Locked On Titans - Daily Podcast On The Tennessee Titans - Titans Weekend News + Mock Draft Monday

Episode Date: March 2, 2020

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Welcome to the Locked on Titans podcast. I'm your host, Tyler Rowland. Titans fans, it is Monday, which typically would lead us into a mock draft Monday presented by the Draft Network. And while we most certainly will get there, there is a lot of news coming out of the NFL scouting combine, more scuttlebutt around Tom Brady and the Titans quarterback situation, some more buzz around Jack Conklin and what he may command in free agency. And then, of course, the actual on-field drills that took place at the Combine over the weekend.

Tons of headlines coming out of that event as well. So we are going to cover all of that in our first segment. Talk about all of the weekend news. So a little bit of a Monday news drop for you guys. And then we are going to get into our Mock Draft Monday portion of the show. In our second segment, we are going to talk about the Draft Network's Mock Draft Monday and get you prepared for today's release. And then we will finish out the show, wrap up the show with a roundup.

We'll do a little Mock mock draft roundup for you guys, a quick one, just to make sure we are staying on top of everything that the football sphere, the draft community has to say about that Titans first round pick. So we are going to talk about all of that. Of course, I do want to apologize for the late release today on this Monday show. It is well documented over the last few months. I have had some dental issues going on that have impacted my voice on the show, impacted my schedule with release. And I appreciate you guys for understanding. Unfortunately had another dental issue here creep back up on me that is, you know, keeping me in some pain, but I'm playing through for you guys, having a few

appointments here and there. So trying to make sure I can get us back on a regular schedule going forward the rest of the week. But I did want to explain to you guys exactly what caused the delay this morning. So glad I can get it out to you guys though, because we have a bunch to talk about. I mean, that Tom Brady stuff is getting juicier and juicier by the moment. There were tons, tons of stars at the Combine and a couple of guys who didn't necessarily help themselves out. So we are going to go over those headlines, like I said, and Jack Conklin appears to be on the move possibly. So we got to go over the buzz that started coming out this weekend over him. Like I said, there's so much to go over on these

Monday shows. Ready to dive into everything with you guys. Let's get it. The first piece of news from the weekend that we need to jump into is the rumors around the Tennessee Titans signing Tom Brady. Why did they intensify this weekend? Well, video came out over the weekend from Tom Brady and current Patriots wide receiver Julian Edelman attending a men's North Carolina vs. Syracuse college basketball game. In the video, Edelman appears to say, he's coming back, he's coming back.

The camera pans to Tom Brady and with a very blank expression, Brady says, no, he's coming back. He's coming back. The camera pans to Tom Brady and with a very blank expression, Brady says, no, he's not. Now that is one piece in itself. What can be taken from that? It's hard to say whether Tom Brady's being serious, whether Edelman is being serious. There is a lot to speculate about with that, but where things really took a turn to intensify those rumors was later on during that basketball game video was taken of Tom Brady and Julian Edelman on a cell phone facetiming none other than head coach of the Tennessee Titans Mike Vrabel now it's well documented that Mike Vrabel's time with the New England Patriots led him to be very good friends with Tom Brady but how much would a friendship like that factor into a free agency decision?

We can't know for certain, but it does lead us to, like I said, speculate on what could be coming this offseason for the Titans. Not only does this situation allow us to speculate on what the Titans will do in free agency, but it also leads us to some concerning questions about whether or not this is a tampering violation. Quite frankly, tampering isn't something you hear about in the NFL. It's something much more associated with the NBA and the player movement you see over there. But if the head coach for a football team is having direct communication with a current

free agent before the legal tampering period has begun on March 16th and is having a conversation with a player who's signed to a different roster, that does make you a tad bit concerned about how the league office would view that. We haven't heard so far going into Monday night any conversation or any reports on whether or not that's on the league's radar, whether or not there's any possible discipline coming from that, but it is something that we should all keep our eye on going forward. Speaking of tampering, we did get reports over the weekend that tackle Jack Conklin was set to sign with the New York Jets when free agency opened. Like I said, it is not March 16th. The legal tampering period has not begun yet so that is quite a

concerning report to know that Conklin has possibly already found another team to go to well that was walked back a bit by ESPN insider Adam Schefter who did report later on during the weekend that the Jets would not in fact be signing Jack Conklin and that he would have many many suitors Schefter even said that multiple times during his tweet where he reported that Conklin and that he would have many, many suitors. Schefter even said that multiple times during his tweet where he reported that Conklin would have many suitors. He used that term, many suitors, quite a bit. So that does lead us to believe what we were speculating already, that Jack Conklin is going to get paid north of $15-16 million this year and most likely be the highest paid

right tackle in the NFL for the coming season. With that in mind, it makes it less likely that the Titans would be able to secure him and bring him back on a long-term contract. So that's the type of conversations that we saw over the weekend. Going into the actual event that spawned all of these rumors and spawned all this speculation, the NFL scouting combine. Some winners and losers from the event, quarterbacks Jordan Love and Justin Herbert impressed, wide receivers Henry Ruggs, Denzel Mims, and Justin Jefferson as well.

Running back Jonathan Taylor from Wisconsin ran a 4.39 and had a great showing. On the offensive line, Tristan Wirfs and Austin Jackson looked very, very fluid and had great testing numbers. On defense, linebacker Isaiah Simmons from Clemson cemented himself as a top 10 pick with a 4.39 40-yard dash, and cornerback CJ Henderson ran a 4.39 as well. Javelon Guidry, a lower-ranked cornerback, ended up with a 4.29 and vaulted himself up into day two conversation as well. Some proverbial losers from the event. Iowa edge rusher A.J. Espinosa ran a 5.0440 yard dash at 275 pounds, which is not considered the greatest time.

Quarterback Jake Fromm was slow in his release and didn't have a fantastic day in drills. Left tackle Trey Adams, along with some injury concerns, looked very rigid in drills. And cornerback Cam Dantzler, who impressed scouts with his size and physicality, ran a 4.6440-yard dash, which does not bode well for cornerbacks. Before we jump into the Mock Draft Monday portion of the show, I did want to share one last piece of weekend news from the Combine with you guys. That is a list of the prospects that the Titans met with.

And it's no surprise that during the week at the Combine, the Titans really focused in on offensive linemen, running back, and cornerbacks. With the addition of edge rusher, I would expect those four positions to be the ones that the Titans really focus on early in the draft. So let's look at some of these prospects names. The list coming from Teron Davenport of ESPN. At offensive tackle, we saw Josh Jones from Houston, Austin Jackson from USC, Lucas Niang

from TCU, Sadiq Charles from LSU, Cameron Clark from Charlotte, some interior offensive linemen like Matt Hennessey from Temple, and John Runyon from Michigan. And then at running back, we saw the Titans look at Cam Akers from Florida State, Eno Benjamin from Arizona State, J.K. Dobbins from Ohio State, Clyde Edwards-Hilaire from Louisiana State, a lot of states there for you. Ohio State, Clyde Edwards-Hilaire from Louisiana State, a lot of states there for you, Kashawn Vaughn from Vanderbilt, Zach Moss from Utah, DeAndre Swift from Georgia,

A.J. Dillon from Boston College, and Anthony McFarlane from Maryland. At cornerback, the Titans didn't just look at cornerbacks, but they focused on cornerbacks that could also play in the slot in nickel coverage, as, of course, free agent Logan Ryan primarily manned that role for the Titans since he was signed three years ago. Those guys were Darnay Holmes from UCLA, who had a great combine. Jeff Gladney from TCU, who I personally am very high on. Amrick Robertson from Louisiana Tech,

who also had a pretty good combine. Dane Jackson from Pittsburgh. And Kendall Vildor from Georgia Southern. So those are some names that the Titans met with. The Titans got limited meetings at the combine. I would expect them to do a lot more work in the future. Going through these guys backgrounds. Trying to get to know them without the opportunity to get a meeting.

But we saw the Titans take some guys last year. Who they didn't necessarily meet a ton with at the combine. And we've seen that during John Robinson's tenure. So these are guys that the Titans wanted to get more information on. What I really like seeing is that a lot of the names on that list that we just read were names that we talked about in our preview. So it's good to see the Locked On Titans podcast aligned with the Titans organization about some of the guys that they should be paying attention to.

So I wanted to make sure you guys got that list. We will hear more rumors in the future of who the Titans are looking at, and we'll break all those prospects down as we get into more of our draft preview series coming up since the Combine is now taking place to go along with our free agent preview series. So the point is, make sure you're subscribed to the Locked on Titans podcast on whatever platform you do stream your podcast. Make sure you're following me on Locked On Titans podcast on whatever platform you do stream your podcast. Make sure you're following me on Twitter at TicTacTitans.

You can start getting those Friday mailbag questions in now if you would like. But with that in mind, that covers all of the news coming out of the weekend for the Titans. We are going to jump into the Mock Draft Monday portion of the show right now. Mock Draft Monday presented by The Draft Network. Let's take a look at Joe Marino's Mock Draft. And if you recall, Joe Marino is also the host of the Locked on Bills podcast. He was on with us during our Crossover Wednesday event from week five.

He does an excellent job, him and his team over at the Draft Network. They have prospect scouting, a full profile for every player. They have tons of mock drafts out throughout the week, especially when they do their mock draft Monday drop. And then they have their own mock draft simulator that's really, really intuitive, really fun to play around with. And I'll have more experience with that as we get closer and closer to the draft. I love doing things like that and kind of planning things out how they might go for the Titans. And if the board goes certain ways, what approach they might take. So really fun exercise.

You guys should check out the site. I implore you to check out the Draft Network. And as you know, we cover the previous week's mock draft because typically the Monday episode is recorded on Sunday night. The new mock draft comes up on Monday during the day. So make sure that you guys are stopping in at some point in time today and checking out the most recent mock draft Monday as well and we will break that down next week so let's jump into what Joe Marino had for the Titans here and with the 29th pick in the first round

Joe Marino had the Titans going with edge rusher out of Alabama Terrell Lewis six foot five 258 pounds he was a redshirt junior. Now, the big thing about Lewis is he did miss a lot of time during his career at Alabama with injuries, an elbow injury, a 2018 ACL injury. So that is going to be in the back of your mind anytime you're talking about Lewis. There are concerns there about his ability to hold up his body, holding up at the NFL level if it wasn't able to hold up at college. But when Lewis was on the field, he showed a lot of things that do translate to the NFL. He has an incredible first step burst off the line of scrimmage. He really gets on the offensive tackle quickly when he's rushing.

And when he gets there, he has good feet and really long arms now the problem is he has those long arms he has those quick feet he has those has that good first step burst but he doesn't have a lot of moves he doesn't have any counters to those moves more just speed to power using that length to try to get around offensive tackles. Now the reason for that is we go back to the injuries. The injuries took away his ability to really work on his craft those sort of things. Anytime that he was able to play he just wanted to go play try to make an impact. When you don't have the practice time when you miss so much time he's only a redshirt junior and we talked about the injuries the ACL in 2018.

He missed a ton of time during his college career at Alabama where he was going to be on the field getting those reps. You can sit in a classroom and look at tape and talk about counters and talk about moves. All you want is a pass rusher. But if you're not out there actually practicing those moves and getting experience on how to set those up yeah you have a spin move everybody knows that an edge rusher could have a good spin move but the timing on that how to set up different guys whether you take a few steps this way and then spin inside you

want to spin outside there's a bunch of different factors that go into how to actually set up these moves other than just knowing the move or knowing the counter and he hasn't had the ability to be on the field to practice those so from a coaching perspective in the NFL you look at a player like Terrell Lewis with his length his first step quickness and his general rawness and you think I can mold that piece of clay into a fantastic edge rusher and this is what I've talked about personally on the podcast looking at edge rushers rather than somebody like a Yotur Grosmatos who's a power guy who can be inside outside or a Marlon Davidson who can be inside outside threat I want somebody with these

kind of tools the length the first step quickness the burst who these coaches and someone like Shane Bowen who's done a great job with the outside linebackers, who can kind of mold somebody with the traits into a technical pass rusher. I'd rather teach technique and have the raw fundamental skills and mold that than the other way around. And that's not always the right way. There's no perfect way. Just right now with what the Titans need from the edge rushing position, that's what I think they should go for. A player like Terrell Lewis, who has tons of great traits and just needs a little bit of coaching, needs a little bit of molding to be the edge rusher you need him to be. So I do like that pick from Joe Marino. The only issue I guess I would

take with that pick is I think the Titans do need to look for an edge rusher in free agency, a veteran who can come in and expect to make an impact right away rather than taking an edge rusher this high. I like the philosophy behind this pick. I would just like to see it maybe in the second or third round there, but Lewis probably wouldn't be available at those selections, so maybe this is exactly where the value needs to be. If the board does shake out this way then I don't think it would be a terrible pick for the Titans because you see guys like Jeff Gladney the cornerback from TCU Justin Jefferson wide receiver from LSU Christian Fulton from LSU

who were taken off the board right before the Titans pick who I think would all be great fits for this team so if the Titans get in position, there's no tackles worth it because there was a tackle run. The cornerbacks have been taken. Justin Jefferson in the first round, wide receivers have already gone off the board. Then, of course, the Titans would look at either running back or edge rusher at that moment in time. And Terrell Lewis, with all the traits that he has,

does make some sense. This was a two-round mock draft, so Marino has the Titans going with cornerback Bryce Hall from Virginia in the second round. 6'1", 200-pound senior. Now, he doesn't have a ton of athletic burst. Hall is more of a competitive, in-your-face, physical, smart, IQ-driven cornerback. He does great in different coverages, great with different techniques. The only thing that he doesn't really excel with is man coverage. Now, he does a great job in press man coverage because he is long, and like I said, he's physical, tenacious, will get in your face, similar to Malcolm Butler, a little bit bigger than Butler, but kind of similar to that. But he's not going to be great in off-man coverage

because you're asking him to close too much of a gap. Now, you get him in zone coverage, and the Titans run a ton of disguised zones. You get him in zone coverage, he can use that IQ, he can use that intelligence to kind of read the quarterback, read the zone, read the receivers. He understands route concepts really well. He's a very high level player being a senior. Just doesn't have that athletic burst to go with what you see but someone like Logan Ryan if the Titans are trying to replace Logan Ryan then a physical hard-nosed smart competitive guy with incredible IQ and a lot of versatility and a preference for zone coverage that would be a perfect fit for the Titans and Hall isn't really somebody you have heard get any kind of buzz or

conversation for the first round so it is logical that he would possibly be there for the Titans in the second or third round. And they're going to need cornerbacks no matter what happens here. Whether the Titans, unlikely as it may be, re-sign Logan Ryan or not, they're going to need to get some cornerbacks in this draft to deal with Malcolm Butler's injuries and age, Dory Jackson on a fifth-year option. Logan Ryan will be expensive and get older and likely won't hold value throughout the entire life of his contract, even if he is re-signed, which is very unlikely. So cornerback has to be a target for the Titans in this draft, and I think Bryce

Hull and everything he brings to the table would be a solid pick. If the Titans left the first two rounds with Terrell Lewis and Bryce Hull, I don't think that you could complain too much about that. So that does it for our Mock Draft Monday, especially the Draft Network Mock from Joe Marino. We are going to go into our Mock Draft Roundup for Monday and finish the show out with that. Let's wrap up a Mock Draft Monday with a Mock Draft Roundup. Let's take a look at Josh Edwards from CBS. He also has the Titans with their first overall pick,

taking Terrell Lewis, edge rusher out of Alabama, who we discussed with the first pick in our mock draft Monday from the draft network so I've talked all about Lewis like I said depending on how the board falls he would be a pretty good value there at 29 although I would expect the Titans to try to address pass rusher and edge rusher in free agency as well so we will move forward since we already talked about Lewis quite a bit not a bad pick from Edwards there from CBS for Sports Illustrated we have Jason McIntyre he has the Titans going with cornerback out of LSU Christian Fulton I really like Fulton here he's got good size for a cornerback coming from LSU they always have very skilled cornerbacks as well he dealt with SEC speed two wide receivers from Alabama

are expected to go in the top 15 with Henry Ruggs and Jerry Judy. Alabama's had some pretty good wide receivers for quite some time now, so having the ability to go up against those wide receivers, also go up against all the other talent in the SEC, especially at wide receiver. Christian Fulton would be a very good pick for the Titans there. I wouldn't be against drafting a corner in the first round no matter who it happens to be. I trust John Robinson to get good value there. And then from NFL.com, we have Bucky Brooks

who has the Titans going with Austin Jackson. Tackle out of University of Southern California. Jackson had a fantastic combine. He was very fluid and his drills just looked really excellent, really athletic going through all the on-field position drills for offensive linemen. And it definitely boosted his stock to the point where I'm not even certain that Jackson will be available for the Titans that late in the first round. So that'll be something to keep our eye on with the way that the tackles are performing right now in the pre-draft process, it could

leave the Titans in a pretty sticky situation where the top five to six offensive tackles are already off the board by the time they pick, which puts the onus on free agency for the Titans to make sure they get a competent tackle solution just in case they miss out on the top ones in the draft. on the top ones in the draft. And then we will round out our mock draft roundup conversation by going back to a friend of the program at this point, Mr. Christopher Knox from Bleacher Report. If you guys recall, he has mocked Kenneth Murray from Oklahoma,

the off-ball middle linebacker, to the Titans in back-to-back mock drafts. Knox does good work but can't help but have a little bit of fun at his expense here with that pick. That's, I would say, even worse than the tight end selections that we saw for the Titans in the past two years in mock drafts that weren't even relatively close because the Titans will absolutely not be selecting an off-ball linebacker in the first round, probably not in the entire draft. That's the biggest strength on the team right now with Rashawn Evans and David Long and Jayon Brown. So there's just no way that's going to be the case. And once again, Mr. Knox went back to the well, and although he had Kenneth Murray going a little

bit higher this time and not falling to the Titans. He had the Titans taking linebacker Patrick Queen out of LSU. Now, I like Queen. Queen is a solid player. He's a first rounder. He had a pretty solid combine as well, but this tells us last week, I guess I theorized that Knox was in a position where he had a player like Kenneth Murray, who's a first rounder, who's a good player, who's going to go in the first round and just didn't find a place to slot him when he was setting up his mock draft. I've done mock drafts before. Sometimes you just miss a player.

He doesn't really slot in, but you know he's going to go in the first round. So you got to find a place for him and you would maybe give him to a team that maybe it's not their top need, but you know that player is going in the first round. So that was my theory that Knox simply had to get Murray in, didn't have a good place for him, and decided to stick him with the Titans since, you know, the Titans could go a bunch of different ways in the first round. It's not an obvious glaring need that they're going to attack. They have a couple of different needs that are bigger than others, but one of those needs is not off the ball inside linebacker, and the Titans will absolutely not be drafting Patrick

Queen. I'm not quite certain at this moment in time that my theory works because putting Patrick Queen with the Titans shows that Knox is thinking that the Titans actually need an inside off the ball linebacker, which shows a little bit of a lack of awareness for the roster. So we are, like I said, just want to check back in with our guy christopher knox see if he's done a little bit more research about the titans roster and their team needs and we'll monitor this if for nothing less than just a little bit of fun to round out a monday show every week and and see what mr knox is thinking here and there and see if he ever amends his

position as to what the titans needs are so he can get a more realistic draft pick in there but thought it was just fun to wrap up with that I don't want to hate too bad on the guy does good work and everything like that so don't take it uh you know anything too negatively just having a little bit of fun with some mocks that are a little off the mark which we see for the Titans every single year so like I said I am going through some dental work for you guys. Hopefully it doesn't affect our schedule going forward. I recorded this on Monday morning after an appointment. I got another few appointments coming up, but hopefully I can be in relatively little pain very, very soon and make sure that we don't get too far off schedule with the podcast release.

So I appreciate you guys being amendable on that as well. I am going to be back with you guys tomorrow, though, no matter what, to make sure we are breaking down all the latest news. We are getting closer and closer to free agency. So that means this week, more free agency preview series episodes will be in the works. We got to start getting into position by position draft reviews as well. There will be tons of rumors in the coming weeks for free agency. There is just a lot going on, even though it is the off season.

So I will be here with you guys Monday through Friday to break it all down. As always, I am your host, Tyler Rowland, and this was Locked on Titans.