Locked On Titans - Daily Podcast On The Tennessee Titans - Locked on Titans: Talking offseason with Mike Keith, Part One

Episode Date: April 2, 2019

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Welcome in to another edition of Locked on Titans. I am Jimmy Morris. Terry is not with us today. Having a little bit of a difficulty getting his two-year-old to take a nap. So, luckily, I am joined by the voice of the Titans, Mike Keith. Mike, how are you today? I'm doing super, Jimmy. It's good to be with you. And we've all been where Terry is, so we understand. Absolutely, we have. So, yeah, so we're going to get into things. It's going to be kind of a two-parter, so we'll release part today, and then we're recording this on Tuesday, and then part of it will come out on Wednesday. Talk about free agency today, do a little bit of draft stuff on the second episode,

which will come out tomorrow. Before we get started, I want to remind you that Terry and I write for NewCityMiracles.com. We're a cover of the Titans for SB Nation, so you can find us there. You can also follow us on Twitter. I'm at jmorrismcm. Terry's at tlamberttn. You can get the podcast wherever you get your podcasts. Just search out LockedOnTitans, and you'll find us there. All right, so before we get started with Mike, y'all have started up the daily OTP, right, Official Titans Podcast. You're doing that 9 o'clock Central every day, right? 10 o'clock.

10 o'clock. 10 o'clock Central at the OTP Road to Nashville. We started on Monday, and we're actually going to go through April 30th. We're going to go all the way through the draft and doing an hour show that you can find at Titans Online or any of the Titans social media channels, Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube. Amy Wells and I have had an interesting start to it, for sure, in particular because of the fact that you went to Hawaii and spent time with Marcus Mariota.

So I think that has piqued a lot of people's interest as we have begun this process. And then, you know, talking about draft prospects and team needs, I like a lot of the analytics of the draft, which is looking at, you know, different team needs and also their draft position, what that draft capital is for different people, what it looks like in what i call mr robinson's hood which is the teams just in front of the titans in the draft just after the

titans in the draft um it and then and then obviously the other part of it too jimmy is just this whole nashville draft experience and every day there's something that comes out that really makes it exciting about what's going to happen here April the 25th through the 27th. I mean, this is going to be an incredible experience. And so there's lots to talk about involving the Titans, the draft every day, which is why we're doing the OTP road to Nashville every day at 10 o'clock. Sounds awesome. Tough assignment for Amy there, having to go to Hawaii to spend time with Marcus Mariota.

She has a tough job. She has a very difficult job. It was, you know, that was really something nice of Marcus to invite us to cover his golf tournament, and it got put together very quickly. tournament and it got put together very quickly we had a team of people who were working on all of the logistics and then amy michael and todd gray did an amazing job of i think really executing while they were there using every minute and there's going to be a lot more of that trip you're going to see later. Because I think Marcus's Hawaii, I don't know if experience is the right word, but just that part of him has always been so fascinating to us.

And for those who've been to Hawaii, I think they get it. For those of us that have not, it's a bit of a mystery that is something really fascinating. And the irony for me is my parents were in Hawaii last week. And so they have come back and told me, they said, we totally get why that place is so unique in the minds of the people who are from there. It's like nowhere else in the world. And we're going to do a lot on that coming up later in the spring. But for the immediate moment, it's a lot about, Marcus, how are you? What have you been doing? And it's really been fascinating.

And really, you know, what he told Amy was something that I think got a lot of people's attention. I mean, he's taken a lot of time to just rest and get better. After seeing the interview, I was fired up because I think this guy is recharged both physically and mentally. I think he's ready to get back here and get back to work on April 15th and be ready to lead this football team. To me, that's very exciting. Okay, well, along the lines of Marcus Mariota, I'm sure you saw the Paul Kuharski report about all the different injuries that he suffered in 2018.

We knew about the major ones that kept him out of a couple games and that kind of stuff. But then to hear about all this stuff that he was going through and the fact that he played through most of it. You know, there was a narrative from a small portion of the fan base. I think it was a very small portion. I think people that have watched him and understood all the things that he's played through and all that stuff didn't think that.

But, you know, some people were questioning his toughness when he wasn't able to play in that Week 17 game. But how much of the stuff that was reported did you know about? And just speak to what you think that says about his toughness and about his willingness to play through so enough to try to help the team. We were aware that he was dealing with a lot of things. And that was part of it. I choose not to ask about injuries in terms of specifics because it's, honestly, Jimmy, it's easier not to know.

It really is because then you don't have to mislead people. You don't fear things slipping out because that's something, I think, if you're doing this, I think that's something everybody fears, particularly with the laws the way they are today. And that's all changed in my tenure with the team. I mean, it's a lot tighter than it once was. And it's not just keeping it from the opponent. It's about someone's privacy. And my wife is in the medical field, and so all of that has been driven home,

not just from the team, but from her. So, you know i was aware there was a lot going on and the the only problem that i had with some of the comments and where i will you know sort of stop and and correct somebody is when they talk about his toughness that bothers me because there's nothing further from the truth, and anybody who has been around him, anybody who has seen how he plays, what he works with, how he goes at his job knows toughness is not the problem. Now, if you want to say he's injury prone, that's your prerogative.

to say he's injury prone that's your prerogative but anybody who wants to say that he's not tough jimmy that is that's just flat out wrong totally incorrect yeah and my the thing that i've thought about it and you can kind of correct me if this line of thinking is wrong but you know the people in the locker room the players in the locker room were the first to defend him. And, you know, in my mind, if there is a toughness question, those guys are – they may not say anything negative, but they're not going to come out and defend him like guys like K-1 did, you know, leading up to all that stuff. That's 100% right. I mean, I'm like you.

I'm not saying that they will sell you out, although some probably would. Some would be blunt enough to say something very direct. But you're 100% right. That's the place where you can't fake it. get the the real story in terms of the feelings of the 53 and 10 guys on the practice squad and the coaching staff i mean when the guys come forward as they have done consistently for him throughout his career and defend him that lets you know that there's something very real there and they don't have a problem with anything that he does or he doesn't do. They respect him and they respect his toughness. 100% right, I agree.

Absolutely, yes. So, like you said, I hope that he's been resting up and I'm excited to see what he comes back with in the new offense and all that kind of stuff. And that leads us perfectly into what we will talk about next, being the moves the Titans made in free agency. All right, so the Titans were able to add, I mean, the big ticket things that happened in free agency, Adam Humphreys,

the word that they signed, Roger Stafford, the offensive guard that they signed. Re-signed Kevin Penfield, which I think was a good move, a guy that was playing well before he was injured last year. Kind of talk about what you've seen that they've done in free agency and how you think it makes this offense better. What I like about the moves is they were completely targeted moves that allow flexibility. And what I mean by that is I wanted a veteran slot receiver.

I've said it consistently since the end of the season when people say, oh, you've got to go draft a wide receiver. We've done that. Thank you. We've done plenty of that. Maybe that's another wide receiver at some point. Great. But for this team for 2019, we need a veteran.

And they went out and got the guy that I really wanted in Adam Humphreys because suddenly, Corey Davis just got better. Taewon Taylor just got better. The rest of Marcus Mariota got

better. We lost a lot a year ago when we lost that option, that reliable option of Delaney Walker in week one. Humphreys giving us that completely reliable option in the slot just makes us so much better because he is a consistent route runner. That's a very complicated position to play in today's game, largely because, A, the complicated defenses go against, and, B, so few guys have the skills to do it coming out of college

from a mental standpoint. Because, Jimmy, they don't do that. You know, they don't adjust. They read off of a card what they're supposed to do. In the pros, you've got to say, okay, well, the corner's lined up here. The safety's lined up here. I need six yards. Maybe you vary what you do a little bit.

Do you think that everything julian edelman does is completely scripted no no i mean some of that is on the fly it's an adjustment that he makes in coordination with a quarterback adam humphries is a guy who's done that so there's flexibility there and then saffold i love because, he's your left guard right now. That's where he's been playing. You put him next to Taylor LeJuan. You put him next to Ben Jones. That's fantastic.

If you get to camp and you decide that you want to have another combination, well, he can play another position. What you got is you got one of your five starters, but because he's not married to a position due to his versatility, this is a player who can give you a look and a lift in different ways. And so they bring back Palmfield and he may be the starter at right guard, or you know what? They may say, you know, Palmfield, let's the starter at right guard, or they may say, you know, Palmfield, let's play you at left guard, and let's play Saffold at right guard.

Or let's do this, or we're going to draft this player, and so we'll move you here. That's exactly what this team needs. The other part of it, too, Jimmy, is if you have an injury, like, for example, if Taylor one goes out of a ball game and Dennis Kelly's already in the lineup somewhere well I mean Saffold can play left tackle you you can or if if Kelly moves to left tackle then Saffold can go where Kelly just came out of I mean that that versatility and the the linemen that it feels like the Titans are looking at in the draft also have that quality. So I think they want that interchangeability to find the best five regardless of position.

Stafford is the perfect guy for that. You talked about the receiver position and the drafting the receivers, and I'm 100% on board with that. drafting the receivers, and I'm 100% on board with that. Do you think there's a chance that at some point in whichever wave of agency we're in now that they are looking to add another veteran guy? I mean, I don't know if there's a guy specifically that anybody has in mind right now, but do you think it's out of the question that they would look at bringing another guy in? Sure.

I mean, for camp, I think you'd love to see the competition. I mean, you've got Humphreys, you've got Davis, you've got Sharp, and you've got Taylor. You figure those players are on the roster right now. Then you've got Jennings and Batson who were on the roster at the end of the year. Ross and Lewis and Raymond are also on the roster. They've been practice squad guys. So, yeah, I could see them drafting one.

I could see them signing another veteran to come in and compete. I think largely it's going to be in direct correlation with how many tight ends they carry. So I think you're probably going to see them either go eight or nine in terms of tight ends and wide receivers. Now, they certainly like to go four tight ends because they like the depth, but the other part of it, too, is they like the special team's ability that it gives them. And so that could be four and four in terms of tight ends and wide receivers,

or it could be four and five. Or if you wanted three and six, in particular, if you had a wide out who was an outstanding kick cover guy, then this group is looking at all of those angles. So long answer to your question, I apologize. I think they could bring in another veteran to compete for a spot. All right, coming up we will talk about the defensive signings that the Titans made in free agency.

Okay, so they obviously made the signing early in free agency with re-signing Kenny Vaccaro. Obviously a guy that came in, they were really lucky that he was available last year when Jonathan Ciprian went down. The guy that came in and played really well, seemed to gel really well with that secondary, which seems like one of the closer groups on the team. How important do you think it is that he's back and that you kind of have – really, it seems like they're the starting five there, so to speak,

with your corners, your nickel guy, and your two safeties. They're bringing all those guys back this year. Let's start with what that does for the secondary. You said the starting five, and that's well put. But look at their depth in the secondary. I mean, here's the thing. The Titans' top three needs entering the draft, not one of those is corner. That's incredible.

But when you've got Logan Ryan, Malcolm Butler, Ty Smith, Adory Jackson, LaShawn Sims, Jonathan Kalou, Kenneth Durden, Mike Jordan, I mean, you're really good there. And then at the safety position, you've got this youngster, Cookshank, who we think is going to play at some point. And then you've got Bayard, who's one of the best in the game, and then Kenny Vaccaro. Kenny Vaccaro, to me, in this defense, was such a key.

And when we lost him, it was such a big deal. To see him come back and what he meant early on and he's going to have a chance to meet and the cost at which they got him. Certainly fair market value for Kenny Vaccaro. He had a nice trip to the bank that day, no complaints. But some other safeties have cost considerably more, and you ask yourself the question, are they worth more?

I think it was a fantastic signing. I love Vaccaro. I feel badly for Ciprian. I still wonder if Ciprian may not be back at some point. I mean, I guess we'll see. But, you know, and probably safety depth is something that the Titans will continue to be looking for as we go through this process.

But, you know, it's a good secondary. I'd say top to bottom it's as good as we've had in the time that I've been here. And that was such a cool moment when Kenny Vaccaro was talking about Jonathan Ciprian. He kind of got choked up in that press conference. Just, you know, seeing the other side of this where these guys, you know, they came in, they're friends, they obviously helped him all the while knowing that this was a very real possibility that things could play out this way.

I think it speaks to the close-knit-ness, if that's a word, of that group. And I think it's part of what makes them so successful. Well, part of it, too, is this is not a young team anymore. This is a grown-up team. There are youngsters, but, you know, it's kind of that middle-aged ball club now. And so the grown-up nature starts to show up in terms of how people operate in their lives with their families and with each other. You know, the moment you have kids, or at the very least,

you're married and you're starting some sort of life together, I mean, your vantage point changes. Well, a lot of these guys, when they get into their late 20s toward 30, they get to that point. And when I started with the ball club in the late 1990s, there was a lot of that. You know, there was a lot of guys who were 27, 28, 29 years old, and they were settled. The locker room was settled. Some guys came in at different points who could sort of wild children,

and the locker room would settle them. You know, guys would say, hey, you know, you might not want to stay out until 4 o'clock in the morning every night of the week. You know, there was some wisdom. And how they dealt with one another as people, it was really cool. And that's what we're seeing now. We're seeing that again. I mean, Logan Ryan is a fantastic human being. that again i mean logan ryan is a fantastic human being and with his leadership of this group and i and he's taken a lot of leadership of the secondary what an example he sets

and then then you've got wesley woodyard who does the same sort of thing who has that sort of relationship with people jarrell casey who has that sort of relationship with people. Jarrell Casey, who has that sort of relationship with people. On the defensive side of the ball, two more guys that we had, Arakpo and Morgan, were exactly the same way. So that's a tight group on that side of the ball. It's a grown-up group, and I think it allowed them to play through good moments and bad moments and to come out on the other side with sort of an even-keel ability, which enabled them to play through good moments and bad moments and to come out on the other side with sort of an even keel ability, which enabled them to be the number eight defense in the

NFL a year ago. Yeah. And speaking about growing up group, you bring in another guy, Cameron Wake, who's 37 years old. I didn't realize he was that old before they signed him. He needed a couple of other things between college and the NFL. signed him he needed a couple couple other things between college and the nfl but a guy that you know has been still really productive um you know in the last three years has almost 30 sacks uh so a guy that's still putting up numbers and again we talked about the the youth at the receiver position

and you know the draft capital stuff that they spent there i think you've got something similar not not necessarily a draft capital thing i'm obviously harold landry was a second round pick last year but you've got a young group with the outside line capital thing. Obviously, Harold Landry was the second round pick last year, but you've got a young group with the outside linebackers and Sharif Finch, Hemalai Correa. Some of those guys, you're losing, like you mentioned, Arakpo and Derek Morgan, two veterans who have been here for a long

time and provided really good leadership. They needed to add a guy, in my opinion, to that group that brings a little bit of that veteran presence. They can kind of teach the Harold Lanes and the Sheree Finches and the Correas, those guys. And, I mean, I just think, I don't know. I mean, obviously, he's 37 years old, so, I mean, that's really a hold,

obviously, for an NFL player. But at the same time, a guy that's still productive. It just seems like he can bring a lot to this team on the field, but there's a lot he can do to help those young guys come along. You know, I don't know if you remember him coming out of high school. He was a major prospect coming out of the Washington, D.C. area. He was known as Derek Wake at the time. So he goes to Penn State, and he's going to be a big star, and he tears up, and that slows his career down, and he ends up playing really well for Penn State, but he's a linebacker. That's really what he does. I mean, he's just a linebacker. He plays the run well. I think he had eight and a half

sacks and like seven interceptions. The knock on him was that he couldn't cover. And so he goes to the Giants, 2005. He's with the Giants for like six weeks. Well, they've got Justin Tuck and Kiwanuka and, you know, all those guys. So, I mean, he's gone. He's with the Giants for like six weeks. Well, they've got Justin Tuck and Kiwanuka and all those guys. So, I mean, he's gone. He's there from like May to June. He's out. He becomes a mortgage broker. He becomes a personal trainer.

He does this for two years, and then he ends up in Canada, and they're like, rush the passer. And, oh, by the way, we're going to call you by the wrong name when you're here. We're going to call you Cameron. Well, he goes up there and records 39 sacks. You know? It's kind of like the pitcher who suddenly they let back, and they're like, we should have been hitting all along. And then he's got 98 sacks in 10 nfl seasons but but the part of it is because of all this football that he's played and all this

work that he's had to put in he plays the run he he does the little things i think he's perfect for this young group at outside linebacker and jimmy i think we're probably going to add one or two more you know maybe in the undrafted pool trying to find another sharif finch in there as well but i mean i i think he's going to be he would be the old man in the group for sure but i mean he's almost like a generation older than the majority of the guys he's going to be working with the latroy lewis's and jamil, you know, guys of that ilk. Yeah, so just kind of your overall impressions of the free agency period. I mean, I thought that John Robinson did a really good job of getting it to a place,

and we're going to talk in our next show about, you know, needs in the draft and all that stuff. But I felt like he did a really good job at free agency of making it to where he didn't have one position that he really had to reach for in the first round. You know, I mean, obviously there's still some needs. There's still some holes in the roster, some places they can fill in. But you've got enough guys now that if some guy falls down the board that you're not expecting, you don't necessarily say, well, we can't take him because we're't take him because we really need this position.

So, I mean, you're on the same page there. Yeah, if you have a generational player that falls to us at 19, you take him, regardless of position, because you can at this moment. I mean, let's look at what he did. He got Vaccaro back for Ciprian's money. So they already had that money allotted for cyprian this year so in essence from an accounting standpoint that's i don't want to say it's a freebie but it almost is they got tanny hill for blaine gabbert's money so they just switched out that spot those two things the safety and quarterback, you improved yourself at the position,

but it didn't cost you any more money against the cap. Wake is a deal that is certainly, you know, for him where he is, he's not going to be cheap, but you're paying a lot of money for Morgan and Arakpo. You're certainly going to have to pay somebody there. It's not something you're tied up in a long time, but the money's fair to him as a player. Saffold cost you some dough, but you saved money by cutting Klein. So that's another spot where you save that. And then where you added the majority of the money is Humphreys,

and that was a position that you desperately needed to improve if you're going to take a step and catch the Colts and the Texans and stay ahead of the Jaguars, which is what you've got to do. So I think he's given himself flexibility. He hasn't hindered his cap short-term or long-term, and he made his roster better. That's pretty good if you ask me. Absolutely.

All right, so that will wrap up our free agency episode with Mike Heath, voice of the Titans. Again, tell us where we can find the official Titans podcast. Find the official Titans podcast every weekday at 10 a.m. Central, Find the official Titans podcast every weekday at 10 a.m. Central, Titans Online, or any of our Titans social media channels every single day. And you can get the OTP wherever you get your podcasts, and we promise to help you through a workout or, if you're like me and you drive to Franklin, an hour and ten-minute commute.

Absolutely. Well, thanks so much for joining us. And we look forward to our conversation coming up tomorrow about the Titans and the draft. That'll be great. Thanks. All right. So, Locked on Titans, thanks so much for listening. Just like the OTP, you can get Locked on Titans wherever you get your podcasts.

Just search us out there. You can also play us in your smart speaker, in your house, in your car, wherever it may be. Just say, play podcast Locked on Titans. Thanks so much for listening, and we will talk to you again tomorrow.