Locked On Titans - Daily Podcast On The Tennessee Titans - Tannehill Rumors, Power Rankings Review & Trade Deadline Rant

Episode Date: February 6, 2020

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Welcome to the Locked on Titans podcast. I'm your host, Tyler Rowland. Titans fans, we got our first crumb of information about how the Titans want to solve their quarterback issue for 2020. So we're going to talk about that first. And then we everything off of 2019, a couple power rankings taking us into 2020, a little bit of a projection from all over the NFL coverage globe. So we are going to talk about that. And to finish off the show, we are going to have a little bit of a Roland's rant about the trade deadline. With today being the NBA's trade deadline day, I want to talk about the NFL's, recap what happened on that day, and talk a little bit about how they compare, how they're different,

and what I would like to see from the NFL that they could take from the NBA and vice versa. So we will round out the show with that. Excited to jump into everything with you guys. Let's get it one of the last little bits of information that we got coming out of the Super Bowl media process was a tweet from Palm Beach Post reporter Joe Shad who covers the Dolphins in South Beach and he spoke with veteran ESPN reporter and newsbreaker Chris Mortensen about Ryan Tannehill. Mortensen had this to say, Ryan Tannehill is not leaving the Titans. That's a direct quote from Mortensen. Now, what's interesting about that is that Mortensen, who, as I mentioned, is a veteran in the newsbreaking and reporting business with the NFL and has been in this industry for such a long time,

would say something so bold about a free agent who has a lot of different options that could come out. It makes you wonder if Mortensen does have some inside information here, which typically these insiders, as they are called, certainly do. And it makes you wonder if the Titans are even considering other options. If they are planning to go ahead and get a long-term deal done with Ryan Tannehill, it would make sense for them to do that. Some of the best quarterback play that this franchise has seen in quite some time. And where this roster is right now, it wouldn't make a lot of sense to reset the quarterback

position whether that be bringing in a veteran free agent who may have a different skill set need to run a different offense or drafting a young player when the titans sit at 29 to be able to move up to get the type of rookie quarterback that you would need to continue the success that they've already had you would have to mortgage quite a bit so I don't suspect that the Titans would want to go that route either continuing to build on the momentum that they have right now seems to make the most sense for them going forward so when you look at an extension for Ryan Tannehill it makes all the sense in the world and at this point it just comes down to how much money they are willing to pay him if you look at a place like spot track.com gives you really good analysis

on salary cap projections gives you up-to-date information on player contracts they do have a feature where they look at market value and they look at some of the recent contracts for similar players and age and you and their statistics and production on the field. So when you look at what they are projecting, we're looking around $30.5 million a year. I think that Tannehill will give the Titans a little bit of a discount on that rate because he is very comfortable in Tennessee. He just had the best year of his career in Tennessee.

You would think he would be eager to get back there and lead that locker room next year as well. So I would suspect that the Titans would look to get that around $27-$28 million a year. This is projecting a four-year deal. I would imagine the Titans are looking for a three-year deal with only around two of those guaranteed. Some similar contracts that we can compare this to. Alex Smith was 33 years old when he signed a four-year $94 million deal, about $23.5 million a year. Aaron Rodgers got four years $134 million. That's about $33.5 million a year. He signed that when he was 34 years old and Tannehill is obviously not the talent that Rodgers is so it makes sense he wouldn't get to that level

Matt Ryan at age 32 got five years 150 million 30 million a year Matt Ryan's been an MVP in this league gone to a Super Bowl so Tannehill shouldn't quite reach that level and then Nick Foles got four years 88 million dollars when he was 30 I think Tannehill is most comparable to Foles there based on their quick success the year before but Tannehill should get a little bit more because I believe he's more talented than Foles more of a possibility of being a long-term starter going forward now that doesn't always mean that things are set in stone Mortensen could be wrong after, he could have got a faulty report or a source could be offered. Just be misled at this moment in time.

Things can always break down. So if something like that does happen, of course, we need to know who the free agents and who the draftees are that are available that the Titans might be interested in. So we are still going to cover that here coming up in the offseason. Make sure you are subscribed to the show on Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Spotify, wherever you listen to your podcasts. We will be there, so make sure that you are locked in to the Locked on Titans. Follow me on Twitter at TicTacTitans as well if you could.

We are going to jump into our next segment. Talk about some of the power rankings at the end of the season for the Titans and what they mean. If you've been a listener of this podcast, I'm sure you've heard all the great advertisers working with locked on to reach sports fans, but you may not know that locked on Titans is a great way for your local business to reach passionate Titans fans.

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We look forward to hearing from you. our first power rankings comes from dan hanzus from nfl.com also the host of the around the nfl podcast which is a really good show really entertaining nfl national show as well his was a 2019 review power rankings taking a look at the entire season behind us not really projecting into 2020 just taking a look at everything that's played out from the beginning of the regular season all the way through the Super Bowl so it's no shock that he has the Chiefs ranked number one and the 49ers ranked number two. That makes all the sense in the world, but what really matters is where the Titans are ranked, and he has the Tennessee Titans at sixth in this power rankings for the 2019 season 2020 playoffs. That's a pretty good ranking for the Titans. You have to be pretty

satisfied with sixth overall, even though they were in the top four I can understand that not necessarily where you finish is the entire quality of your season the Titans were two and four came back only finished nine and seven so I can understand some teams like the Ravens are ranked third I understand the rankings there you have somebody like the Packers at five who got to the same round as the Titans but had a better regular season overall. But what's really perplexing is the New Orleans Saints at four. The Saints lost before the Titans. They were one of the more disappointing playoff exits we can remember in recent years lost

at home to a Vikings team that came in all the way down at 11. So that doesn't make a lot of sense to me. You would think the Titans would be above the Saints there regardless of what their regular season records were. that came in all the way down at 11. So that doesn't make a lot of sense to me. You would think the Titans would be above the Saints there, regardless of what their regular season records were, just because of how flat and how miserable the Saints came out in the wildcard round at home. Interesting there, but like I said, overall, the Tennessee Titans being at 6, you can't complain too much about that.

Let's take a stroll on over to Sports Illustrated where the staff of Monday morning quarterback Andrew Brandt, Gary Grambling, Mitch Goldich, Kalen Kaler, Bette Marston, Connor Orr, and Jenny Vrentis all voted on the power rankings to finish the season and the Titans actually came in at number four in this poll. They were only behind the San Francisco 49ers at two, the Kansas City Chiefs, of course, at the top spot, and then the Baltimore Ravens, which as I mentioned with the previous power rankings, they had a fantastic record-breaking season. So even though the Titans beat them, it's understandable that when you look at the entire body of work for the entire season, that they would be slightly ahead. I have no issue with that but here the Titans are ahead of the Saints who come in at five, the Packers at six, the Patriots at seven. So the rankings are a little bit different there

but the Titans are properly respected there and get the number four spot in this season ending power rankings. For this portion of the programming we are going to dive into a couple mock drafts that actually project into 2020 about what we expect to see going forward into the next season. And this one comes from ESPN, from their ESPN Nation team of writers, and actually has the Titans at number eight, basically citing that the Titans have already

found their identity which has proven to be true if they can find a way to bring back Ryan Tannehill and Derrick Henry which they are completely expected to do then this offense is already tailor-made the play action bootleg Ryan Tannehill getting the ball to his playmakers quickly getting the ball out of his hands and then using Derrick Henry as a hammer at the end of games. It's just a perfect recipe for the Titans to continue the success that they had at the end of the year in 2019. So having them ranked eighth does make a lot of sense. You see a couple teams ahead of them.

The New England Patriots at seven. I don't necessarily agree with that, but the Seattle Seahawks with a quarterback like Russell Wilson, Green Bay Packers, who had a better regular season record than the Titans and still have Aaron Rodgers, the New Orleans Saints, again, another shaky one there. We will wait to see what Drew Brees decides to do for the upcoming season. And then the big three that have been ahead of the Titans every step of the way, the Chiefs at one, the 49ersers at two and then the Baltimore Ravens at three so if the Titans can repeat their success again in 2020 I would expect them to be right up there in the top four at all times no matter what our fourth and final power rankings comes from Bleacher Report a 2020

projection power rankings it has the Titans as low as we have seen them during this little round up here at 13 i was pretty surprised to see that ranking for the titans i know that there's a lot of uncertainty when it comes to the free agents that they're going to be able to bring back and be able to afford but there is just no way that the titans should be ranked behind certain teams like the cowboys the Steelers, the Vikings. Again, the Saints is a questionable one there, but you look at the first three I mentioned, it's pretty incredible that Bleacher Report had the Titans ranked this low, but that's why that they are only power rankings if the Titans are able to sort out all of the questions

that they have in the offseason and get reasonable production where they need it. There's no reason that the Titans should be the 13th best team in the NFL next season. That is going to do it for our power ranking segment. We are going to jump into a little Roland's rant about the trade deadline. Roland's rant so today is the NBA's tread deadline we're already seeing a bunch of deals start to take place or be rumored in the NBA and while for the longest time the NBA's trade deadline day was a much more high-profile event than the NFL's. I thought that about the 10 days leading up to the trade deadline last year for the NFL were pretty notable. You look back at some of the deals that took place starting October 16th.

The Ravens traded for Marcus Peters. That was pretty high-profile. Peters is one of the better corners in the NFL, and obviously it turned out to be a good move as he changed their defense once he arrived. That same day, the Jaguars traded Ramsey to the Rams, so that was a big blockbuster move for being in season in the NFL. Muhammad Sanu went to the Patriots on the 22nd of October, and then again on the 22nd, Emmanuel Sanders went to the 49ers, who ended up making it to the Super Bowl. The Patriots then turned around and traded defensive end Michael Bennett to the Cowboys, so there were a lot of

rumors going around from that moment on the 24th of October all the way up until the actual deadline of the 29th. We only got three more trades after that though going into the final days coming up to the deadline. Kenyon Drake went to the Cardinals from the Dolphins and then Leonard Williams was traded to the Giants from the Jets and then actually on the deadline is when the Rams acquired Aqib Tlaib from the Dolphins and that Dolphins exodus that took place we saw Laramie Tunsil earlier in the season as well so a little bit more activity than we're used to seeing from the NFL and I think that although the NBA is considered like I said a much more high profile event during the trade deadline looking at this maybe not the actual

day of and that's the one thing that I would like to see if the NFL could have more trades actually on the deadline or the day before then it could be much more of an event but if we get a lot of trades in the NFL like we saw in 2019 the week leading up to the trade deadline I think that would be fantastic for the NFL would be fantastic for everyone who enjoys the NFL as trades and transactions and different moves and all that are a very exciting part of professional sports and a big part of the reason why we all enjoy it so much wanted to take this opportunity just to point out that the NBA trade deadline while not being so concentrated

on just a couple of days, that 10 days week leading up to the trade deadline in the NFL this season was excellent. And there turned out to be some really consequential moves. So really exciting stuff. Hopefully the NFL continues that trend into 2020 and maybe even the Titans get in on the action next year. So that is going to wrap up today's show. Tomorrow we are going to be back with you guys to round out the week,

get you into the weekend. As a general reminder, next week will be our ultimate division crossover. Make sure you tune in all five days as we have all of the hosts from the AFC South Locked On podcast on the show all week. Also, the mailbag is tomorrow. It will be the last segment of tomorrow. Make sure that you are sending me your questions on Twitter at TicTacTitans or putting them in the reviews on Apple Podcasts.

I will make sure to get all those answered for you guys tomorrow. But that will do it for us tonight. As always, I am your host, Tyler Rowland, and this was Locked on Titans.