Episode Date: December 27, 2017

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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 tonight? Not near as good as you, sitting down at the beach. Yeah, I'm sitting down here at Dolphin Island, so if we have a little bit of connectivity issues or sound issues, I apologize for that. But we're down here until New Year's Eve, so pretty excited about that. Sitting down here on the balcony right now overlooking the ocean so that's not things could be worse but anyway um all right so we actually had a little bit of titan news today which is kind of weird for a tuesday but um we'll talk a little bit about demarco murray and i guess maybe kind of conflicting reports on his knee injury and what we think it means then we'll talk talk about the Titans' 2018 opponents. We know who those are at this point.

We know who they'll be playing at home and away. I don't know, obviously, the exact order they'll play them in the schedule yet, but know who they'll be playing. And then we'll talk a little bit about the line for the Titans-Jaguars in Week 17, which kind of surprised Terry and I both when we saw it. But anyway, as always, I'm Jimmy Morris. We write for MuseumMiracle.com. I'm on Twitter at jmorrismcm.

Terry's on Twitter at tlambertfb. All right, so DeMarco Murray today was announced that, well, so Mike Malarkey says he has an LCL sprain, and, you know, he's day-to-day. That's what Mike Malarkey said. Adam Schefter, a little bit before we started reporting this show, said that he has a grade 3 MCL spring, but that DeMarco wants to play on Sunday.

So, I mean, to me, it sounds like that they're shot he's going to play. Now, we've seen, I mean, there was a week, a couple of, or there was a game, a few weeks, I guess after that Colts Monday night game where he just looked banged up. We really thought they were going to arrest him a week, give him a week to get better.

He responded well to treatment and was back out there the next week. At this point, I wouldn't be shocked if he's ready to go, but I would say it's probably a pretty safe bet that he won't play. Mike Marquis didn't close the door today, and we know how much he loves DeMarco. So that will be something to watch as the week goes along. Yeah, I think the key here is he left the door open, he said, maybe in a limited role that Murray could play. So, I mean, we've said it all along, it's clear this staff has some sort of

trust issue with Derrick Henry, with other backs on the roster on third downs, passing downs, pass protection. So that's DeMarco Murray's role, if nothing else. Now, the past couple weeks we've seen him be the bell cow, and he's kind of reestablished himself as the running back one here. But I think that much is out of the question for sure. So, like you were saying, DeMarco Murray is loved by his coaching staff. You know, I texted you in the news broke today, and I said Malarkey might run him out there in a wheelchair himself

out of the tunnel. So, you know, the Schefter news, if the Schefter news is correct, I don't see any way he can go. I don't know who to believe right now, but we've seen Murray be banged up throughout the season, and we've seen him play when we thought he would rest, so maybe we'll be surprised again. Yeah, I think you're right.

We talked last night about the fact that um you know that that doctor that writes for the san diego whatever paper said that he thought it looked more like an mcl or an acl um and so i mean the shepherd report you know goes along those lines but the titans are still saying lcl so i don't i don't really know what it means but regardless in my mind for a limited role if that's what they're saying, if he's going to play a limited role, if they just truly don't trust Derrick Henry on third down, passing situations, whatever, then I'm fine with DeMarco Murray coming in when it's third and 18, when it's third and 12.

You know, when you're in third and long, second and 15, whatever. Those types of situations are if he's going to play that limited role. But if he's limited and they're going to give him any carries at all, I think that's a terrible idea. I think it's dumb. I don't understand. I mean, I know we've got issues with Derrick Henry, and we've talked a lot about that, about how some people pretend like

once they hand it over to Derrick Henry, he's going to rush 1,500 yards and we're never going to have to worry about it again it's not gonna be that simple but we've seen this year derrick henry is the better back right now and he's the one that needs to be getting the carries and especially when you start talking about demarco murray being hobbled like he's going to be it just doesn't make sense for them to give him anything more than a you know blocking situations those kind of snaps that's the only thing that it would make sense for them to give him anything more than a you know blocking situations those kind of snaps that's the only thing that it would make sense for them to give him and you know we've kind of not been able to criticize john robinson at all because virtually everything he's done to this point has turned to gold uh considering where he started but i'm just i'm shocked that they didn't

bring in another back i mean they're they've rolled with two running backs, which is just unheard of in the NFL. I really thought they would add a pass catcher, a theoretic type, even going bargain bin hunting, just signing a cheap guy that can go out and catch some passes and help out on third downs. So I'm really surprised that we haven't seen that. And, you know, they're in a position now where it might finally bite them. So I don't know how much David Flewellen is going to do in terms of pass catching. We've seen them shy away from Derrick Henry in that role.

They just don't trust Kalfani Muhammad. You know, they didn't trust him in preseason so well, but they trust him right now? So I'm not going to shut the door on them poaching somebody off a practice squad just to have another body up. But it's a really interesting situation. And, you know, I don't know if it was Malarkey's call or John Robinson's call on the end, but just not adding that third capable back might come back to bite them.

Yeah, absolutely. And we'll get an indication of how this is going to go as the week goes along. Obviously, practice reports will tell us some stuff. But if they make a move, whether it's Muhammad or somebody else, then we'll know that DeMarco Murray really is either going to be out or extremely limited and they need somebody else. You know, in the case right now, if you have a limited Murray, limited to the passing down roll or whatever, then you've only got two healthy running backs.

You've got Henry and you've got Flewell. And if one of those guys, if Henry goes down, then it's just Flewell. And I don't think we want that. I know that they're going to bring in somebody that's going to come in and save them. But you've got to have at least another guy out there in case, in case one of the other guys goes down. So anyway, that'll be something we'll keep an eye on as the week goes along.

Just to see, like I said, roster moves, I think will probably be the best indicator of where they feel like Murray is. If they add somebody, then they, they don't feel good about his chances to be out there.

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Search Draft in the App Store. And you can use the promo code LONFL. All right, so Titans 2018 opponents were announced today. Terry posted about that on site, musiccitymiracles.com. You can check that out there. You know, we were talking before we went on real quick. When you look at next year's schedule, the fact that they play the AFC East, they play the NFC East, two divisions that are pretty tough generally.

Just looking at it from right now compared to this year's schedule, next year's schedule is a lot harder. And Terry made the point, you know, the Titans are never going to get an easier schedule than what they had this year. So you're looking at home games against the Jets, Patriots, Eagles, Redskins, Ravens, then obviously the division opponents, and then away games against the Bills, Dolphins, Cowboys, Giants, and Chargers, and then the division opponents there as well.

So, you know, I mean, looking at that now, we're not going to sit down and go through what we think are wins and losses because that's ridiculous to do at this point. But as kind of a high overview, Terry, what stood out to you when you first saw those names? It's just like I told you. It makes this year's schedule look really simple, really easy.

So much can change. We've seen the Titans. We thought the Titans were going to be a top-tier team. And they've come out and they've been a middle-of-the-road team. So when you talk about teams like the Eagles, Titans were going to be a top-tier team, and they've come out and they've been a middle-of-the-road team. So, you know, when you talk about teams like the Eagles, teams are going to get film on Carson Wentz, and maybe they'll be able to slow him down.

You don't know how he's going to respond to the ACL. So a lot of things can change. But just looking at it right now, it just looks like three or four steps tougher than what the Titans are going through right now. So you're talking about the Cowboys, and the Giants will be a better trip to play the Chargers. Titans never went out there.

So it's going to be tough. This staff is going to really have to improve. This roster is really going to have to improve. Marcus Mario is really going to have to improve. Or, you know, it might be a down year, and that might spur some coaching changes. Yeah, I mean, like you said, so much can change with teams between now and then.

Even in the season, we've seen injury and that kind of stuff pop up. I don't know. I just don't see a path that's easier than what they've had this year. So, I don't know. But it's always fun to see those names out there and for things to already be decided as far as who's going to be where in the division. And obviously, if you're not familiar with the way the NFL schedule works, each year they play everybody in the division twice.

They play an entire division from the AFC. They play an entire division from the NFC, and those rotate on a yearly basis. And then they play the team from the two divisions in the AFC, but they don't play the whole division. They play the two teams that finish in the same spot as them. So the Titans are second in the division. So that's why you have the Ravens and the Chargers. So that's what you're looking at for next year, and that's how the schedule works.

So you can kind of figure out where they're going to be as the season goes along. But then the last two opponents are sometimes not finalized until after week 17. But Titans already have that this year. So anyway, obviously that'll be interesting to watch, and we'll keep it up with that as we go along there. Alright, so coming up to this, we'll talk

a little bit about, we didn't touch last night on the NFL's I don't know if it's an apology or an admission of wrongdoing, on the onside kick against the Rams on Sunday. So we'll talk a little bit about that, and we will talk about the line for Titans-Jaguars, which is kind of interesting. Okay, so real quick on the NFL, or on the onside kick,

the NFL basically came out and said they screwed up, or the referee screwed up. One of the referees basically told the Titans that the ball was in play while the other referee had said the timeout was longer. And so then, I think once they realized they had done that, they had to figure out what they could do to try to make up for that.

We know a guy that's a college ref, and he said he knew of a similar thing that happened. The ref blew the whistle for play after they had kind of miscommunicated on one sideline, and he ended up getting fired over it. Now, I don't know what's going to happen here because the guy we know said that the referee that he knew didn't change the outcome like they gave the team to recover the onside kick the ball. Obviously, that's not what happened in the Titans game. But, you know, like we said last night, there's been so much this year with the rule, what's a catch, what's not what happened in the Titans game. But like we said last night, there's been so much this year with rules,

what's a catch, what's not a catch, and then just blown calls in games not going on. We saw one in the Titans-Steelers game in the Thursday night football game, that fumble that went forward right at the end of the first half. Obviously, it didn't end up mattering. The Titans got smoked in that game. But the Steelers got like a like a 15 yards further in than they should have and were able to kick a field goal because of it so and obviously Miami I mean we we know what happened down there so you know the Titans have been I guess the victim of

these things a couple times this year but it's not exclusive to the Titans it's been all across the NFL you know the funny thing is they made a big deal at the beginning of the year about how they were going to have some full-time officials this year. Honestly, I can't remember a year having as many different controversial things as this year has. It's ridiculous. NFL can come out and say

we were wrong, but you can't go back and change the call. We don't know how it would have affected the game, but it was certainly a crucial point in the game where the Titans had just kind of recaptured momentum. They get that ball back, you don't know what happens. And we'll never know.

So, honestly, all today kind of did was kind of turn the knife a little bit for Titans fans. So they've been on the wrong end of these blown calls now three or four times. You had the weird non-interception call in San Francisco. You had the Johnnie Smith pass interference in Miami. You had the Matt Castle fake fumble that went forward 15 yards. So sometime soon, I hope, the Titans are going to be on the other end of these calls. Yeah, absolutely.

So we'll keep an eye on that. Like you said, it just doesn't do you any good when they come out and say, oh, sorry, we messed up. Doesn't change what happened on Sunday. All right, so last thing tonight, the Titans-Jaguars line came out today and we were sitting at chick-fil-a eating lunch and terry texted me and said the line opened titans minus six and i really i like i thought that i read it wrong like i had to i had to kind of stare at my

phone for a minute because i thought it was going to be like titans plus six would have made more sense to me um and so i guess i mean you know obviously we know the titans and the jaguars first time they played but that that seems like you know ages like like that seems like a season or two ago um so i mean i don't think it's really fair to use that as a reason for this obviously what the what vegas is factoring on is the jaguars resting some guys um if you look at my book you know the the titans are onand-a-half point favorite. So, I mean, I think it's adjusted a little bit in some spots to what it came out with. But it's an interesting spot because, I mean,

you think about guys that Jaguars could rest. And Terry and I talked about this off air before earlier this week. Who are they going to rest? Are they going to rest Bortles? I mean, they could, I guess. But they've seemed this year to really try to run their game plan regardless of what is going on because I think they know in the playoffs they're going to need him to throw to win some games so you know maybe they give him some time off in this game they could rest Leonard Fournette he's been you

know banged up with different stuff as the season's gone along but I mean really it's the it's the guys on the defensive side of the ball that um you know that i would be worried about and with their injuries at receiver um you know i wouldn't think that i would think they would want to get as many reps as they could with guys like kenny cole and and uh dd westbrook and those guys have you know westbrook was hard at the beginning of the year those guys haven't been on the field very much now sure they'll get hearns and Lee back at some point. But I don't know. I'm not sure they're going to rest a lot of guys on offense.

If they rest a few of the guys on defense, I guess you could see something happen there. But I don't know. It'll be interesting to see. Jim Rohn came out and said today that they're going to play to win. You know, they're going to play like they do always. And coaches generally say that. And every now and then they'll say, no, we're going to shut guys down. But we'll know more as the week goes along,

and especially if you have a couple of guys, like Jalen Ramsey or whoever, inactive on game day. That'll give you kind of a better indication of what the Jaguars are looking at in this game. Yeah, this is a really weird spot. I mean, I feel like people just have this unrealistic expectation when they see rumors that the Jaguars are going to rest their starters. It's not like you're resting Tom Brady

and your whole roster is going to change because you're sitting your quarterback. I'm not sure how big of a fall-off it is from Blake Bortles to Chad Henney. You know, they've played without Leonard Fournette a ton recently. So if you start talking about resting Jalen Ramsey, You know, they've played without Leonard Fournette a ton recently. So if you start talking about resting Jalen Ramsey, if you start talking about resting, you know, some of those defensive starters, A.J. Bouye, okay, then we can talk. But we don't really know what they're going to do.

So it's kind of interesting. I was shocked to see it so high. I think Titans by three is much more accurate. So we'll see. It's weird to talk about the Jaguars resting starters. They're just not, you know, we see teams with quarterbacks, teams with obvious offensive playmakers. We see those guys being rested.

So I'm not sure we've seen a team like the Jaguars in this situation before resting players. So it's kind of new territory for us. Yeah, I mean, you think about like a Le'Veon Bell. You know, the Steelers played the Browns this weekend. Now, the Steelers could still, if they win, the Patriots lose, the Steelers could still get home field advantage. But, I mean, you think about something like that making sense, the rest of the guy, like you said, Tom Brady.

You don't think about, you know, your cornerbacks and your defensive linemen. So we'll just kind of see how that goes. And, again, like I said, we probably won't know anything until Sunday as far as what they're going to do. But it's an interesting spot, too, because the Titans more than likely are going to be the sixth seed. You know, if the Ravens win, the Titans win. You've got a bunch of teams.

Anyway, if it plays out, you've got a bunch of teams at 9-7. Obviously, if it's only the Titans and the Ravens that end up at 9-7, then the Titans would be the foul because they beat the Ravens. But if you've got two or three teams there, the Titans end up as a 6-8, and they've got to go to Jacksonville and play again next week. So, you know, all that stuff, it makes for a little bit more of an interesting dynamic there. So, like I said, we won't know anything, so we'll

keep an eye on that as the week goes along. Terry, anything else we need to touch on tonight? Yeah, it's worth mentioning, if the Bengals beat the Ravens and the Titans win, Tennessee would go to Kansas City to take on the Chiefs.

So kind of keep that in mind. I think we would all probably rather play the Jaguars. Am I right on that? Yeah, I think so. I think the Chiefs have found their mojo, however you want to say that, on offense again. They lost it in the middle of the year. But they seem to be hitting on all cylinders again.

And you don't want to go to Arrowhead in January. That's not something you want to walk into. So, yeah, I think you're probably right about that. So, yeah, it'll be interesting to watch. But anyway, all right, so we'll be back tomorrow. We'll have a practice report to talk about tomorrow night. And so we'll know if DeMarco Murray practices. I would be shocked if he did.

If Logan Ryan practices, you know, if they could get back this week, they need him out there. So we'll kind of keep an eye on that as the week goes along. You can obviously follow along, musiccitymiracles.com. Follow us on Twitter. I'm at jmortsemcm. Terry is at tlambertfb. That'll do it for tonight.

Thanks for listening to Locked on Titans. Please subscribe and rate and review the podcast on iTunes. We'd appreciate that. We'll talk to you again tomorrow.