Focusing in on one position battle for the Tennessee Titans.
When the Tennessee Titans opened training camp, everyone forgot what we had talked about for the months leading up to the preseason.
For good reason honestly, everyone was learning about the Taylor Lewan suspension, as well as the big deal for the best safety in the league Kevin Byard. It was a flurry of confusion, denial, outrage, excitement, and acceptance so the position battle sort of got ignored.
With all of that news in the rear view, it is time to look at position battles and the results on the field. To some extent, the biggest position battles seemed to be defensive tackle and right guard with backup running back and EDGE rotation somewhere behind those.
While defensive tackle is very much unresolved, the biggest question mark is what will happen at right guard and ESPN seems to support this in their latest article.
Every team’s beat writer was asked to pick out a position battle to watch this preseason and Turron Davenport point a finger directly at the offensive line:
"The competition between veteran Kevin Pamphile and rookie Nate Davis for the final starting spot on the offensive line is one to watch. Once the pads go on and the players can bang, a more true picture can be formed. Davis made a statement to offensive line coach Keith Carter by quickly moving away from the “frog stance” he used in college. Pamphile is entering his sixth NFL season and started two games for the Titans last year."
What makes this even more interesting is a recent article in The Athletic about the same thing. John Glennon talks about what is happening at right guard:
"Then there’s the ever-changing right guard spot. It looked as if the starting job was Kevin Pamphile’s to lose coming into camp, but it appears more and more he’s done just that. Pamphile has not often been the starting right guard, a position that’s seen rookie Nate Davis…get snaps there."
So far, I believe that Nate Davis is the only player to get two practices as the starter at right guard and like Glennon said, we all thought Pamphile was penciled in to be the starter but that may have been erased at this point.
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I am very curious to see Davis there in the preseason because he is making a jump from Charlotte (not UNC, but Charlotte) to the NFL.
Is he athletic and intuitive enough to make that jump and be an average or better starter?
If so then he was a fantastic value in the 3rd round of the 2019 NFL Draft.
However, it is a lot sooner than I thought we would see him so I am tentatively waiting to see just exactly how much he plays and how he looks when he does play.
With the first preseason game coming up on Thursday against the Philadelphia Eagles, Davis will have to face a deep defensive line no matter whether he goes against the starters or not.
Maybe more than any other rookie, it is going to be important to monitor how Nate Davis plays against the Eagles to see if he is really that good or if he is just doing well against the backup DTs of the Tennessee Titans.