Locked On Titans - Daily Podcast On The Tennessee Titans - Ranking Titans Position Groups: First to Worst

Episode Date: January 26, 2021

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You are Locked On Titans, your daily Tennessee Titans podcast. Part of the Locked On Podcast Network, your team every day. Welcome to the Locked On Titans podcast. I am your host, Tyler Rowland. Titans fans, I want to have a little bit of fun on today's episode, but also set the foundation for our offseason conversations to come. What I want to do today is I want to take the Titans roster as it finished the year and rank each position from best to worst.

And then what we can do from there is we can look at certain position groups that we need to drastically improve, certain position groups where maybe we could afford to have a little bit of a decrease in production if it means boosting up some other spots. So before we dive into tomorrow's conversation on Wednesday where we look at what the Titans salary cap looks like right now, what cap casualties they could have to create more room, what in-house free agents they may be debating bringing back or letting leave.

Before we dive into that conversation, I want to spend today, take a look at the roster as it sits and go through where I see the strengths and weaknesses on the team. So we are going to start with the first four positions, then go to the next four positions, round out with the bottom four positions, then go to the next four positions, round out with the bottom four positions, and I bet you can guess which position group came in at last place. But we are going to dive into each position group on the Tennessee Titans from best all the way to worst on today's Locked on Titans podcast. Let's get it. We are going to dive into my ranking of the Titans position groups, ending the 2020 season from best to worst. But before we do, I want to remind you guys again that on tomorrow's show,

we will be taking a look at the Titans' financial situation, looking at what their salary cap looks like right now heading into the 2021 offseason, how they can create more room by cutting certain veteran players, and then also take a look at the in-house free agents that the Titans will be debating on whether to sign back or let walk in free agency. So a lot coming up on this week for the Locked on Titans podcast.

Make sure that you're subscribed on whatever platform you do stream and make sure that you follow me on Twitter at TicTacTitans as well. But let's dive right into this ranking. The number one best position group on the Tennessee Titans ending 2020 was the quarterback position. I know that I'm not super high on Logan Wood's side, but the reality of the quarterback position is you really need that one guy who can carry you. The Titans were led by Ryan Tannehill, led the NFL in game-winning comebacks, led the NFL in fourth-quarter comeback touchdown drives. I mean, he was magnificent, and any time the Titans needed a boost, Tannehill was there

to give it to them. So for that, I am ranking the quarterback position as the number one position group on the team simply because Ryan Tannehill is that good. Number two, the interior offensive line. We have Ben Jones at center who was one of the best five centers in the NFL, in my opinion. You have Roger Saffold and Nate Davis who were both top 20,

maybe even top 15 guards in the NFL this year. And the Titans' zone run scheme is really dependent on having athletic and intelligent guards that can execute those combo blocks on the line of scrimmage and then get up to the second level and get their hat on a linebacker and do two jobs at once on the same play. The Titans' interior trio was absolutely fantastic. But outside of that, I thought that Aaron Brewer, the interior offensive lineman as an undrafted free agent,

was great this year. I actually named him my offensive rookie of the year for the Titans in his limited snaps. But whenever he was asked to come into duty for the Titans, the Titans always did not miss a beat in the run game, so very impressed by those four. Jameel Douglas, not so impressed, but he's not an absolute zero out there. There are worse interior offensive linemen in the NFL than Jameel Douglas, so a very,

very solid group there for the Titans. Number three, the running back spot. I mean, obviously you're led by the king, Derrick Henry, with 2,000 rushing yards. But I think Darrington Evans, once he was healthy, I mean, he helped the Titans out. Had a receiving touchdown, caught a few passes, had a few good runs as he was learning the offense. I think he's really going to make even more of an impact for the Titans next year, especially in special teams. So then you look at Jeremy McNichols, who was an absolute saint, and what a boost he was to the Titans in pass protection

when Derrick Henry was really struggling with pass protection during the year, and Darrington Evans was not available to the Titans due to injury. And then, taking it a step further, I was incredibly impressed with Deontay Foreman. He came in. Remember, he had that awesome touchdown catch on the play-action pass. They had Derrick Henry and Foreman in the backfield in the red zone. I thought that he gave the Titans the most similar look to Derrick Henry that they've gotten since Derrick Henry has been in Tennessee.

So I really liked what Foreman provided the Titans. Centerize Perry did a lot for the Titans in special teams, if not necessarily on offense, which was to be expected at the beginning of the year anyways. And then Corey Blossom game was a help for the Titans when they had to utilize the fullback in their offense to match the numbers game in that zone running scheme. So I really love the running back group for the Titans. I would love to see a little bit more from Darrington Evans in the pass game, and that would really take this running back group to the next level.

But with Derrick Henry and all these other little pieces that they had throughout the year, I thought the Titans running back group did a fantastic job, my number three. And then the last position group that I want to talk about here in our first segment is the wide receiver position. Now, wide receiver is going to get very, very dicey going forward. I could see Adam Humphreys being a cut candidate due to just not being able to stay on the field. Obviously, Corey Davis is a big threat to walk in free agency. It's something that I'm forecasting. And outside of that, the Titans don't have a lot that they can rely on. But you do have A.J. Brown, and we are ranking the position groups as they end in 2020. So with Corey Davis, with A.J. Brown, with Cam Batson, Kalief Raymond, Nick Westbrook, Akina, all playing roles for the Titans late in the year. I got to give them that

number four spot. But again, like I said, that's a very dicey position. The Titans don't have anybody really on the books officially outside of Humphreys, A.J. Brown. Now, I'm intrigued by certain options the Titans picked up late in the year. A practice squad guy like Marcus Johnson, also a practice squad guy like Chester Rogers. I think they could even be better players than what the Titans had in Cam Batson, Kalief Raymond, Nick Westbrook-Akina. Now, Westbrook-Akina did really help the Titans late in the year in special teams, and he's

a big-bodied receiver unlike those other guys, so he could have found himself a spot as the Titans' fifth, sixth wide receiver on next year's roster, but overall, the wide receiver group was fantastic in the 2020 season. I have them at number four. So we are going to move forward into the second grouping that I have here, the next four position groups that I want to talk about. Before we get into that, though, I got to tell you guys about our friends over at betonline.ag. You got the Super Bowl coming up, the NBA season, the NHL season, college basketball.

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BetOnline, your online sportsbook experts. We will continue ranking from best to worst the Titans position groups at the end of 2020. Just as a recap of our first segment, number one, I had the quarterback position. Number two, the interior offensive line, number three, the running back position, and number four, the wide receiver group. One thing that is notable there is no defensive positions are represented in my top four, and obviously, for good reason, as you guys know. Before we dive into our second portion here of my positional rankings for the Titans, I do want to remind you guys about a new podcast from the Locked On Podcast Network, and it

is Locked On Today. Going to be bringing you all of your daily sports news, all the biggest news in American sports and sports from around the world. So make sure they get your daily sports fix with the Locked On Today podcast from the Locked On Podcast Network. Check that out on whatever platform you do stream, and while you're doing that, you are listening to the Locked On Titans podcast, so probably a good time to subscribe to the Locked On Titans podcast on whatever platform you do stream as well, but let's dive into

our second grouping here, and we are starting out not with defense and not even with offense this time. The special teams group, and within the special teams group, I included just the specialists. Long snapper Matt Overton, kicker Steven Gostkowski, and punter Brett Kern. So Brett Kern, obviously fantastic.

The weapon. He's one of the best punters in the NFL and went healthy for an entire season. In my opinion, the best punter in the NFL. So a major boost for the special teams unit just from Brett Kern alone. But when you add in that Steven Gostkowski made four to five game-winning kicks for the Tennessee Titans, and he did struggle at times throughout the year, but my favorite part about Gostkowski was at the end of the season when he kicked the ball, I thought it was going in.

And it was nice to have somebody that we could rely on after going through five different kickers in 2019. So Gostkowski had his ups and downs, but he proved fruitful for the Titans and made a ton of big kicks that were absolutely necessary. And, you know, I want to throw in Sam Sloman in this group. The legend Sam Wise carried the Titans up the mountain and threw in the ball so that they could win the division title. Thank you very much.

You're getting included in this even though you're not on the team anymore. But, you know, I thought the Titans... This is something that I preached. You guys were calling for the head of Gostkowski early in the season and it proved wrong. I was right.

You gotta settle down, young man. You can't just be dating forever. You got to pick one and ride it out through the ups and downs. And having Gostkowski through the ups and downs helped the Titans more than it hurt the Titans. And then Matt Overton came in. Bo Brinkley, you know, God bless his soul. Whatever happened with COVID and how it affected him, it clearly did.

The Titans had to go a different direction. Once Matt Overton came in, you just didn't have to worry about the long snapper anymore. The long snapper should never be mentioned. The long snapper should never be concerned about. Just do your job over and over and over again consistently. And Matt Overton was able to do that for the Titans. So just bare minimum consistency is all you really need in a quality long snapper.

So you take a look at those three guys and what they were able to do. You add in Sam Sloman's addition there at the end. And I got the special teams at number five overall. The specialist, I guess, not the overall special teams. Special teams wasn't good for the Titans this year. But those three specialists as a group, I have as the fifth best position group on the team number six the tight end group So obviously John who Smith a versatile guy did a lot after the catch helped the Titans offense also helped once Taylor LeJuan went down with all the blocking and you can't have a successful run game without

the blocking and you can't have a successful run game without tight ends being successful and productive as well. Jeff Swaim, Michael Pruitt, and Jonu Smith were all absolutely excellent blocking for most of the season. Now, the reason that they're down on this list at number six is because when the Titans struggled in the run game, it was because the tight ends were getting whooped on the outsides. That really hurt them in the playoff game against Baltimore. The tight ends, the edges, the tackles, they got destroyed.

So Jeff Swaim, Jonu Smith, Michael Pruitt, when they played poorly, it really, really hindered the Titans offense. So I'm going to give them sixth place overall halfway through the list here. And then, of course, you got to talk about Anthony Ferkser, who basically became Adam Humphreys once Humphreys was out for most of the season. Ferkser really had some big games for the Titans in the passing game. And while he wasn't really much in the sense of blocking in the run game, his value in the passing game and the role that he played really, really helped the Titans.

So I'm going to give the tight ends number six. Number seven, likewise, in a similar spot, the offensive tackle group. Now, the reason that they're at number seven here is they lost Taylor LeJuan, lost Ty Sambrillo. Then Questenberry filled his role admirably. But the reality is that Questenberry is a low end of the roster practice squad tackle. So he held up in the run game, struggled a lot more in the passing game. But the reality is with Taylor LeJuan and Ty Sambrillo missing your two top left tackles,

what else could you ask for? I thought Questenberry did a fantastic job considering his limitations in the role that they put him in. Dennis Kelly was a rock on the other side. No, he wasn't all pro like Jack Conklin. No, he wasn't pro bowl level, but he was a consistent, solid, average offensive tackle, which is really all the Tennessee Titans needed at that position.

One thing that does weigh down this position group, though, although we saw an excellent performance from a guy in his role like Questenberry and then a solid play all year from Kelly, is Isaiah Wilson not being on the team, being suspended at the end of the year, being on the unable-to-perform list. It's just unfortunate. The tackle position with Taylor LeJuan out, Tyson Brillo out, Isaiah Wilson out, left with Marshall Newhouse, left with Dennis Kelly, left with Questenberry.

I mean, obviously, that's not the best group on the team, but because of what they did in the position that they were put in, have them at 7th overall. Now, number 8, we finally get a defensive group, and that's the interior defensive line. Daquan Jones, Jeffrey Simmons, Jack Crawford, Tyre Tartt, Matt Dickerson, Larell Murchison. The Titans' pass defense was miles worse than the Titans' run defense. You could actually count on the Titans' run defense for the most part. I know that they had certain games where they were really lax. You think of Dalvin Cook going off for 180 yards. You think of that first matchup

with the Indianapolis Colts, but overall, the most consistent part of the Titans defense throughout the year was that interior defensive line. Daquan Jones, Jeffrey Simmons was probably the best player on the Titans defense, at least outside of Malcolm Butler. I thought Jack Crawford was a complete liability at the end of the year, but he had certain games where he played well and playing in that elephant role for the Titans where you're basically a 4-3 defensive end, but do some 3-4 defensive end principles, do some edge principles. That's a tough spot for a guy like Jack Crawford, who is really just a backup defensive lineman. If he could have been a backup to Jadavion Clowney, if he could have been a backup to Jeffrey Simmons and Daquan Jones,

he would have had a much better season for who he is. He's a role player, not a starter. So kind of thrust in that spot made things difficult. Tyre Tart really needs to improve his consistency, but he showed flashes as an undrafted free agent. I thought Matt Dickerson did well filling in in that Austin Johnson role as that rotational defensive lineman for the value and the role that he's placed in.

He did fine. And then Larell Murchison was hurt a lot throughout the year, but thought he improved as well after being really, really bad at the beginning of the year. So that is the second grouping there. That's the next four. We are going to cap off today's positional ranking by going through the bottom four positional units that the titans had at the end of 2020

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all the parts your car will ever need. rockauto.com We have gone through 8 of the 12 positional groups that we will be ranking on today's show. And let's recap how far we have gotten. And number one, the quarterback position. Number two, the interior offensive line. Number three, the running back group. Number four, the wide receivers.

Number five, the specialists. Number six, the tight ends. Number seven, the offensive tackles. Number eight, the interior defensive line. Now we are going to get into the back four position groups on the team. And if you disagree with my rankings here, if you disagree with my analysis on a certain position, or you just think I have someone too high, too low, make sure that you let me know on Twitter at TicTacTitans. Follow me there and make sure to shoot me your opinions. If you form it in the form of a mailbag question, let me know how you feel.

Then I'll give you a shout out and kind of answer more as to why you think I put things the way I put them. But before we dive into the bottom four positions that we are going to be discussing today, I want to remind you guys about the Locked on Bets podcast. Told you earlier in the show about betonline.ag. Now, if you want to go to betonline.ag and play some intelligent wagers, get your analysis and gambling news from your boy Q on the Locked On Bets podcast, the new podcast from the Locked On Podcast Network.

Make sure you subscribe on whatever platform you do stream. But let's dive into these last four position groups. Number nine, the inside linebacker group. And I can't believe this. I really can't at the beginning of the season I was convinced that the inside linebacker group was one of the best spots that the Titans had they had Rashawn Evans who seemed to be you know blossoming and turning into a fantastic player getting better and pass coverage being used more as a rusher. I thought he was really

about to blossom into a versatile piece. And then Jayon Brown really came into his own at the end of the year last season, 2019. And then David Long showed incredible improvements at the end of the 2019 season. But then Tyrone McKenzie abruptly leaves the Tennessee Titans as their inside linebacker coach before the 2020 season. Jim Haslett is hired, and we see an incredible drop in the production and the performance of the inside linebackers. Rashawn Evans can't get off blocks. He's overrunning certain plays, being overly aggressive, not diagnosing plays very quickly.

Jayon Brown is even struggling in pass coverage. Similar things in the run game, unable to get off blocks, misdiagnosing plays, overrunning holes. David Long, unable to get on the field for a lot of the year due to inability to play special teams. Clearly, he wasn't developing at as high of a rate as we were expecting, so a massive regression from the inside linebacker group. You look at Nick DeZubnar, Will Compton, and Darren Bates. Those are the guys that really buoyed this position because

they helped on special teams so much, so that's how the inside linebacker group even got to number nine instead of number 10, but you know, the talent is there, in my opinion. Rashawn Evans, probably a guy that isn't going to be with the Titans forever. He hasn't proven to be able to kind of do well with the mental aspects of playing inside linebacker. Even when Jayon Brown got hurt, Will Compton had the green dot. David Long had the green dot, which is the play caller for the defense. So why isn't Rashawn Evans leading the defense, calling the plays? Makes you think that maybe he's kind of lacking on the mental side of the game.

And him diagnosing plays in real time, you can kind of see those deficiencies. So disappointed by the inside linebacker group. I'm putting a lot of that on coaching, though. Hopefully David Long and some of the strides we saw him make at the end of this season as well carry forward. We're going to need him to be the best inside linebacker on the Titans next year. Number 10, the safety group. Kevin Byard had his worst season since his rookie year.

He looked lost in pass coverage. The tackling from the safeties was terrible. Kenny Vaccaro, Kevin Byard, Amani Hooker all really struggled tackling, coming down in run fit, coming down as force players, filling holes as the running back turned up field. Just terrible in run defense from the safeties this year, in my opinion, especially their tackling. Also, Kenny Vaccaro fell off a cliff when it comes to pass coverage. Joshua Kalou, when he was out there, looked lost. He is not a safety, folks.

He's a special teams player, and viewing him as a defensive player, it's misguided. Joshua Kalou is not a defensive player. So the Titans didn't really, and Dane Cruikshank was excited to see what he could blossom into maybe this year, but he was on IR for most of the year, injured for most of the year. So unfortunate that we didn't get to see more development from Dane Cruikshank. Hopefully he's able to come back healthy. I suspect the Titans may be getting rid of Kenny Vaccaro to allow Amani Hooker, who did

have good moments in pass coverage, allow him to take that safety spot full time. But having a third safety that you can rotate in as the Titans like to do, having Dan Crookshank come back and be healthy, that would be a big boost. Safety is actually a low key need for the Titans in free agency or the draft that I don't think a lot of people are talking about that I plan to talk a little bit more about going forward. So safety at number 10. Number 11, cornerback. Malcolm Butler played well. We saw some good first and second down play from Desmond King. Christian Fulton had some bright

moments out there. Breon Borders played okay in a couple of games before his deficiencies really got exposed. But outside of that, Ty Smith, a liability. Kareem Moore, mostly a special teams player. Chris Jackson was maybe the worst defensive back in the NFL. Chris Milton was a really good special teams player, but ended up on IR at the end of the year. So really we're talking about Malcolm Butler, who I thought was pretty good. And then Adoree, who was hurt pretty much all year and then just terrible. Adoree was god-awful when he actually played.

Desmond King, I mentioned, up and down. He has a lot of what Ryan Logan brought to the table, but he also has a lot of the negatives that Logan Ryan brought to the table. And that's why he was taken off the field on third downs a lot when they knew that the other team was going to pass. Christian Fulton talked about him as well. Want to see more from the rookie. Injured a lot. Had some bright moments when he was out there, though, and kind of got rotated in more at the end of the year, getting Adorey, Malcolm, and Fulton out there together, which is what Titans fans were hoping to see all year long.

But overall, the Titans cornerbacks just got destroyed most of the year. Jonathan Joseph, Breon Borders got picked on there at the end of his tenure before getting hurt and going to IR. Ty Smith didn't get it done. Malcolm had good games and was probably the best defensive player for the Titans, but he still wasn't absolutely unbeatable out there. But overall, I don't want to hate on Malcolm. He was one of the better players on the team all year long.

So with Adory, with Desmond King's deficiencies on third down and pass coverage, Fulton being up and down and being injured, and then the other just terrible defensive backs that got rotated in for the Titans throughout the year has to be the second worst position on the team. And lastly, don't have to spend a lot of time here, guys. You know what it is. Edge rusher. Harold Landry, and I don't blame Harold Landry.

He had a career high coverage snaps this year. Why are we using our best pass rusher and coverage so much? I don't get it. But Harold Landry didn't take a step up in his pass rushing development. But Harold Landry didn't take a step up in his pass rushing development. Derek Roberson did not take any steps in run defense as a first and second down run defender. The Titans had to rotate in Tazar Skipper and Wyatt Ray at the end of the year because Roberson was one hurt. And then when he wasn't, he's just not good enough in run defense.

And then you look at Clowney getting hurt. A waste of money there. You look at Vic, oh God, Vic Beasley. Can you think of a signing and free agency for the Titans that went worse as quickly? There may have been worse free agent signings, but to go bad so quickly from the jump, that was a failure. I mean, you look at the other guys that they had like I said Skipper you had Wyatt Ray out there for a little bit Brooks Reed got some run at the end of the year I mean just despicable just miserable and the Titans have to attack cornerback and edge if you had to pick two positions on defense that you wanted to be your most talented positions you

would pick cornerback and edge rusher and And those are the Titans' two worst positions on the defense. And that's how you have as bad of a defense as the Titans ended up having in the 2020 season. So that's how I see the positions, the position groupings ranked at the end of the year. Remember, on tomorrow's show, we are going to break down the financial situation the Titans in. What kind of cap space do they currently have?

What does it currently look like? Who are some potential cuts that the Titans in? What kind of cap space do they currently have? What does it currently look like? Who are some potential cuts that the Titans could make to clear up more cap space? And who are the Titans in-house free agents who they will be debating on whether to bring back or let walk in free agency? That's all coming up tomorrow on the Locked on Titans podcast. Make sure you subscribe on whatever platform you do stream. That's going to do it for me today, folks. As always, I am your host, Tyler Rowland, and this was Locked on Titans.