Locked On Titans - Daily Podcast On The Tennessee Titans - Titans 2018 Draft Class: Overall Review, Draft Grades & Optimistic Football News

Episode Date: May 27, 2020

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Welcome to the Locked on Titans podcast. I am your host Tyler Rowland Titans fans Today's edition of the Locked on Titans podcast is brought to you by built bar built bars are the best tasting protein bars on the market Make sure you check out built bar.com and use promo code locked on for $10 off your first order We are going to continue our draft class review series today. If you have not checked out the previous editions of the Locked on Titans podcast where we go over the 2016 class and then the 2017 class, make sure you check those out. But today, it is time to break down one of my favorite draft classes of the John Robinson era and the smallest draft class

in terms of actual prospects taken in the seven rounds of the John Robinson era as well. So really fun to jump into this one. There are some big time impact players at the top of this top heavy class. But one thing that goes under the radar and one thing that John Robinson started hitting on here in the last few years is a couple of undrafted free agents who were able to make an impact in the last two seasons. So we are going to make sure to not only talk about the players that were selected, the trades that were executed, but also the undrafted free agent class that has had an impact on the Titans in the last two years.

So we are going to do a general overview to start our show. And then of course, we will get our red markers out and go into the grade segment of our show. We will give a grade to each of the four picks that John Robinson made. And then I'm going to give a grade to the undrafted free agent hall in general. I think that with this class and how impactful the undrafted free agents ended up being that it's only fair to take a look at those guys and their impact and assess that when we look at the draft performance for John Robinson in his third attempt as a whole. And then we are going to get into the what if section, but also I want to get into a little bit of recent news. Nothing

too crazy, but just something I want to make a mention of. So excited to jump into all of that with you guys. Make sure that you are subscribed to the Locked on Titans podcast on whatever platform you do stream. I'm going to be breaking down the 2019 draft class tomorrow. And then, of course, like I mentioned, you can go back and check out the other two episodes on John Robinson's first two draft classes if you have not done that already. Also, our Friday mailbag segment will make a return this week. Make sure that you are adding me on Twitter at TicTacTitans and letting me know what questions you would like answered in Friday's mailbag. So with all of that out of the way, we are ready to dive into the 2017 draft class.

Let's get it. For his third draft on the job, Titans General Manager John Robinson completely changed his approach. on the job Titans general manager John Robinson completely changed his approach in his first two years as general manager we saw Robinson take 10 players in 2016 and then nine players in 2017 working the draft board to collect as many picks as he possibly could in 2018 we saw the opposite direction in the opposite version of that from Robinson as he was ultra aggressive at using all of his draft picks to move up and get players that it was obvious he had a target on that could make an immediate impact for the Titans roster.

So going into the 2018 draft, Robinson had six picks. He had traded his seventh round pick earlier in the season to get David King, defensive lineman from the Kansas City Chiefs, who only played for the Titans in that 2017 season before being cut before the 2018 season. So Robinson took the six picks that he had and found a way to move up three picks in the first round from 25 to 22 and select inside linebacker Rashawn Evans from Alabama. Evans has played in 31 of 32 possible games in his career so far, has 164 total tackles including 119 in 2019. Remember in 2018, Jayon Brown and Wesley Woodyard were the starting linebackers for the Titans, so Rashawn Evans had to work his way into a starting role midway through the 2018 season. Evans has two and a half sacks in his career, 11 tackles for loss,

and of course the highlight play of his career, the 53-yard fumble return touchdown against the Kansas City Chiefs in 2019. Harold Landry was the second round pick for the Titans and Robinson again was very aggressive moving up from pick 59 to pick 41 to select Harold Landry who instantly became one of the best edge rushers on the Titans team and then in 2019 was clearly the best edge rusher available. Harold Landry has also played in 31 of a possible 32 games. He has 112 total tackles. 17 of those tackles are for loss. He has 28 quarterback hits, 14 in each season, 13 and a half sacks in his career, including nine in 2019. He also has two forced fumbles and

an interception. Landry and Evans both have become above average starters for the Tennessee Titans, and both have made their fair share of amazing plays and important plays in the previous two seasons. The Titans were unable to pick due to the aggressive trades up, all the way from pick 41 down to pick 152 in the fifth round, where they traded up their second trade with the Ravens of the day to select defensive back Dane Cruikshank and Cruikshank while he hasn't had a huge role on the defense he has been a critical player in special teams Cruikshank has played in 28 games in his two seasons has 21 tackles had the 66yard touchdown catch on the fake punt from Kevin Byard.

He has played in 49% of the snaps on special teams in 2018. And then played 81% of the special team snaps for the Titans in 2019. As mentioned, Cruikshank may not have carved out a role on the Titans defense quite yet. But he has been an invaluable member to the Titans special teams unit that is one of the best in the Titans defense quite yet, but he has been an invaluable member to the Titans special teams unit that is one of the best in the entire NFL. And no John Robinson draft is complete without a completely wasted pick in the last two rounds of the draft. And he made sure that even though he only had four picks, he had to get his waste pick

in there. And the Titans selected quarterback Luke Falk in the sixth round with pick 199. Falk never made the Titans roster in the regular season. He was cut before week one, subsequently signed by the Miami Dolphins, who happened to be the Titans week one opponent in 2018, which caused a lot of different conversation about how Falk could have defected to the other side and been revealing the Titans game plans. Ultimately, Falk did not have much of a career in the NFL. After his time in Miami, he went to the New York Jets. He did end up making two starts while their quarterback Sam Darnold was out with an injury during the 2019 season, but after those two starts was cut by the

Jets and has not been picked up since. It is worth mentioning that the undrafted free agent class in 2018 was relatively successful. Joshua Kalou as a defensive back has played in eight games for the Titans and had an amazing block to end the game against Kansas City this last season. Matt Dickerson as a defensive lineman has played 82 total snaps for the Titans in his two seasons, 54 snaps on defense last year. And then Cameron Batson played in 11 games at wide receiver in 2018, had eight catches for 82 yards, played 18% of the offensive snaps in 2018. And while an injury left him unavailable in 2019, it is clear that he'll have a role with the Titans going forward as he did sign an exclusive rights free agent deal on a one-year extension to play for the

Titans in 2020. So although it was an incredibly small class and the smallest class of the John Robinson era, he still found a way to find contributors in the undrafted free agent market, which kind of makes up for the lack of sixth and seventh round picks where you can take those kind of shots. And quite frankly, looking at the sixth and seventh round picks that Robinson has made and had made in his first two drafts and comparing that with the undrafted free agent class, I mean, Cam Batson, Matt Dickerson, Joshua Kalou, Dalen Dawkins, all of those players are better than any of the players that he took in the sixth and seventh rounds in his first two drafts.

So at some point, you have to give Robinson credit. He said, I'm not going to take as many draft picks because I don't hit on those late round guys anyway. Might as well go ahead and search for undrafted free agents, maybe take some priority undrafted free agents and move up and be aggressive with my late round picks and find a way to get the guys that I want. So at the end of the day, Robinson made four draft-related trades, at least as they relate to the 2018 draft, made two with the Ravens, the one to go get Rashawn, the one to go get Cruikshank, made one with the Raiders, the one to go get Harold Landry, and then made another earlier in the season for David King giving up his seventh round pick, which as I mentioned earlier,

David King only played that one year for the Titans, didn't really make that big of an impact, and then was off the team by the time that the 2018 draft class even hit the field. So kind of a wasted seventh round pick there, but couldn't be any worse than some of the other players Robinson has used seventh round picks on before. So doesn't really make that much of a difference, but he was still able without that seventh round pick to be aggressive with his picks, move up, get key guys that have made key contributions to this team. And if you need a key contribution, then you have to check out Bilt Bar. Bilt Bars are the best tasting protein bars on the market. I've told you guys recently about some of my favorite flavors, the salted caramel chocolate, the peanut butter

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the smallest draft class of the John Robinson era, as I've been mentioning throughout the show, I am going to add in when we do our grades, the undrafted free agent class. Now I'm not going to give a grade to each individual player from that undrafted free agent class, but I'm going to give you guys some of the highlights that I mentioned in our first segment and then give an overall grade to the class itself. And then I'll kind of push that into an overall grade for the 2018 draft, which will include the undrafted free agents and the selections made and the trades that were executed to make everything possible. So like I said, get out those red markers, let's dive right in, and we will start with the first pick of the 2018 class, and that is Rashawn Evans.

So what John Robinson was able to do here is he traded the fourth pick for the Titans, which was 125, and the 25th pick, which was the Titans' original pick in the first round in 2018, coming off that playoff appearance, and was able to trade up three slots to pick 22 he also got a sixth round pick a compensatory sixth round pick pick 215 back from the Ravens which he was able to utilize later on in another trade up so with the Rashawn Evans pick as I mentioned 164 tackles 111 of those last year Rashawn Evans has made some huge plays in the Chargers game with the goal line stand, the Patriots game, in the playoffs, a part of another goal line stand, the obvious play, the fumble recovery for a touchdown to swing the game back from the Colts.

Things were looking pretty bleak for the Titans at that moment in time, if we're honest and go back and re-watch that game. And that play that David Long made to force that ball out and Rashawn to pick that ball up and actually score, it totally changed the Titans season, quite frankly, because that's the number one game that you can point to and say, this is where it really became Ryan Tannehill's team. This is where they really believed that they could do something special, taking down the Chiefs. And it happened to be the last loss that the Chiefs had the rest of the season so it makes it even even more impressive from that vantage point but Rashawn Evans has

has been a major playmaker for the Titans in the two years that he has been with the team obviously two more seasons to go before he's done with that rookie contract at this point I would assume that unless he has a terrible year in 2020, he'll have his fifth year option picked up. He's been pretty fantastic since he started as a starter halfway through the 2018 season. At this point, you have to give Rashawn Evans a B+. He hasn't become a Luke Keekly, a Bobby Wagner, one of the best linebackers in the NFL. He's not a pro bowler or an all-pro, but he has been an above-average starter. And John Robinson moving up to get in front of the New England Patriots, who had heavily rumored love for Rashawn Evans.

Really important that he was able to make that play because Rashawn Evans, as I talked about during the season, is the exact kind of physical presence and dog that the Titans needed in the middle of their defense unfortunate that Rashawn Evans basically he didn't lose the AFC championship for the Titans but not making that tackle on Patrick Mahomes touchdown run before halftime I mean those are the type of plays that you gotta make uh it's unfortunate that that play will kind of be burned into my memory when it comes to Rashawn, but I won't let it outweigh all of the great plays that he made on his way there.

So a B-plus for the Rashawn Evans pick. Then to Harold Landry, nine sacks last year to go along with the four and a half that he had his rookie season. He was able to get an interception last year, was able to force a fumble in both his years, 14 quarterback hits in both. He's been out on the field. He is the Titans' best edge rusher. He's the only person along the defensive line right now that you really have to game plan for in a pass rush perspective. Jeffrey Simmons, we're expecting to take a leap, but right now, the Denver Broncos for

week one really only got to focus on Harold Landry, and that's the issue that he had at the end of the season last year. Just didn't have any consistent help on the other side of the edge rush since Cameron Wake went on IR. The Titans were rotating in, banged up Reggie Gilbert, rookie and Derek Roberson, so didn't really have consistent help on the other side. Maybe if the Titans are able to get Vic Beasley back to his 2016 form Harold Landry will take another leap and another big step but trading up to get Landry with the Raiders the

Titans gave up the 57th overall pick their second round pick and their third round pick which was pick 89 to trade up to pick 41 and get Harold honor Landry as Vince Young happened to call him at this moment in time taking a look at everything that Landry's done and how important he was for the Titans' pass rush last year, you have to give the Landry pick a B-plus as well. Now, if Landry takes another leap, like Evans, and they become Pro Bowl, all pro-level players, then those are A-plus picks or at least A-minus picks,

and we'll revisit that next offseason. But at this time, they are both B-plus above average players, and to trade up and get them seemed to be smart, calculated decisions for John Robinson. And the final trade up of the day was to go get Dane Cruikshank. The Titans traded up from pick 162 with the Ravens again for the second time of the day, traded up to pick 152 and gave up pick 215 which they got from the Ravens originally just gave it back to them in the secondary trade so Dane Cruikshank I mentioned how impactful he was on special teams I'll repeat this 49% of the special team snaps in 2018 his

rookie year 81% of the special team snaps last year to get a core special teams player who's impacted Titans in back-to-back years in the fifth round like that when you had limited assets and just knowing that you need to trade up 10 spots to make sure you get this guy who can have an impact that is a solid B grade for me on Dane Cruikshank if he finds a way to get more involved in the defensive snaps this season then that grade could go up even more as a fifth-round pick. And then finally, you have Luke Falk, who was cut before week one, as I said, barely had a career in the NFL after his two starts in New York in 2019. That is a D for the Titans and for John Robinson,

another wasted sixth-round pick that ultimately probably hurt the Titans more than anything as any information that he gave the Dolphins for that week one contest. You know, maybe it didn't make a huge impact, but any information whatsoever that he could have tipped the Dolphins off to is a detriment to the Titans. So picking a quarterback who didn't even survive more than a few months and then ended up giving information to your week one opponent, that is disastrous. So I'm going to go go with a D could possibly be a D minus now looking at that undrafted free

agent class Cam Batson Matt Dickerson Joshua Kalou Dalen Dawkins if you look at their contributions as a whole over the past two seasons Kalou made that block in Kansas City, but he's also played 36% of the special team snaps. 164 of his 212 total snaps in the NFL came on special teams for the Titans in 2019. So got to give Kalou some credit there and give John Robinson some credit for finding an undrafted free agent who actually made an impact play for the Titans. Matt Dickerson has played 82 total snaps for the Titans in 2019, 54 on defense. He had 14 special team snaps in his career as well. So having a player who can be a part of the rotation on the defensive line coming as an undrafted free

agent, pretty solid. Cam Batson, we talked about his contributions in 2018, and John Robinson just signed him to another one-year extension so that he'll be on the Titans in 2020. Clearly, they think Batson can be a contributor in that Kalief Raymond role. Those two will probably battle it out for the roster spot. So having guys like that, and then Daylon Dawkins, of course, who's just added depth at the running back position off and on throughout the last few years. Looking at that undrafted free agent class, having four decent guys who have spent a lot of time on the roster, I'm going to give that a B overall for the undrafted free agent haul that Robinson was able to pull in.

So you look at a B plus for Evans, a B plus for Landry, a B for Crookshank, a D, possibly D minus for Luke Falk, and then you get a B for the undrafted free agent class. And then with the trades moving up and being aggressive I am just going to settle in at a solid B for John Robinson in this class and although there was only four players the addition of the undrafted free agent class really makes a difference and you can kind of add those players to the hall which doesn't make it seem as bad that it was so limited in terms of numbers. Trading up, I give Robinson some credit for trading up and being aggressive and going to get Landry, going to get Cruikshank, going to get Evans,

who have made a big impact on this team in the last two years. So obviously this one is still to be determined a little bit more than 17 and 16, but I think at this time it's fair to give John Robinson a solid B for the 2018 draft class. Next, we are going to get into the what if picks. And I'm going to throw a what if at you as a tease. What if there were no what if picks? a professional level tease to end the last segment if i do say so myself all jokes aside i was being honest with you taking a look at the 2018 nfl draft i i kind of looked at the entire list of players who were available and if I'm honest with you I can't really find an area where I really think John Robinson made any mistakes

it's it's not an excellent class at this moment in time in terms of being super deep I mean of course you'll have different players in here that, you know, maybe the Titans could have gone after. Look at the Rashawn Evans pick. So, someone who came after Rashawn Evans, who's turned into a pretty good player, Lamar Jackson. But, once again, we're in the middle of Marcus Mariota's rookie contract. There's just no way that John Robinson is doing that at that moment in time, and I can't necessarily blame him. Now, Darius Leonard was on the board at the time, and he turned into a rookie of the year and a pretty solid linebacker, if we're being honest.

He was the defensive rookie of the year that year, of course, but if I'm honest with you, that year of course but if I'm honest with you I don't think that Darius Leonard is is a lot better than Rashawn Evans I think just the situation that he was in panned out a little bit more for him in 2018 I think Rashawn Evans is just as good of a player as Darius Leonard and even if there is a gap there and you want to say that Darius Leonard's a better player, I don't think it's by enough to make this pick bad or for me to go back and say I'd rather have Darius Leonard. Rashawn Evans made some huge plays for the Titans and his personality fits perfect with what the defense needed. So I'm not in a position to give you any what if pick for Rashawn Evans and Harold Landry.

Same thing. I mean, I'm looking at some guys who came after. I'm not just going to fly through the list, but the only real players that made any kind of difference after Harold Landry was picked at this time is DJ Chark. I mean, he made it to the Pro Bowl, caught a touchdown pass from Ryan Tannehill. Other than that, I mean, players like Michael Gallup have been okay, I guess. There have been contributing players in here, but nobody who I would take over Harold

Landry, I wouldn't take DJ Chark over Harold Landry right now with where the Titans are at in their wide receiver position. I don't think Chark is a good enough player to give up somebody like Harold Landry, if I'm honest. I think it's harder to find a great edge rusher or a good edge rusher even at that than it is to find a wide receiver the caliber of Chark, even though I like Chark as a player. So at this time, I don't have any what ifs. You want to go down to the fifth round and look at where Dane Cruikshank was picked? I mean, I literally, look at where Dane Cruikshank was picked. I mean, I literally, I can't even, I can't even like guess or even try to manufacture a what if pick. There's nobody at the end of this draft. I don't think this is a great draft really at the end of the day. So there's nobody really here who I would

say is a what if pick and a similar answer I'm going to give you with Luke Falk although I don't think the Luke Falk pick was a smart one there's no players there's not a single player who comes after that who turned into a decent enough player that I would be you know mad at John Robinson or think he could have done something different what I will tell you is Logan Woodside was picked in the seventh round by the Cincinnati Bengals, and he ended up being the Titans' number two quarterback by 2020 anyway. So maybe you could argue that John Robinson should have taken Logan Woodside and got him in the building a little bit earlier than he did.

But that's literally, that's it. That's the only what-ifs I could even manufacture for you, and there really aren't any in there. There's just not. That's a pretty solid draft for Robinson with what he was trying to do. I can't really fault his approach and his philosophy. Now, one thing that I did want to talk about to round out the show doesn't have anything to do with the 2018 class, which is why I wanted to save it to the end and make sure I gave you all of my analysis on that 2018 class before I dove into anything new. And I come with possibly optimistic news. Well, something I'm certain is optimistic is we got some photos today from the Titans Twitter account showing Kevin Byard in the facility working out, Kareem Orr in the facility

working out. So nice to see guys in the facility that aren't necessarily rehabbing as things kind of get back to normal and on that note we did get a report about the NFL's conversations about how things are going to play out throughout the summer basically saying that they're looking for teams to be able to start minicamp between June 14th and June 27th now I will say that as optimistic as that report was, the NFL's public relations team did come out and say that there hasn't been any definitive dates set yet.

And then the president of the Players Association, J.C. Tretter, who's an offensive lineman in the NFL, also came out and said that the players haven't agreed to anything and they haven't got any solid dates from the league yet either so what i think to parse that report is basically the nfl has had conversations about what they want to roll out the details of those conversations the dates at least got leaked leaked the nfl can't come out and say that that was their plan because they haven't proposed it to the players and they think that's poor form to leak it to the media the players probably don't like that when they haven't been consulted and from the player side they literally haven't been consulted on exact dates or agreed

to anything so they're going to refute that report as well but I think ultimately after the sides iron these things out those dates June 14th through June 27th, will ultimately be when NFL teams kind of get back to normal. We're seeing the NBA start to work on plans to get back to normal. The NHL has proposed a plan. The MLB is trying to work things out with their players. So hopefully this is a good start, good momentum towards getting our sports back, getting the NFL back on time, and getting our Tennessee Titans back and being able to be there with them to enjoy the game.

So keeping my fingers crossed and staying optimistic, but of course with the caveat of I want everybody to stay safe and stay healthy, of course, as we all get through this together. But that is my breakdown of the 2018 Titans NFL Draft. Make sure that now that you are done with this episode of the Locked On Titans podcast that you go check out the Draft Dudes podcast. As I always say, never a bad time to get started on your preparation for the fantasy football season ahead.

I know that a lot of you guys are probably competitors, want to make sure you win those leagues. So go ahead and start taking in that information and getting that research in now months in advance you will be more prepared and more ready for your fantasy football season than ever before but with that said make sure that you guys are checking out builtbar.com use promo code locked on for ten dollars off your first box at builtbar.com also make sure you're subscribed to the Locked On Titans podcast or following us on Spotify or whatever platform that you stream. I'm going to do the 2019 class tomorrow.

And of course, I did the 2016 and 17 class on Monday and Tuesday. So if you haven't heard those, go back and check those out. I'm going to be bringing you content all the way up into the season until things kick off and then I will be with you of course five days a week throughout the season as I am in the off season I'm basically just always with you guys I am constantly pumping out content never miss a day holiday anything like that I always try to have a show ready for you guys Monday through Friday and if you would I don't really ask for a lot but considering the work that I put in to make sure you guys have your daily Titans content if you would, I don't really ask for a lot, but considering the work that I put in to make sure you guys have your daily Titans content, if you could leave a review, a five

star review would be great, but any kind of review would be fantastic. It helps other Titans fans catch the show. Make sure you're following me on Twitter at TicTacTitans as well, checking out any of the video breakdowns or additional analysis that I provide there. checking out any of the video breakdowns or additional analysis that I provide there. As always, I am your host, Tyler Rowland, and this was Locked on Titans.