Locked On Titans - Daily Podcast On The Tennessee Titans - Mile High Massacre - Game Review, Titan Up/Titan Down & Titans Talk

Episode Date: October 14, 2019

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Welcome to the Locked on Titans podcast. I'm your host, Tyler Rowland. Titans fans, I can't slice it any other way, but it is a rock bottom Monday. Things are about as bleak as they've been since before Marcus was drafted, and it's no coincidence that it's because of his benching. This is a seminal moment in the direction of this franchise and where things will go from here, and we are going to talk about that in our first segment and just kind of take a big picture look at this team and this organization and where they're at right now. Obviously, things are about as low as they've been in four or five years.

So we're just going to take a general look at how we feel about the team. And I'm going to kind of get some big picture things, like I said, out of the way. And in our second segment, of course, we're going to do tighten up, tighten down. But even in that, we're going to kind of get some big picture things like I said out of the way and in our second segment of course we're going to do tighten up tighten down but even in that we're going to kind of keep it big picture of course I'm going to give you some some takes from the game for some individual players but generally I have some bigger bigger issues that I want to go tighten up tighten down on and give you guys where I think things are good that we can look at because it is important to make sure that we understand the positives compared to previous years and previous errors of this team. But, you know, obviously we have to point out where we can make some changes quickly in hopes to turn this around.

The Titans are only 2-4, so there's definitely a lot of time. In our third segment, we're going to do Titans talk. I'm going to play you some of the instant reaction from Ryan Tannehill and Marcus Mariota and Mike Vrabel around that decision. What's going to happen going forward? Clearly, now that that genie is out of the bottle, that is going to be the hottest topic around the team going forward. So buckle up Titans fans. Here we go. Let's get it. Your Tennessee Titans lead story is clearly the benching of Marcus Mariota and the replacement of Ryan Tannehill in the lineup. Late, middle, third quarter against the Broncos on Sunday. A 16-0 loss on the road takes the Titans to 2-4.

Definitely changes the outlook on this team. The motto going into the season, and the team really leaned into it, was good to great, how the Titans can go from good to great. It seems that they've gone the opposite way. At this point in time, with the Titans offense struggling the way it is, it's hard to think that either of the quarterbacks on the roster are going to be able to drastically change things. So when Marcus was benched,

he was 7 of 18, 63 yards, like I said, in the middle of the third quarter, and had just thrown his second interception. Now those are the first two interceptions that Marcus has thrown all season, and while he's been praised for not turning over the ball, which is something that he's done the past two seasons, which he can't do. He doesn't make enough plays to make up for it. Some quarterbacks throw interceptions, but they make so many plays, throwing long touchdowns, off-script passes,

that you can live with a couple interceptions, them trying to take chances. Marcus isn't one of those quarterbacks. He doesn't make enough plays to do that. There's no design runs called for him anymore either, so he's not using his best abilities either so there's definitely as always enough blame to go around but Tannehill came in was 13 of 16 144 yards and he did throw the interception late in the game on fourth down in the red zone trying to make something happen there at that point in time and it didn't look

like the Titans were going to have a chance to come back and win that game anyways like I said I don't know if either quarterback is drastically going to change the outcome of how the offense plays but we're not certain who that quarterback is going to be going forward and of course that's going to be the hottest topic around the team I think at this time based on what we saw and based on the numbers that we see here and not everything is based on numbers mostly you just have to watch the game and see how they throw Tannehill had more zip on the ball he was more consistently accurate on sideline throws which are something that the Titans clearly like to go to with the talent of the outside receivers. So if you're just judging quarterback skill, you have to let Tannehill

start the rest of the season. And at this point, I'm not certain if Marcus's confidence is in a place where you can put him back into the lineup after practice this week. I just don't think that can happen from here on out. And what that means for the future is a longer, more complicated topic in terms of the contracts that can be offered, what the other options are available. And of course, we'll have time to get into all of those things. But at the end of the day, when the passing offense is struggling like this, regardless of who the quarterback is is because the offensive line is bad the receivers don't get separation the play calling is suspect the run game can't

get going Derrick Henry had 15 carries for 28 yards 1.9 yards per carry I just don't know if any quarterback change is really what's going to fix this offense and that leads us into the other big takeaway here is how long can Mike Vrabel coordinate with Dean Pease this incredible defense that has yet to give up more than 20 points in a game while Arthur Smith looks completely lost calling an offense there's no rhythm there's no plays that connect to each other, that go off of each other, a series of plays where they show a similar look and do something else. None of that is strung together in a coherent way. Just an example, it's one play, but any Titans fan who watched the game, the swing pass to Deion Lewis on third and two,

there is no way that that was going to work. You're throwing the ball behind the line of scrimmage and expecting Deion Lewis to make a couple people miss or make a defender miss and pick up four or five yards from where he is to get a first down while the offense is kind of rolling. It's just something that I don't understand. I don't know how any Titans fan or analyst could understand. It's a universally head-scratching decision, and at some point you have to wonder what Mike Vrabel was doing sitting there watching him do it. The Titans are 2-4.

If the offense was even competent, they may be in a better position. We'll see if they're able to turn it around, and mostly we'll see who they think the quarterback is going to be who's going to help them turn it around. In our second segment, we're going to do tighten up, tighten down, and although there are some tighten downs and some negatives that we definitely do have to point out, I do want to point out some larger, bigger topic tighten ups that we can focus on in this state of mourning, as you could call it. Anyways, we're going to get into that next. Before we do, I want to let you guys know that Peloton is offering a limited time offer.

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He has four sacks on the year and I am incredibly disappointed. I've been trying to find the positives all day. I thought for certain they were going to credit him with a sack. Joe Flacco kind of slid down in the pocket. Harold Landry was right there and kind of put his hand on him. I figured that that would be credited to Landry as a sack. And although he didn't make a great play and, you know, make a solid sack to take him down, he kind of just put his hand on Flacco. I think all things considered, he deserves it. So I was just hoping for some positives there.

He didn't get credit for the sack, but he did put the pressure on that caused him to slide down. He was in the backfield throughout the day. He had six tackles on the day, which was tied for the lead for the Titans with Rashawn Evans, which leads us into our second tight end up, which is Rashawn Evans. He led the team with six tackles. He was excellent, in my opinion, in terms of bringing that physicality. He stuffed Phillip Lindsey on a third and two in the backfield.

I thought that just he made his presence felt out there as best he could. He did get banged up a little bit at the beginning, but was able to come back. Luckily, with Jayon going out as well, it was important for him to come back. The Titans are talented at inside linebacker. They can't give up that advantage by having both guys go down. So another Titan up on that note was Wesley Woodyard. I thought he came in and played against his former team, the Broncos, and played very well when Jayon Brown got hurt. It's unfortunate that Jayon got hurt. Every time we do the Crossover Wednesday event, I talk about Jayon to the other host. I want to make sure that his name gets out there as much as possible. But in his stead, Wesley Woodyard, who's been up and down throughout the season coming off of the

bench. He had five tackles, produced the Titans only registered sack, had two tackles for loss. So Wesley Woodyard came to play, not surprised against Denver and not getting as many snaps he's used to. He should be fresh and ready to go. So not surprised that he played as well as he did, but it was very important that he played that well for the defense to be able to keep pace when the offense is constantly falling behind. The last tight end up that I have for a player in the game is the mayor of Murfreesboro, Kevin Byard. He is clearly the best player on the team, and I have no idea where this team would be without him. John Robinson's best draft pick by far,

the best safety in the league. It's very clear. Every week he just proves it again and again. It's like the guy never has a bad game. He always is where he needs to be. He's the quarterback on defense telling everybody where to go. He's the emotional leader, clearly the best player on the team, and I'm just really happy to have a guy like that with how just not fun the offense is, just how much of a struggle

it is to watch the offense, to have a player like Kevin Byard on the other side who's just constantly making plays, grabbing the ball off the tight end's back. He's just phenomenal, and the only mistake that he made was not taking it the entire distance for a touchdown because I would not be surprised if he was the only person who was possible to get us points heck they maybe even should try him at quarterback he had that touchdown pass to Cruikshank last year doesn't seem like it's out of the realm of possibility and that leads me to my final tighten up the roster is good this is different than the Jake Locker years or Mettenberger or Clipboard Jesus, Charlie Whitehurst and some of the really down Rustin Webster years that got us to the John Robinson era.

The roster is good. This roster is not bad. We don't need to totally rebuild the team. There needs to be changes and I'll get into that, but this team is not far away from playoff contention. They were nine and seven, three years in a row for a reason. I think they just need some competent offensive things to happen and some certain changes to be made. And this team can be right where we expected them to be and right where we want them to be. So take that away as we go through the tight end downs. This roster is good and we know it.

out of the way as we go through the tight end downs. This roster is good and we know it. We know it. There's talent all over this roster. And with some more drafts, I believe that there can be more, but some changes that have to be made are our tight end downs. And the first one and the clearest one is Arthur Smith. We've given him a chance. We're six weeks into the season. This isn't a small sample size anymore. We've seen all that we need to see. The screen passes that don't work, the protections that are clearly not designed properly, the basic route combinations that aren't getting receivers open. Nothing is schemed open in this offense unless it's a play action over the middle of Delaney Walker.

That's all we ever see. Those are open. That's it. The only other big plays this Titans team gets are two-man routes where they have seven guys back to block, and you can't consistently get chunk plays in the NFL having two guys run out in routes. You can't. Arthur Smith has shown us enough. We have seen enough from Arthur Smith. He is not an offensive coordinator. He's a good guy. He's been here for nine years. He's a great person that everyone trusts, and he works hard, and all the guys know him for so long, but all the things that he was supposed to do build on

the player's strengths and weaknesses. When have we seen a read option from Marcus? Here's my thing. If Marcus is going to get benched because he's struggling throwing the football, why haven't we just said, okay, throw health out the window. We need to cater to this guy's strengths and have him do RPOs, you know, run pass options, go back to some of the stuff he did at Oregon, up tempo, no huddle. We're not doing anything on offense to cater to our players' strengths. We're not helping Marcus at all now. He did his fair share of damage out there today. He was terrible. He's completely lost confidence. He's broken. He sees ghosts in the pocket. He drops his eyes and runs into the back of his lineman. He's broken. I'm not saying that he's not to blame

because he's to blame and I agree that they should have gone to Tannehill at that point in time Marcus is broken for whatever the million reasons are Arthur Smith isn't making him better so we got to go with something else we got to try something else at this point we can't keep beating our head against the wall seven points in the last 10 quarters Arthur Smith is not the answer offensive coordinator. And I'm not going to come out here and call for people's jobs and say people need to be fired. But I can tell you that something needs to change. And Arthur Smith is not the guy who's going to get this Titans offense into the new millennium. That's what we know. And then a follow up to that as a Titan down is Mike Vrabel.

He's sitting there and watching this happen. He has too much trust. He has too much trust in Adoree Jackson to put him out for punt return as long as he did. He had too much trust in Cairo Santos to leave him kicking as long as he did. He has too much trust in this offense going for it on fourth down in certain situations like against Atlanta and Jacksonville when he shouldn't. He has too much trust in Arthur Smith. And clearly they shouldn't have hired in-house. And he had too much trust in Arthur Smith and clearly they shouldn't have hired in-house and he had too much trust in Arthur Smith which leads you to question John Robinson but we could

go down that pipe all day long all I know is this Titans offense is still stuck in the 90s and it has to come out of it and changes have to be made we can't sit back the rest of the season and go the rest of the way and keeping this same formula going together. It's just not going to happen. My final two tight end downs are going to be players from the game. Clearly, Marcus was a tight end down. He was struggling out there, missing passes that have to be complete. A lot of those throws on the boundary to the sidelines, he just doesn't hit them.

And you have to wonder if last year's injury to his elbow and the nerve damage that he experienced you have to wonder if that's I don't want to make a pass for him he was 7 of 18 63 yards two picks he was taking a chance on the second pick I'm not even necessarily mad about it but the momentum of the offense just needed changed so at this point you wonder if it's the health you wonder if it's the confidence it's probably everything all mixed up together but either way a massive tighten down and I would be shocked if he gets his job back again another tighten down and this isn't for play this is just Jayon Brown was injured he got a groin injury during the first quarter I believe it was in the first half

and he did not return in the second half he had his pads off so clearly it seems significant hopefully after resting and rehabbing for the next couple of days and maybe being limited in practice or taking practice off he'll be able to play he's definitely an important player to the Titans defense we cannot afford to have anyone off this defense as they try to keep this team afloat as the offense drowns so really really hope that Jayon can come back. Again, another fun player to watch, and we need all of that that we can possibly get. The last Titan down is me and my predictions. I'm 0-6 on the year in predictions. So at this point, I'm just going to go against whatever I really think

and hope that in some reverse jinx of a reverse jinx of a reverse jinx that that helps. Anyway, we're going to get into our third segment, Titans Talk. With the big quarterback switch today, it was such a big topic, such a divisive topic throughout the offseason and training camp and preseason. I think it's important to hear from the people involved. So I'm going to play you a little Ryan Tannehill, a little Marcus Mariota, and a little bit of Mike Vrabel in our third segment.

Titans Talk. So I want to play you guys the press conferences of first, Mike Vrabel, second, Ryan Tannehill, and third, Marcus Mariota, so that you guys can hear directly from the people who were involved in this circumstance, what they have to say, how they felt throughout, and what their kind of thoughts are going forward. This is going to be the biggest topic for the rest of the Titans season, most likely until we get a definite answer or until the offense starts to play drastically better.

So we might as well get as informed as we possibly can on the topic so like i said first we're going to have head coach mike vrabel second ryan tannahill third is going to be marcus um you know probably right before you know i just try to evaluate you know what we're doing and how we're doing it um you know every decision we make we try to do in the best interest of the football team at every position. So that one will be no different. At that point in time, we're really just trying to find a way to move the football and score some points.

Our defense was forcing them to kick field goals. We gave up the touchdown, but I felt like we were in the game and we needed to find a way to score. And that's the only way that you can win. I mean, I'll evaluate with John and the coaching staff, but I'll let you know as soon as I figure it out and do what's best for the team. What kind of issues do you have? I think there's a lot of issues. We'll identify them the best that we can after watching the film and try to correct every technique, every fundamental, take it like a pro.

I think that he certainly wasn't happy. Any of us weren't happy. When we lose, nobody's happy,. We want guys that want to play. I'll identify all those after we watch the tape. It didn't look like we had a rhythm to us offensively. I made a decision. That's what I signed up for. That's what you sign up for. When you decide to coach at any level,

you've made a decision that you're no longer on the fence. You can't have it both ways. You can't be afforded the luxury of waiting and seeing and then taking approach, well, I wouldn't have done that. When you decide to coach, you decide to go all in. You've got to find ways to win and help the players and improve. So when you don't win, it's to your point, how is it? It sucks. A few minutes looked over and then he came up to me and told me to get ready to get loose and go in the game. Obviously it wasn't good enough. We were down, I think, two scores, 13 points when

I came in and we failed to put points on the board. So you're not going to win any games if you can't put points on the board. We have to be better all the way around, and I have to be better. Yeah, I felt the ball was coming out good. I felt my locations were good. Definitely felt like it had been a while since I played, but I thought I was able to settle in and find some open guys. I have no idea. Brable hasn't told me anything. And at this point, nothing has changed for me.

Just we have to go back, look at this tape, and see how we can improve as an offense and how I can improve. I'm sure there's several plays out there that could have done something differently. So I have to take a look at those, take a real look at myself in the mirror and go back to the drawing board, whatever position that is this week and get myself ready to go for next week. I'm sorry.

Yeah, there's not a whole lot of rust as far as throwing. We throw in practice and felt ready to go. Obviously, it's different feeling a live rush and moving around in the pocket. And also, I definitely felt like it had been a while since I played. But there were some times where, you know, I had good pockets, good edge pressure where they rushed it upfield, and I was able to step up underneath and deliver the football.

So, you know, I thought the offensive line did he did a pretty good job obviously there's obviously some things we can work on there but overall I felt like for the most part I had time to go through my reads and try to find somebody. Brian, it turns out that you are the guy going forward. How confident are you that you can beat the St. Tim? Yeah I feel like we responded well. You know, obviously it's tough. You know, they love Marcus as well.

So these situations are tough for everybody. But just try to rally the guys. Hey, let's go win this thing one play at a time. You know, there's constant communication. And, you know, tell me how I can help you guys out, all that type of stuff. But I felt like the guys responded well and dealt with the adversity. How do you feel at this point? I don't feel great.

And, you know, Coach made a decision, and, you know, you've got to be – he's going to make a decision that's best for the team. So, you know, I respect it, and, you know, I just try to be there for Ryan. Yeah, I just – I mean, was it inaccurate today? Didn't give our guys a chance to make plays, and, you know, obviously that's some of the reasons why I got pulled. Yeah, our defense is playing outstanding. You know, they, week in and week out, have, you know, kept us in games,

you know, has really carried the load throughout the year. We are not pulling our weight as an offense, and we just have to find ways to improve and change that because our defense is playing nights out. I mean, it starts with me. I've got to do a better job. And it's being able to convert third downs, complete passes, getting the rhythm.

That's solely on me. For me as a competitor, I would love to be out there with my guys. But again, it's going to come down to the coaches, what they decide. Yeah, I mean, things happen for a reason. I truly believe that. And I can learn from

this. I'm going to grow from this and I'll become a better player from it. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. You know, no matter what, you know, I'm a team player and, you know, if they call my number, I'll be ready to go and I'm going to make the most of the opportunity. What is it like? Yeah, he just told me we needed a spark. And for me, I just, again, I just try to be the best team player that I can be, support my guy, support somebody that supported me throughout the entire year, and just kind of be another set of eyes for him. We're just talking about how we got to bounce back and move

forward. And I've got a bunch of great guys in that locker room. We're just talking about how we got to bounce back and move forward. I've got a bunch of great guys in that locker room. For me, again, I'd love to be the guy. I feel like I've tried to be the best teammate that I can be and help wherever I can. I wouldn't say personally. As an athlete, maybe. I can. I wouldn't say personally, you know, as an athlete maybe, you know, it is tough,

especially this being for me a first time, but again, I truly believe things happen for a reason and, you know, I'll be better from it. I can't really answer that right now, but I do know that I've got to play better. I've got to give our guys opportunities to make plays and you know we're going to take a look at it and I'll be better from it. That was Titans talk in our second segment we did tighten up and tighten down in our first segment we reviewed the game and talked about some some bigger talking points coming out of it specifically the quarterback competition going forward the rest of the season. So it's going to be a crazy week, guys. We're really going to have to pay attention to everything we hear out of practice.

And then eventually, hopefully, we get an answer as to who the quarterback is going to be going forward. I haven't really said this throughout the episode, but it's my opinion that we probably need to go with Tannehill the rest of the year. He was clearly throwing the ball better. need to go with Tannehill the rest of the year. He was clearly throwing the ball better, and unfortunately, whether it be this offense, this organization, the offensive line, the wide receivers, the coordinator changes, whatever it is, Marcus is broken. So go with Tannehill the rest of the year, and we'll evaluate where we are in the offseason, but hopefully that means we can turn

the offense around just a little bit and make this team just a little more fun to watch. Who knows? String a couple victories together and you're right back in it in the middle of November there. So we will see how it goes going forward. Obviously, I will keep my eye on this for you guys and we will be back tomorrow. I am your host, Tyler Rowland, and this was Locked on Titans.