Tennessee Titans Week 10 win renews hope in 2019 season

With a Week 10 victory, the Tennessee Titans have placed themselves back in the playoff picture with six games remaining.

Unbelievably, the Tennessee Titans miraculously won a shootout against the Kansas City Chiefs. In a game where the Titans looked dead multiple times, they somehow showed resilience that was not part of this team’s DNA up to this point in the season.

Down 10-0 early in the first quarter, Tennessee strung together a quick four-play, 73-yard drive that was kick-started by a 52-yard bomb to rarely used Kalif Raymond. That set up a gorgeous Ryan Tannehill pass to tight end Anthony Firkser in the endzone.

Despite going into halftime with a 13-13 tie, the Titans found themselves down 29-20 early in the fourth quarter after the Chiefs scored on three consecutive drives to start the second half. Led by Tannehill, Tennessee strung together two clutch drives in the fourth quarter to go up 35-32 with 23 seconds left in the game.

With the win, the Titans move to 5-5 on the season heading into their bye week. After the Titans’ Week 9 loss to the Panthers, the season seemed over as they fell back into fourth place in the division. However, a vital victory against the Chiefs catapults them back into the playoff picture.

Tennessee should be optimistic after winning this game given their circumstances.

The Titans entered the game without Jayon Brown, Jurrell Casey, Corey Davis, Delanie Walker, or Malcolm Butler. Despite the Titans being down so many critical players, their defense held up to force the Chiefs to settle for five field goal attempts over the course of the game.

While Butler is ruled out for the rest of the season, the bye week should give Tennessee time to bring back its roster to full health. Harold Landry and Rashaan Evans are starting to pick up NFL speed and are showing their athletic abilities. They will only improve with the return of Casey and Brown.

On the other side of the field, the Titans finally posted their best offensive game to date. While people will point to the Browns or the Falcons game, I think what the Titans did on offense today was more impressive. The Titans showed an ability to move the ball, particularly on the ground, but mixed up personnel packages on passing downs to keep the Chiefs defense on their toes.

Derrick Henry posted his best game this season with 188 yards rushing. Henry is most dangerous in the fourth quarter, and that showed once again against the Chiefs. The Titans need to continue to find ways to get him touches late in the game, even if they are down on the scoreboard. His bruising style of running is mighty taxing on defenses and it’s when he has shown to do most of his damage.

The Titans have a difficult schedule left, but it’s hard not to look at the opportunity ahead and be optimistic.

Tennessee have the ability to reduce their competition’s playoff chances each of the next three games with the Jaguars, Colts, and Raiders on the schedule, while also increasing its own.

With the win against the Chiefs, they have given themselves some leeway in not requiring a victory in every game left. The final three games will be interesting on how the NFL season plays out. The Saints and Texans each look strong in their postseason pushes.

While the Titans play the Texans twice in the final three weeks, its fathomable to see the Titans playing backups against the Saints and Texans in the final two weeks. If so, the Titans might be able to cakewalk into the wild card without having to face Drew Brees or Deshaun Watson.

However, if the Titans are sitting in Week 15 with a 8-5 record, then they have a good shot of stealing the division from the Texans.

While it’s easy to get excited at the prospect of what could happen for Tennessee, it’s important to remember that this is a team that has inexplicably lost to teams it shouldn’t lose to. With Nick Foles on the schedule next, Tennessee needs to knock out the Jaguars from playoff contention.

They struggled in Week 3 against Gardner Minshew and they should be wary of the Leonard Fournette rushing attack paired with the D.J. Chark and Dede Westbrook passing attack. The next three games are crucial in defining what the Titans offseason will look like.