Locked On Titans - Daily Podcast On The Tennessee Titans - Locked on Titans: Disappointment in San Francisco

Episode Date: December 18, 2017

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Welcome in to another edition of Locked On Titans. Jimmy Morris, joined by Terry Lambert. Terry, how are you? Just another glorious day of being a Titans fan. Yeah. They always seem to come up with new ways to lose games. This was another loss, obviously, to the 49ers. The 49ers hit a lot of second field goals with the Titans today.

But it was a much different game than what we saw last week. We found a different way to lose. Titans found a different way to lose. So that was fun. Let's start with the Titans today, but it was a much different game than what we saw last week. We found a different way to lose. The Titans found a different way to lose. So that was fun. Let's start with the offense because that's where we've kind of been for, you know, that's been the large debate for most of the year. Now the defense was the issue today, and we'll get to that. But I thought when they went to the no huddle right at the end of the first half,

Marcus looked more comfortable in that drive than I had seen him look in a month, six weeks. I mean, it had been a long time since I had seen that in Marcus Mario, where he looked like he was stepping into his throats. He looked like he was going through his progression. He looked like he was looking off safety. The kind of stuff that we saw him do last year that we haven't seen him do this year. He wasn't walking in on guys. He wasn't late on throws.

All those kind of things that have been his issue for the last, you know, really the majority of this season. He didn't look like that guy. He looked like the guy from last year. And I thought that carried on pretty much throughout the second half. I mean, from that standpoint, I thought Marcus played his best game in a long time. You mentioned before we got started that he threw for over 200 yards for the first time, and I don't know how long it's been.

But, so, from that standpoint, that was a positive. I really thought that he looked like he had it back together today. Now, I don't think he's fixed. This offense, obviously, is not fixed. But, I mean, I think if we can see positive things from Marcus Mariota throughout these last two weeks, even if it doesn't end up with a tight end in the playoffs, which it really doesn't feel like it's going to right now, I feel like we can at least have something positive to feel

heading into this offseason. Yeah, that's what I told you. I'd almost rather lose and have Marcus look good because I know it's going to pay off in the future if you get that franchise quarterback. So to see the Titans losing and Marcus playing bad, that was a double whammy for me. And that's where I was kind of all the way out on this team, on this staff last week after Arizona.

But to see him come back and look like the guy that we've all come to know, the guy that was scanning the field, picking apart defenses, leading this team, that was good to see, 23 points against the 49ers. And some of that might be San Francisco. They're not very good on defense but still you you take anything at this point you just wanted to see some some signs of life out of out of mariotta and we saw that today so uh that was my main takeaway offensively is just kind of mariotta just kind of riding the ship and and yeah he wasn't today, but he didn't turn the ball over.

He pushed the ball down the field, made some nice throws. He went 23-33 for 241 and two touchdowns. So a nice day at the office. Big thing for him, though, no turnovers. Yeah, and so as positive as it is to see that, the two-minute drive right before the end of the half, and then they came out and ran a little bit of no huddle right there at the beginning of the third

quarter. As positive as it is to see him do that and do it well, it's equally as frustrating the fact that they haven't done more of that this year. And that's what really makes me angry about this coaching staff is that week in and week out, we've seen them do the same thing over and over,

them not work, but then refuse to change. They don't make any changes. They don't try to go up-tempo. They don't do any of that kind of stuff. And I understand, like, you know, there's got to be a part of you that when your quarterback is playing as poorly as Marcus has played, you don't want to put more on him. You don't want to put more of the game in his hands.

But at the same time, you've got to be able to have more than just this, like, you know, couple weeks view of who your quarterback is, of what he's capable of. And you've got to say, okay, we've got to do something to get this guy going because we know he's a lot better than what he's playing like right now. And so we've got to do something to get him rolling, to get him going in a good direction. And so you saw a little bit of that today,

but it just makes you wonder why we haven't seen more of it, why we haven't seen more of it early in this game, why we haven't seen more of it in the last couple weeks, why we didn't see it at all last week in Arizona. You know, to do something to shake up what this offense has done and just how stagnant this offense has come. And like I said, in that second half, and again, like you said, and, you know, we talked this week about how bad the outside corners are for the 49ers.

So take all this with a grain of salt, but I think we would all agree that what we saw from this offense, and especially Marcus Mariota last week, we would not have been surprised at all if they came out today and Marcus still looked lost, the offense still looked terrible. So, I mean, so, you know, to see him look good and talk about how well he played and that kind of stuff, of course you have to factor in the defense that he was doing it against. But still, they were able to do some things. You saw Eric Decker make some big catches.

You saw Rashard Matthews come back and make some big plays. You saw them, you know, Corey Davis make a couple of plays, and Marcus had him on a deep ball and he missed him. I mean, so there were a few things that we saw that were positive that we haven't seen in the last couple weeks, but it just really, really makes me angry that they haven't tried to do more of that to jumpstart this offense really throughout this past six weeks. I know they won the majority of those games,

but even still they had to know that the bill was coming due like it did last week in Arizona, and they should have done something to try to help it out, and they just never did. Yeah, I'm with you. And I want to say credit the offensive staff for kind of sticking to something that was working. But, you know, we've been kind of screaming for this for most of the year, to run a little more spread, run a little more gun, run a little more no huddle, do something different.

And finally they did today, and it worked. So I love that they kind of stuck with that no huddle look in the second half. I think that really helped. You saw the offense come to life when they started doing that. So it was no more kind of eye formation. You know, they weren't running the ball on second and 13. You know, they weren't calling a half back dive anymore so uh that was progress uh but again like you were saying where has that been you know why did it take till week 15 it's week 15

offense has been broken for a long time and everybody kind of saw this this little skid coming uh so yeah i'm not sure why it took them so long to get to this point to change things up. Okay, and we've got to talk about the final drive, the final Titans-Occupy drive, where it looked to me like they got tight butt syndrome, whatever you want to call it. Like, it seemed to me like they were content with the field goal try,

all right? And I know there was a lot of talk about the third and two play. There was a handoff to DeMarco. He lost the yard. I mean, they ended up keeping the field goal going ahead. We know what happened from there. But like Malarkey was asked about it after the game. He said, well, we don't want our quarterback to take a sack in that situation.

They asked him if Marcus could have audibled out of it. He said yes. Then they asked him if Marcus could have audibled out of it. He said yes. Then they asked him if Marcus should have audibled out of it. He said no. Marcus was asked about it. He said, you know, after he saw the safeties come down, that he probably should have checked out of it, all that stuff. Okay, well, that's all fine and whatever.

And, I mean, I think they're – I'm not sure. We've had some debates on plays that Marcus has checked into or checked out of throughout the year. I'm not sure how good he is at that, but that's the kind of stuff that – if we're going to talk about that stuff, we're just going to speculate because we don't know that kind of stuff. We just know what they tell us, basically. Why, with all that being said,

why did they ever call a run to DeMarco Murray right there? Like, it doesn't make any sense to me. You cannot be afraid right there, as Malarkey said, that your quarterback is going to take a sack. Number one, you're a smash-mouth football team, you know, air quotes. Your offensive line should be able to protect long enough to throw some kind of quick hitter that has the possibility to pick up at least two yards. You have to have enough faith in your quarterback for him to know the situation, for him to drop back, he has whatever, three steps, balls out,

if it's not there, throw it away. You have to have enough confidence in him to be able to do that in that situation. I don't understand why they would ever call a running play right there. I don't understand why that was what they had going up to the line. And then especially once you see it, and the market is something about, well, the fronts that they had been giving us, we thought that it would be a good. Well, you can't.

I mean, you can't go into that play call in that situation basing it off of what they've done the other game. They're going to do something different there to try to trick you, which is what happened. Got outcoached, you know, surprisingly. But, like, all they have to do right there, with the safeties up like that, somebody runs a slant, you hit that, you get, even if the guy just pitches the ball and gets tackled, you've got the first down, the drive keeps moving,

you have a possibility, if nothing else, to run more time off the clock, but then you have a chance to go in and score a touchdown, so the 49ers need a touchdown coming back to win the game. to go in and score a touchdown, so the 49ers needed a touchdown coming back to win the game. That, to me, was everything that's wrong with this coaching staff in one play. I just don't understand why you ever thought that putting the ball into Marco Murray's hands right there was the best idea. Yeah, especially out of shotgun.

So I'm not going to say, I'm not going to blame anybody, because like you said, we don't really know who called that play or who checked into it or whatever. But to me, you've got a weapon in Marks Mariota who can run the ball. He's been very efficient throwing the ball. He's had a great day. He was in

rhythm. I thought the receivers had a pretty good day. Everybody seemed on the same page. So it just kind of seemed to me that was a spot where you need to trust your quarterback. So whether that's on Marcus, whether that's on Robiski, whether that's on Malarkey, I don't know. But somebody needed to trust their quarterback. And it's a spot where you can use Marcus' mobility.

You can call a read option there. You can get Marcus rolling out of the pocket. Make things easy on him, give him two reads, and if there's nothing there, let him, you know, go for it with his legs. So I never like running out of shotgun on short yardage situations. You know, when you need two yards, I just – look, I've watched so many games that Butch Jones has coached, and that's all he ran, and it drove me up a wall.

So I don't want the Titans to start doing that. But, again, it was kind of a weird deviation for them to go shotgun. I saw a stat I don't have in front of me that Titans played something like 75% of their offensive snaps from the gun today. So I think we're seeing them kind of sort of try to evolve. But in that particular situation, I'd much rather be under center if you're hellbent on running the ball. Yeah, and going back even a little bit further,

they handed the ball to DeMarco Murray right before the two-minute warning. Now, I understand that if you're going to run on that drive, that's the time to run because then the clock's going to get stopped for you regardless. I mean, I get that there, but what I don't understand is when you hand the ball to DeMarco Murray, what's the best possible thing that can happen? What's the best possible thing that can happen?

Three yards? Right. I mean, I know that way back in week three, week four, whenever they played seattle he had like a 75 yard run or something like that but since then i mean what what is the what is the best possible thing that can happen so i to me you're just wasting a play right there that's all you're doing you're just wasting a play and i it's just stuff like that it just it just doesn't any sense. This stuff seems like common sense to me. I don't understand. And I don't understand their whatever to keep giving DeMarco Murray the ball.

You know, we talk about Derrick Henry's effectiveness, and the entire run game still wasn't effective today. We were talking before we came on, and I said, you know, it's sad that I felt like DeMarco Murray looked better today than he has in a while. I mean, the last two weeks, I think he's looked fresher than he has at most points in this season. But with as good as, you know, saying that DeMarco Murray looked better today or looked good today or whatever, he averaged 3.3 yards of carry. Like, that's a good day for him at this point.

So I don't understand why, you know why you're going to get into a situation where the split between Murray and Henry is 18 carries for Murray and only seven for Henry. Henry might have had one carry in the first half, but all seven of those might have come in the second half. I can't remember. He might have had one in the first half. I don't understand that.

I didn't get to hear Malarkey's postgame press conference reading through the comments that are posted on Titans online. Nobody asked him about it, so I don't know what his reasoning would have been for that. And again, not that – you know, Derrick Henry, look, he was 7 for 19. He averaged 2.7 yards per carry. Best running back today was Taewon Taylor. But, like, so, I mean, not that, you know, it's some big thing where it's like this tragedy that they're not giving Derrick Henry the ball because he's

so much better, but we've seen that Derrick Henry with carries gets more effective as he goes. The last two weeks they've just dropped him out of the game plan, or at least he has been a secondary piece of

the game plan instead of where in a few weeks before that it was it was almost like he had moved up to kind of an even split with demarco murray i don't understand why i don't understand what henry has done to get dropped off like that and why they've gone back to demarco as a feature guy it's bizarre i don't have an answer uh the you know you try to figure it out you just get get more frustrated so there's no real pattern I don't think there's any rhyme or reason to it I know they like DeMarco more on passing downs but

that doesn't mean Derrick Henry shouldn't play but one or two snaps in the first half so it's weird but you know at the same time it's never been more obvious to me the Titans need another running back. They need a guy with some juice.

Just look what Kareem Hunt has done for Kansas City. The list goes on and on. I could rattle off 10 or 12 names. The Titans just don't have a difference maker in the backfield. We've seen DeMarco Murray try to make a cut, and it's just sad. There's not a lot left in the legs with Derrick Henry I was telling you earlier

once he gets going after that two seconds that it takes him to get going he's fast, he's scary he's great but how often is that so we've seen him break away and that's all great but I'm looking for consistency, and the Titans just don't have consistency out of either of their backs right now.

So if I'm John Robinson, that's a huge priority for me. They've got to figure out who they're going to turn this backfield over to because I just don't know how much DeMarco Murray has left. No, I mean, he's done. I think that's fairly okay at this point. And, yeah, like I said, I mean, there's a role for Derrick Henry, and there's a place where he can be effective. They've got to get somebody else.

You're absolutely right about that. The other thing that was surprising from an offensive perspective before we move on to the defense, Delaney Walker had a bad game. I mean, he ended up catching the touchdown, so that was good. But, like, you know, he drops a touchdown that, you know, was a great – I mean, we've been killing Marcus for a lot of the year, and people think that I haven't killed him enough. But, I mean, like, he's been bad for the majority of this year.

That was a great throw, the ball that Delaney dropped in the end zone. I mean, that's, you know, got to be caught. Got to be caught. It's going to be an NFL tight end. He also had the fumble. There was another route where he kind of ran it out, and he made contact with the defender to top his route, slowed down because he thought there was going to be a penalty.

They didn't throw the flag. If he had run through it, I think they, you know, he would have caught it and it would have been a first down. I think they ended up punting right for that. So there was just a few things like that. I think they ended up punting right for that. So, there was just a there was a few things like that. I mean, it was a rough day for him, but I mean, you can't how much you want to feel Delaney Walker. He's been a great

guy for this team, and a lot of points has been, like, the majority of the offense. But, you know, he had ten targets and they only caught five of them. So, it's kind of a deal where that needs, they need to be a little more efficient on those. It was good to see Richard Matthews, like I said, come back and have a good game. Because, you know, I had Patrick Peterson last week,

and nobody's been able to do more than Patrick Peterson this year. And then, you know, I had the hamstring injury before that. So good to see him back out there and contributing. And, again, you know, you've been saying for a couple weeks now that it's draft season. I've kind of refused to get there, but I'm there now. Like, everything that I'm thinking about now is what I was looking forward to 2018. I'm not – Yeah, I'm not interested anymore.

Yeah. Like, look, you know, most of y'all, I'm sure, saw what the Rams went to Seattle and did to the Seahawks today. So, I mean, how good can we feel about the Rams next week? The line's already out. Titans are 6.5 points underdog. Could probably be higher than that. The only thing that might be in the Titans' favor is the fact

that the Rams just went up to Seattle and just really decimated their division rival. And so now they've got travel across the country, kind of a letdown spot for them. That might be the only thing the Titans have in their favor. So, like I said, a lot of stuff that I'm thinking about is what I was looking

forward. And so that's kind of where this offense is going. So that's why, you know, Go Harris kind of transitioned into a little bit more of that talk now. But, you know, like I said, hopefully the biggest thing that I want to see in the next two games is Marcus to play like he did from the end of the second quarter through the second half today.

That's what I want to see just so that we have that feeling going forward that we know he's still the guy, that he's not broken, his confidence is not lost forever, all those things. Because we know anybody that is a rational person that has watched all of his games knows that he has the ability. Now, he hasn't shown it at times this year, sure, but you know that the ability is there.

To me, it's just been a confidence thing. So if he gets that back going forward, then that's something to feel good about when we look forward to next year. Anything else, Terry, on the offense before we move to the defense? Just to kind of put a bow on it, there was so much talk on Twitter about the third and two play call and who checked into what.

Look, this doesn't happen if this offense doesn't come out flat for like the whatever week in a row. They spotted San Francisco 13 points. They were down 16-3 at one point. So, you know, if you don't spot them 13 points, this might be a different story. You know, if Delaney Walker catches that touchdown, this is probably a different story.

So I just don't want to act like the whole game came down to that. It was a big moment in the game, but the Titans missed a ton of opportunities to kind of seal this one. You know, we're going to talk about the defense here in a minute, but Adore Jackson dropped a pick in the end zone. It hit him right in the chest. So that was another missed opportunity. So it's like Malarkey said, there was plenty of chances to go win this football game,

but the Titans didn't take any of them. And we've seen that way too much over the past two weeks. that those things have kind of swung back the other way whereas you know they would they'd find a way to make that play even those ugly games that they won to win the game now they've been missing those opportunities so um and again you know if we're being honest and looking at it logically rationally we knew that they weren't always going to be on the positive side of these things, and they were lucky to be on the positive side as much as they were early in the season. All right, so coming up, we'll talk about the defense and what we saw from them today. So, yeah, I mean, you said it before we came on,

that it's frustrating that we can't see both sides of the ball play well in the same week. And you said you've got to really go all the way back to week two against the Jaguars to see both sides play a complete game. And I think you're exactly right. And so today when the offense was good enough to win, the defense just wasn't. And, look, there's a lot of things that show up in these situations okay they don't have a pass rush and they they can get there when they blitz they can they can provide pressure there were times where they made jimmy garoppolo move off of his spot we talked about how that was the way they did that was the thing they needed to do

to try to force him into some mistakes he still didn't make the big mistake today um and listen i think that when it's all said and done jimmy garoppolo you were going to look back to try to force him into some mistakes. He still didn't make the big mistake today. Listen, I think that when it's all said and done, Jimmy Garoppolo, you were going to look back, he's going to be a heck of a quarterback. I mean, there's no doubt about that. So, you know, you've got to kind of tip your hat to him because he was able to make some throws today, and he obviously makes quick decisions and sees what's there and gets the ball there.

But there were too many times today where the middle of the field was just wide open and busted coverage. I mean, I don't know what the answer is, but it seemed like whenever the 49ers wanted a chunk play, they just had to get somebody to the middle of the field, and they would hit him. The Titans would miss a tackle.

And so a play that was still going to be like a 20-yard gain ends up being a 30-, 40-, 50-yard gain because you miss a tackle, then you've got was still going to be like a 20-yard gain ends up being a 30 40 50 yard gain because you miss a tackle then you got to run the guy down from behind so it was just kind of that all day and you know like we're saying we're a pass rusher in a in a corner probably still away a nose tackle uh you mentioned also before we started from having a good defense but it's just frustrating that you know j that Jimmy Garoppolo with a bunch of receivers that you've never heard of. I mean, Marquis Goodwin is a good player,

but you're in trouble if he's your number one receiver. He should be anyway. But he had a great day today. Jimmy Garoppolo is making these guys look like a cast of pro bowlers. And I don't know. It's just frustrating that for as well as the defense has played the majority of the year, they couldn't even,

you know, on that last drop, step up and keep a big play from happening and help the Titans offense win a game for them for one time. So I kind of have a theory on, on the, the, the blitzes and why the middle of the field was so open.

I think Dick LeBeau is kind of forced into a corner here in that his pass rush doesn't work with four guys. And we've seen him kind of adapt over the year. He sent Wesley Woodyard up the middle with these blitzes. He sent Avery Williamson, whoever's on the field. So he's come up with these exotic blitzes because the edge rushers just aren't working. And to be fair, Derek Morgan wasn't out there today, and that was a big loss.

But still, so you see these guys forced out of coverage, and they're now rushing the passer. So Jimmy Garoppolo delivered today. And he said after the game that blitzing makes it easier on him. So he was a guy that really played well under pressure today. And it just seems like the Titans were just a couple steps off of getting enough depth. You know, Jimmy would hit that tight end over the middle over and over and over. And the receivers would cross, and they'd just be running wide open.

So it's hard for me to really blame Dickwood Bowe. I just think he's lacking some pieces that would really make this defense work, and that's why I'm still on this pass rusher thing. I know the pass rushers looked good in previous weeks, but you're playing against some bad offensive lines, some of the worst in the league. You talk about Arizona and Houston and Indy, those are some of the worst in the league.

So Titans have produced against those teams, but they're not very good. And you can say the same about their quarterback. So I think this group has kind of been propped up by playing some bad teams, and we probably got a little bit of false hope. But a good quarterback in Jimmy Garoppolo, who's now 5-0 as a starter in the NFL, carved him up today. So we're kind of back to square one with this group.

It's just frustrating. You know, this group is – we're in week 15 now, so they're just – they're never going to put a full game together. Yeah, and like you said, I mean, sometimes defensive coordinators have to do things they probably wouldn't necessarily want to do because they need to get pressure. Because regardless of how good your secondary is, if a guy has all day to sit back there on the throw, he's going to find somebody open. And remember, Jim Schwartz went from looking like a middle-of-the-road

defensive coordinator to one of the best defensive coordinators in the league when he had Albert Hainsworth and Kyle Vanderbosch up front. The players can make a guy look a lot better than he actually is. And so that's the thing. They're missing a dynamic guy up front, like you said. I think we've got to be happy with what we've seen from Adore Jackson this year overall. Like you said, it would be great to see him come down with that pick in the end zone.

I think he gave up some plays today I haven't seen yet. I haven't gotten the PFF email yet. But, I mean, I think Jimmy Garoppolo's rating when targeting him was probably pretty good today. He did give up some things today. But, you know, Logan Ryan's been good. He got hurt, missed the end of the game so we'll just see how his ankle is if he's able to go this next week but you know they got some pieces there so that that's a that's a positive thing but again like this is not this is this part of it's not surprising right we knew the

steepens was going to struggle we knew they had holes um that hadn't been that hadn't been filled um they did they didn't that hadn't been filled. They didn't do anything to address the pass rush and everything, at least not this offseason. Besides bringing in Eric Walden, who's been a solid addition and was a really good, you know, you said a no-brainer signing for this team, and you're right about that. But he's still not a dynamic guy. He's not a guy that's a huge difference maker.

Speaking of Eric Walden, your thoughts real quick on the ball that looked like it was an interception but was called a catch the mark he's going on the field and then murlocke challenged it and the call got upheld i don't know it looked like it looked like a pick to me uh i'm not sure how you review that and say that that he didn't pick that off uh and then you get the jesse j James thing in Pittsburgh. So, I don't know. The NFL has some issues with figuring out what's a catch and what's not a catch.

It was a big moment because the 49ers went down and scored because the Titans weren't awarded that ball. That's another little thing that you can point back and say the Titans might have got hosed there. It looks like a pick to me yeah absolutely and you know every week i talk about you know some fun interaction

i have on twitter uh the funny thing was i was thinking so i tweeted out after that i said that's that's an int and then i came back and said that's an int we don't bet on it getting overturned all right because it just i don't know it felt like one of those calls that times were going to get screwed on. Same every week. Yeah, so then this guy comes in and he says, oh, so you're on your couch. You think you know more than the people that get paid big money to look at this stuff and figure it out. I'm like, first of all, I just said I think this intercepted it. And then I even said it's not going to get overturned. But, like you're saying, the NFL has things that happen every single week

that just defy what we think logic is as far as what to catch and what's not and, you know, what's inbounds. I mean, there's all kinds of things that happen week in and week out. And then the league, you know, three days later issues an apology because they got it wrong. So, yes, they get it wrong sometimes, all right? So, yeah, I did think that I knew more than them in this situation. I get, objectively, I get how they didn't overturn it once it was called a catch.

I don't understand how it was ever called a catch. To me, it looked pretty clearly like Walden had it, and then Goodwin tried to come and take it away from him. Now, in my opinion, Eric Walden should be strong enough to not let Marquis Goodwin get as much of the ball as he did. But, you know, whatever. That's not really what we're talking about here. But, yeah, it's just frustrating.

And like you said, if that goes a different way, maybe we're having a different conversation right now. But even with all that being said, there were still plenty of opportunities to put this game away. And, again, the offense, you know, went down there and got points and gave the ball back to the defense at the lead, and they weren't able to hold it. So, I don't know.

This is kind of what I thought games were going to be like coming into this year was where we were in these frustrating close losses. We were talking about, man, if the defense could have just made one play, you know, the Titans could have won that game. I thought we were going to be having a lot more of those conversations this year than, man, the offense sucks and the defense played well enough for them to win. Yeah, and like I was saying, you're just not going to see,

it seems like only one side of the ball can be good at a time. And I don't know why that is. But I think today it was just kind of a product of Jimmy Garoppolo being really good. I mean, I was so impressed with what he did, you know, coming in there and figuring out the offense. That was just what his third start. So he looks like he's going to be a really good one. And we're only three games in, so we'll see.

But, you know, He took the pressure well, and he just flat beat the secondary. Losing Logan Ryan, I don't know if we touched on that. That was a big deal. Made the Titans rely on Bryce McCain. If you were on the fence about adding another corner, just remember,

fourth corner is Bryce McCain. The Titans need another corner. Just keep that in mind as we kind of transition into free agent and draft season. So overall, just another really, really frustrating day for the Titans. I just don't think it's going to get any better. The Rams are really good. You've seen what they can do today. They're already six and a half point favorites coming across the country, which is just crazy considering the road trip they're already six-and-a-half-point favorites coming across the country, which is just crazy considering the road trip they're about to make.

You finish up with the Jaguars. So I hate to be so pessimistic, but there's just not a lot to be excited for, at least with the rest of this season. No, and you said it, right? I mean, they can't put it all together in a single game. And you know what that is? That's an 8-18.

And that's exactly what this looks like right now. It looks like an average, mediocre team. Better than terrible, but not good enough to even make the playoffs, or especially if they are able to make the playoffs, do anything once they get there. You know, look, anything can happen week to week. So, I mean, it's not over yet. And, again, like we said last week, if they get to nine wins,

they're going to get in. However, you know, more than likely. However, I don't see a scenario right now where they get to nine wins. I just can't see it happening just because they're just not good enough. And they're playing two really good teams in the last two weeks of the season. They weren't able to take advantage of playing two teams that were well under.500 in these last two weeks. You've got to get one of those.

You get one of them, and you're more than likely in the playoffs, and they weren't able to do that. They're going to have nobody to blame but themselves when they look back on a missed opportunity of possibly making the playoffs. You know, division title, whatever. And look, Jacksonville is playing really well.

I don't think anybody wants to play Jacksonville right now. And it pains me to say it because I hate their fans so much, but they're really good. Blake Bortles is playing really, really well. And, you know, it's hard to say.

It's hard to watch. But they are – they have taken that next step this year. We've made fun of them for years because, you know, they win every offseason and we wonder about when they're going to take it. They've done it. They've taken that next step this year. The Titans still haven't. I worry that the – this is a larger conversation for another day

and not at the very end here. I worry that the Titans are not going to be able to take that next step with this coaching staff. That remains to be seen. We can point to all the anyway i i just my my fear is that that we the group we have right now is just not the group to put it over the edge i think they've done a good job in stabilizing and i don't know i don't even know right now if i want mike malarkey fired i want terry rabisky fired just because i i just i fired just because I don't understand why he was ever hired in the first place.

I don't know that they have the staff here to oversee them taking the next step. That's the conversation we're going to be having for the next couple three weeks as we go through the end of the season. We'll hold off on those thoughts for now, but that's just something to be

thinking about. Terry, anything else about this game before we get out? Not really about this game, but just to kind of expand on your point, just keep in mind how banged up the Texans are. Keep in mind Andrew Luck's not there. Keep in mind J.J. Watt and Deshaun Watson aren't in this division right now, and the Titans aren't going to win this division. So that's alarming to me. What are you going to do when they return?

So that's what. They got three out of those four. They don't win any of those games if those teams are at full strength, likely. So just kind of keep that in mind. Is his staff going to be able to go beat Deshaun Watson? And there's no guarantee that he's going to come out and be what he was this year. But everything we saw points to that.

So, like Jimmy was saying, I'm not sold. I'll go ahead and say it. I'm not sold that this staff gets us there. I'm kind of out on them. But at the same time, you're not going to move on from them. You have to remember where this team came from. You have to remember that this team held the number one overall pick just two years ago.

The improvement's still there. The numbers are still there. Even though they're trending down right now, you can't make a move. Like Jimmy said, we'll get into that a little later. Yeah. That's all we got for tonight. We'll be back tomorrow and we'll get an update on Logan Ryan's ankle. so that's all we got for tonight uh we'll be back tomorrow and we'll get an update

hopefully on logan ryan's ankle hopefully that's not something that's going to cause him to miss any time because like we say they really need him out there um i'm jimmy morris at jay morris mcm on twitter he's terry lambert at t lambert fb on twitter we're at music miracles.com so be sure to check out the site we got another reaction piece up there already. Um, and we'll have a lot snap counts and all that stuff. Talk about tomorrow. So,

uh, check that stuff out and please, uh, like, and subscribe and rate the podcast on iTunes, locked on Titans. You can search it and find us there. Um,

and we'll have new episodes for you four days a week. So be sure and check that out. Subscribe to that so you'll get them as soon as they come out. So for Terry Lambert, this is Jimmy Morris saying thanks for listening to LockedOnTitans, and we'll talk to you again tomorrow.