The Titans offense finally looks elite. We can thank Arthur Smith for that.
When was the last time you saw a Tennessee Titans offense that actually looked good? Like, regularly, consistently, actually good– with talent everywhere on the field and players that carried an aura of “oh yeah, we’re scoring on this drive whether you like it or not?”
Think about it for a second. Chances are, you’ll probably be thinking for a while.
Sure, 2016 had its moments, and the overall numbers actually look pretty darn good. But look back at the box scores, most of the Titans’ truly special games came during a magical, “how is this happening” level run from the offense, before reverting back to games with just a couple touchdowns to show for.
To find the last truly, undisputedly great offensive season, you need to take a trip back to 2003. Steve McNair was in the midst of an MVP season, Eddie George the seventh 1,000-yard season of his career, and things were happy. An offensive paradise that the Titans haven’t seen anything like since. That is, of course, until Arthur Smith came along.
No, 2019 wasn’t 2003. Back in McNair’s MVP year, Tennessee was putting up on average just over 27 points a game, ranking fifth in the NFL– the highest since the franchise was in Houston. So no, 2019 wasn’t 2003. But it was the greatest offensive season the Titans have had since then– and we owe that to Smith.
A Week One Statement
The Titans were fresh off the heels of another 9-7 season in 2018 that was supposed to be different. Derrick Henry was finally going to have full reign in the backfield, not having to split carries with Demarco Murray, Marcus Mariota was coming off an offseason where he could practice rather than rehab. And finally, finally, Tennessee was going to have a young, forward-thinking offensive coordinator running the show in Matt LaFleur.
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Things were supposed to be different, but what we got was more of the same. It took 12 weeks before Henry looked like a star, Mariota could never get comfortable in the offense after a Week One injury, and Tennessee sputtered to the finish line, missing the playoffs and ranking towards the bottom of the league in points and yards per game. So going into Week One of 2019, the only thing Titans knew what to expect was that we didn’t want more of the same under Arthur Smith.
Two quarters into his debut though, Smith’s 2019 Titans offense looked like a “cover band” version of 2018. Two scoring drives on the team’s first three possessions was nice and showed glimmers of what Smith’s offense would become with some big chunk plays and a heavy reliance on play-action, but in large part, the team stalled out in the first half with their final three possessions ending in three punts and a combined 39 yards.
Things looked and felt frustratingly similar to the way they were in 2018 until the third quarter began, and the Tennessee offense started to take shape under Smith’s vision. The team relied heavily on the running game, but the second half is where that reliance started to pay off. Runs and nice play-action passes were traded for massive plays like AJ Brown’s 50-yard reception and a Derrick Henry catch and run off a screen pass that went 75-yards for a touchdown.
Tennessee got a huge boost from their defense against Cleveland, but signs of the offense Smith would eventually build started to show themselves. In the second half, the team was seemingly scoring at will, ending with 43 points– their highest scoring total since Week 10 of 2016.
But the bad parts of the Titans offense showed up more often through the first half of the season than the good ones. For as explosive as Tennessee offense showed the potential to be in Week One, they were consumed by their fair share of growing pains early on.
The Bad Parts
Tennesee followed up their 43-point coming-out party against Cleveland with a 17-point dud at home against the Indianapolis Colts that looked eerily similar to the Titans of 2018. The offense wasn’t killed by turnovers or penalties or dumb mistakes– they simply couldn’t move the ball.
All said Smith’s offense managed just 243 yards against the Colts in a disheartening 19-17 loss. After coming out and crushing the Browns just seven days earlier, Tennessee fell back to Earth in a hard way. And things began to spiral.
Tennessee followed up their 17-point outing with a seven-point showing against the Jaguars only four days later on Thursday Night Football. The Titans managed to move the ball a little better, but drives were killed by sacks and Tennessee couldn’t find the endzone until the game was essentially decided.
The Titans did follow that up with a solid showing against the Falcons, but things quickly went back to the dumpster after that. Seven points against the Bills, only to be topped by a 16-0 shutout against the Denver Broncos that looked and felt like rock bottom. Mariota was benched, the team managed a combined 39 rushing yards, and, oh yeah, zero points to show for any of it.
The season felt lost, and the offense hopeless. All the shine from Week One against the Browns and the slight glimmer of hope from Week Four against the Falcons had worn off entirely. But, just one week later, Smith’s offense transformed into one of the best units in the NFL.
Playing Elite Offense
NFL fans can be an impatient bunch, we want immediate results. It’s in our nature to look over at the Rams and see the offense Sean McVay was able to build practically overnight and say “hey why can’t we just do that over here?” But for Arthur Smith, a first-time offensive coordinator, and first-time play-caller, the job came with some clearly visible growing pains.
But when Smith figured it out, and the offense began to click, the Titans looked truly unbeatable on that side of the ball– for the first time since 2003. Ryan Tannehill came in and took over the job of starting quarterback seamlessly, putting up some league-leading numbers along the way. AJ Brown began playing at a superstar level and broke the 1,000-yard mark as a rookie. And Derrick Henry, well, Henry earned the title of ‘King’.
It wasn’t just the Titans big three playing at a high level, either. From Week Seven onward, everyone began playing at a higher level. The offensive line turned into one of the best groups in the league by season’s end, Jonnu Smith and the tight end group started to emerge even without Delanie Walker— and Smith’s offense took shape and turned into the unit we all hoped for.
The offense broke the 350-yard mark eight times in the final ten weeks of the season, the 30-point mark six times, and won seven of their final ten games in large part due to their offense. What Arthur Smith wanted his group to be was working better than anyone could have imagined after that early-season stretch. The play-action passing game was deadly, Derrick Henry was controlling games on the ground, and nobody had an answer.
And here’s the craziest part, the Titans could do it again in 2020– this time for a full 16-game schedule. Ryan Tannehill is back. Derrick Henry is back. And most importantly, Arthur Smith and his vision for the offense are back. And with the growing pains of 2019, a thing of the past, Smith and the Tennessee offense should be set to control games and roll through defenses once again.