The only free agents the Tennessee Titans will pay attention to this offseason
By Will Lomas
Defensive line
-McCoy is known by everyone in the NFL and is well respected, but specifically the connection here is between Jon Robinson and McCoy from their time together in Tampa Bay.
The Pro Bowl main stay has changed his play style over the course of his career becoming more of a run defender with some pass rush, than a pass rusher who occasionally makes a nice play in the run game.
For the Titans, they already have their veteran leader in Casey but they had virtually no interior pass rush when Jeffery Simmons was on the sideline. I don’t think they make a move, but McCoy is interesting if he is interested in winning instead of a big contract on a bad team.
-Daquan Jones was fantastic this season, especially in the first half of the year but he is scheduled to make nearly $8.5 million this season. That is a lot of money for a guy who is good at helping others create big plays and not necessarily making big plays himself.
All of that is important because the Titans could try to restructure this contract and if it doesn’t work out, cutting or trading Jones and signing someone like Billings as a young nose tackle makes sense.
Billings spend three years protecting off ball linebackers for new LB coach Jim Haslett, so if he liked what Billings did for his defense a few years ago then this move would make sense.
-I don’t know that the Titans could find a way to make a deal for Reader that would save them any money compared to the Jones deal I mentioned above, but picking up a mid round pick for Jones and signing Reader for a similar amount would also be a really nice move.
The connection here is pretty major with Mike Vrabel being around Reader for two years, including maybe his best season in 2017 here Vrabel was his DC.