Titans vs. Ravens: Reasons for optimism and concern for Tennessee
Concern: Ravens pass defense
As we already highlighted, the Ravens can be run on based on DVOA despite their overall ranking as the No. 5 run defense in the NFL this season. However, even if Henry gets going, the Titans are still going to need to throw the football.
That’s where this matchup becomes tougher. Not only does Baltimore own the No. 6 pass defense, it also sports a DVOA ranking of fourth, which means there is no metric showing a weakness against the Ravens through the air.
Tannehill faced a similarly tough pass defense last week against a Patriots team that limited him to 72 passing yards. Thankfully for the Titans, New England wasn’t able to get anything going on offense themselves, so Tennessee was able to overcome the poor production.
That will not be the case this week against the league’s best offense. As much as you keep the ball out of the hands of the Ravens offense, it is still going to score points, and you can bet that point total will be more than 13.
The infusion of Marcus Peters into the Ravens’ defense has been a real game-changer, and offensive coordinator Arthur Smith is going to have to figure out a way to get his quarterback to make more of an impact in this divisional round game against what is a very talented secondary.