Locked On Titans - Daily Podcast On The Tennessee Titans - Locked on Titans: Wrapping up a win over the Colts

Episode Date: November 28, 2017

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Welcome in to Locked on Titans. This is Terry Lambert running solo tonight. Jimmy had something pop up, so I'll be handling things tonight. Gonna wrap up this win against the Colts that put the Titans to 7-4. The Jaguars lost to the Cardinals, bringing them into a tie with the Titans atop the AFC South. Titans, of course, have the tiebreaker as of right now. So first place in the AFC South, five games to go. Hard to ask for much more than that. So first things first, Mike Malarkey updated the injury report.

The big name here is Rashard Matthews, who missed the game with a hamstring issue. Malarkey said that he was day-to-day going forward. And really, this popped up last week over in a practice. So, you know, we don't know a ton about it as far as the severity goes, but as we've seen with hamstrings, you know, they can, they can linger around.

So, uh, that's going to be something that we follow on the site. Uh, so, so check back with us on, on musiccitymiracles.com for constant updates on that. Uh,

and you know, the, the Titans passing game wasn't great on Sunday. And they probably missed him more than we know. It was just a, that's one of two guys that really have a consistent connection with Marcus Mariota. So I think we can give, you know, we can kind of give Mario a pass for another clunker of a game. So you hope that Matthews can come back healthy and, you know, in a really good spot next week against a Houston team that's really struggling to defend the pass at all. So we'll keep an eye on that.

Denorah Searcy suffered an ankle issue in the win over the Colts. He's also considered day-to-day. So that's the other thing that we're watching. Outside of that, everybody's healthy, and it's really strange to be, what is it, week 12 now, and really no significant injuries. So the Titans are one of the healthiest teams in the league, you know, knock on wood, but it's kind of crazy to think about. So we got plenty more from Mike Malarkey in his press conference today.

The first thing he said was about DeMarco Murray. He basically said DeMarco Murray was 100%. And that the hamstring and all his little nicks and bruises weren't really hurting his game. And, you know, if that's true, to me, you've got to think that DeMarco Murray, it's kind of getting towards the end of his career. You know, you just look and you see these holes. You don't see a big burst there anymore.

It's a stark contrast from what we saw last year with him. It's just kind of lacking that dynamic running ability that we saw some of last year. And, you know, Derrick Henry looked like the better back again on Sunday. And like we said last night, I think we've said this before with Derrick Henry. We just haven't seen the consistency. You know, we haven't really seen him come out and take this job and grab it by the horns. I think if he could go do that, I think the staff would really ride with him and give him the majority of the touches.

Speaking of touches, the snap count was almost dead even between the two, 32 snaps to 31. So you're seeing a split backfield right now. And like I said last night, there's little things that DeMarco Murray can do that they don't necessarily trust Derrick Henry to do, and maybe that comes in time. But really, the Titans have to go into this offseason with the expectations of adding another running back,

potentially to replace DeMarco Murray. So that's kind of where I'm at with that. Malarkey kind of threw his offensive line under the bus a little bit, saying that they weren't getting a push, and it's kind of unfair to judge what we're seeing on the field from the running backs, and I get that. And, look, that matches up with everything we've said all year. This offensive line cannot get a consistent push, and nobody can really put a finger on it.

It's interesting to me that they had Fowler down. He was inactive, so they rolled without a fullback. You saw Supernaw take some snaps out of that fullback spot. You saw DeMarco Murray take some snaps out of that fullback spot. So I think they're searching a little bit there. Clearly, something worked at the end of that game against the Colts with Derrick Henry. Why you can't see that with a full game out of Derrick Henry, I don't know.

Maybe this offensive line finally wore the Colts down. That's probably the most likely scenario. But, yeah, you'd like to see the Titans wearing people down. That's what they're built to do. They're built to win fourth quarters on the ground. That's definitely encouraging to see in the fourth quarter, but at the same time

you've got to see it a little sooner. That's what I'm really looking for as the Titans try to take on Houston this next week. We'll take a short break and we'll be back with some talk about Marcus Mariota.

Alright, we are back. Mike Malarkey had his press conference today. He talked about Marcus Mariota and he kind of praised him a little bit, which was odd considering everybody pretty much said he had a clunker of a game and that's fair. and he kind of praised him a little bit, which was odd considering, you know,

everybody pretty much said he had a clunker of a game, and that's fair. You know, you look at the stats, there was nothing special. The offense kind of sputtered along all day. But he said he praised his decision-making. And, you know, there's been one thing that we've kind of called into question after the last couple of weeks, it's been his thing that we've kind of called into question after the last couple of weeks. It's been his decision-making. Four picks in Pittsburgh.

Just some miscommunications, sure, but also some terrible decisions. And that's really something that we didn't see out of him last year, and that's a spot where he's kind of regressed. And I've said all along that you can probably trace that back to a lack of a run game and him having to press and some new receivers along the way. So I thought it was interesting that somebody brought up the fact that Mariota was injured and somebody asked if that could be hindering him mentally or in any sort of way.

And Jimmy kind of touched on that last night, kind of speculated a little bit about him not really trusting himself in the pocket and him kind of being skittish a little bit under pressure. But Malarkey shot all that down, and he basically said, no, that's not a factor. He's 100%. He's fine mentally. So, you know, if that's not a factor,'s 100 he's fine mentally so uh you know if that's not a factor and i obviously

question that then what is wrong what what has changed from from this year from last year to this year it's very odd and you know with the offensive line too it just seems like it's dropped off of a cliff uh so lots of questions for me maybe it's it's just a year of having terry rabisky's tape uh maybe that's it uh but but man i like i said last night titans have five games to figure this out for the playoff start so uh we'll see how that goes. We'll see if they can kind of use these three games as a tune-up to really get going for that Rams game and that Jaguars game. One area that Mike Malarkey was not happy with was Corey Davis,

specifically with his blocking. happy with was Corey Davis, specifically with his blocking. And that's surprising to me because I watched every game he played at Western Michigan, and the guy would take you into the grandstands. He's an aggressive, hard-nosed blocker. So it's interesting to hear Malarkey kind of scald him, and, we haven't heard too much negative things about Corey Davis. But, yeah, he kind of took Corey Davis out back with the media. He said he's got to learn to block better on screens.

He knows this. He said that the Titans would have had a couple big plays had he just blocked his man in front of him on the outside. Titans would have had a couple big plays had he just blocked his man in front of him on the outside. He basically told Corey Davis that he doesn't know what he's done in the past, but he's here now and he's going to have to block. So it's really interesting to me to really hear Mike Malarkey get after his fifth overall pick, especially since he's kind of had Corey Davis' back, and it's been just glowing reviews to this point.

So if you're looking for a spot where Corey Davis can get better, it's clearly blocking to Mike Malarkey. On the flip side, he had four targets, and he caught all four of them. He had that spectacular catch over the middle in the second half against the Colts so again you're seeing the flashes out of davis i really think it's a chemistry issue with him and mario it's going to come with time and you know we probably had some unrealistic expectations for davis especially considering all the mouths to feed in this offense there's plenty of uh plenty of weapons around Davis, so it's not like he's going to get peppered with targets.

So, you know, the panic on him after the Pittsburgh game was kind of ridiculous. But I think you're seeing more and more flashes. You're not going to see big numbers right now. You're not seeing big numbers out of Mariota, so you're not going to see big numbers right now. You're not seeing big numbers out of Mariota, so you're not going to see it out of Corey Davis. As long as he's still building and figuring out the playbook, that's all you can really ask right now. We'll see how he handles a struggling secondary in Houston,

a team that you can beat through the air in Arizona. So there's some favorable matchups going forward. But again, everything's building to this Rams and Jaguars finale. So Corey Davis is a big part of that. So you want him to be right by that game for sure. All right, when we come back, we will wrap things up with a quick look at the Houston

Texans. Alright, we are back. Quick note on this Titans-Texans game. We're recording this before the Texans play the Ravens on Monday Night Football, so don't hold me accountable to anything I say in regards to injuries or anything like that.

We've got a quick – we've got a line on this game. It's pretty big. Titans minus seven. So Titans are a touchdown favorite at home against Houston. That's a little surprising, I guess, considering that the Titans are playing all these close games against not-so-great teams. But they do get a bump playing at home.

So Titans by a touchdown per my bookie. So the Texans are coming to town. Not the same Texans team that you saw by any stretch of the imagination a few weeks ago in Houston. Deshaun Watson, obviously out for the season. Texans will be starting Tom Savage. They're another bad football

team. It kind of matches up with what we've seen over the past few weeks, Steelers game aside. This is a team that Tennessee should dominate up front. Texans offensive line is not anything special. They should be able to get after Savage. They should be able to stop Lamar Miller in this run game. Again, I think this is a get-right spot for this passing game.

You've seen Houston give up huge games to quarterbacks. Think about what Russell Wilson did up there when Houston took a trip to Seattle. And it's just happened time and time again. So you've got two corners over here, Kevin Johnson and you've got Kareem Jackson that are not having good years per PFF. Those are two spots that the Titans can kind of win right there. So maybe this is a spot for Corey Davis to kind of break out and put up some big numbers.

Maybe this is a spot where Marcus Mariota can attack downfield. You know, this is just a game that the Titans should handle, and you want to see them put together a clean game. It's like we've been saying all along, they just keep finding ways to make things interesting. And, you know, that Cincinnati game, it really stands out as some blown opportunities. That's probably a game that the Titans should have won by 17 points going away. So maybe they can do that against Houston. Just keep winning.

Eight and four, that's pretty much locking yourself into a playoff spot. I don't want to talk too soon because things can change rapidly in the NFL. But with the state of the AFC right now, if you win this game and move to eight and four, you got to feel really good about your playoff chances. Whether or not the Titans can go anywhere in these playoffs, that's a different story. But the fact that they're going to be there is certainly a step. There's problems there, and I'm not going to sugarcoat it. But, you know, it's still a step in the right direction. So, as I've said, there's three get-right games here for the Titans.

They should figure it out, man. I feel like I've said this all year. But, you know, they just keep plugging along and making the same mistakes, and we don't see any improvement week to week. So maybe, just maybe, this Houston game is where it starts. So check out MusicCityMiracles.com all week. We'll have continuing coverage of this Texans game. Jimmy will be back tomorrow night.

You can follow us on Twitter. I'm at TLambertFB. He is JayMorrisMCM. We'll get with you tomorrow night, and look for the pod on Wednesday morning on the site.