It’s all just a little bit of history repeating
This one has taken me a while to write. I really didn’t want to spill ink, once again, about the Titans being just a step above mediocre. For the longest time, I didn’t think I had to. Things used to feel so much different than they do now.
All was quiet in the peaceful little town of the 5-0 Titans locker room. I mean, sure, the road to 5-0 wasn’t one without its speed bumps. But 5-0 is 5-0, and Tennessee could always hang their hat on the pride of a 42-16 blowout against a Super Bowl contending Buffalo Bills. Things were good, actually, no, things were great. And then, 5-1.
But I’m sure it’s not a big deal, right? It can’t be. Any kind of loss is a loss you would like to avoid, but how much trouble could there be from one three-point loss to a really good team. No trouble in our quiet little town. Nothing to worry about. And then, 5-2.
It’s probably an accident though. This was one of the three last unbeaten teams in the NFL just two weeks ago. Granted, this loss was pretty bad. But sometimes these things happen. Both teams that played in the 2019 Super Bowl had losses to teams with losing records in their seasons, right? I’m sure it’s nothing to worry about, this quiet town is, well, a quiet town after all. And then, 6-3.
Loss number three should be the tipping point. No longer is this a team on a five-game winning streak with a few irritating quirks that never seemed to get in the way of winning. This is a team that seemed stuck in a rut in the middle of their 34-17 loss to the division-rival Colts just a few short weeks ago. Even in a win against a tough-out Baltimore Ravens team on Sunday, issues in how the Titans are built made themselves frustratingly evident. I had bought into the optimist’s take, but it gets harder each week to ignore the issues.
This is a team who’s glaring faults are becoming more and more troublesome as the weeks progress– and they’re starting to mask the things the Titans used to do well. No longer does this team look elite, but they still don’t look hopeless. They look as they have for the last half-decade– like a 9-7 football team.
Who Are The Tennessee Titans?
As Tennessee Titans fans shift focus from the crucial win against the Baltimore Ravens to the next game against the Indianapolis Colts, one thought keeps popping into my head.
Frustration. This team is frustrating.
Through every third-down conversion allowed, every long drive the defense suffers through, every blown pass block, predictable play call, every missed field goal, blown punt, dropped touchdown, and opposing quarterback made to look like a John Elway/Tom Brady hybrid– the Tennessee Titans are maddening.
Have I ever told you the definition of insanity? It’s being a Titans fan in 2020.
But not because the Titans are bad, they’re not. Not even close. We can whine and scream all day and night about everything I just mentioned, but that’s not what makes Tennessee so frustrating. It’s the fact that buried somewhere beneath a layer of historically bad third-down defense and perpetually awful special teams is an elite team with an elite roster.
Even with all that they have working against them, the Tennessee Titans are still ranked in the league’s top ten in points per game. They’re still seventh in yards gained per play. Ryan Tannehill is still seventh in passing touchdowns, and Derrick Henry still leads the NFL in rushing yards.
And that’s just on the offense. The underperforming defensive side of the ball is still one loaded with talent, with two All-Pro players in the secondary in Kevin Byard and Desmond King, the NFL’s leader in run-stopping win rate at defensive tackle in Jeffery Simmons, a multi-year Pro Bowl player in Jadeveon Clowney (who is on I.R. for now), and a Super Bowl hero playing cornerback in Malcolm Butler.
And yet, I would direct you to the top of this slide. For all it’s talent on paper, this defense is allowing teams to convert on third down 54% of the time. They’re allowing touchdowns on 69% of opposing offense’s red zone visits. Only two teams have sacked the opposing quarterback at a lower rate than Tennessee, and only four teams have allowed more passing touchdowns than the Titans.
The Titans are a team that can’t seem to live up to what they have. Overflowing talent on both sides of the ball, enough to take care of business early in the year while teams were still overcoming the rust of a weird, shortened offseason. But now in the late part of the season, with teams across the league on their feet and fully prepared, cracks in the Titans foundation are starting to show– and not just on defense either.
How It Started vs How It’s Going
Regression was the word of the offseason for the Tennessee Titans.
Yes, Derrick Henry was coming off of one of the best running back performances in recent memory, but elite running back play is inconsistent. Yes, Ryan Tannehill had just reeled off a 10-game stretch where he was the most efficient quarterback in the league, but we have six season’s worth of tape from his Miami days that show us he was due to take a step back.
It was across the board– AJ Brown wouldn’t be as much of a home run hitter as he was the year before. The offensive line would take a step back without Jack Conklin. From position to position, the Titans offense would look worse in 2020– but oh how wrong they all looked through the first five games.
In fact, up through Week 6 of the NFL season, the Titans might have been playing even better than they had at any point in 2019. Four of their first five games saw the Titans reach over 30 points, and twice they cleared the 40 point mark. In all five of their games, the offense had reached over 330 yards– and one game over 600 yards.
Performances like those had the Titans sitting pretty. They weren’t just playing well for recent Tennessee standards– they were playing at an elite level for anyone. Through those first six weeks, the Titans found themselves ranked second in both points and yards per game– the only offense in the league to be ranked in the top five in both metrics to that point.
But if you were paying attention to the last slide– you know the numbers, while still good, aren’t quite as pristine for the Titans’ offense. The last four weeks have seen the Tennessee offense take a major step back. They’ve… regressed.
After hitting 30 points in four of their first five games, they’ve done it just once since Week 6, needing overtime for 30 points on the dot. After five straight performances of over 330 yards, they’ve only done it twice. At one point in the year arguably the strongest offense in the league, the Titans now look pretty good, and pretty good only.
And pretty good is, well, it’s pretty good. But it might not be enough to compensate for the wealth of defensive inefficiencies they’ve shown– and that once elite team with a once elite offense is now looking like they might be cursed to being “just pretty good”.
The Road Ahead
There are a few possible causes for the Titans’ setback on offense. Losing Taylor Lewan to a season-ending injury back in Week 6 (the Titans’ last truly great offensive performance) certainly hurt, as did losing Adam Humphries from the mix at receiver– one of the team’s most reliable players.
Maybe even playcalling and an overreliance on the running game could be to blame, forcing Tennessee into second or third and long situations where Ryan Tannehill can’t rely on the play-action to open the passing game up. All of these are factors– but it’s ignoring the most glaring, and most probable cause of the Titans’ recent offensive woes. The schedule.
Weeks 1 through 6 didn’t pose as a daunting stretch of defenses– not in the way Tennessee’s recent opponents have. While the Titans coasted against teams like Jacksonville and Houston and a banged-up Minnesota team– they’ve hit a wall against stronger groups like Chicago, Pittsburgh, and Indianapolis. It’s against the stronger defenses, and especially the stronger run defenses, where the Titans offense goes from elite to pedestrian– and it’s not getting easier. The Titans escaped the Baltimore Ravens– statistically one of the best defensive groups in the league, but one without some of their strongest defensive talent. Next week, it’s the Colts again. If Tennessee can’t turn things around permanently, and in a hurry, the backslide could pick back up again.
And even while the defenses get easier, the offenses won’t. Maybe the Browns wouldn’t have been much of an obstacle for the early season Titans, but is it insane to expect Cleveland could beat the tires off a struggling Tennessee defense while the offense struggles to keep up? Same question for Aaron Rodgers’ Packers team. The way things have been, even the Houston Texans could pose a real threat in that final game of the year. After all, even the good version of the Tennessee Titans needed overtime to pull out the win.
And now, here we are. In the middle of a season still within reach of being special, but one at high risk of fading fast. No longer is everything at peace for an undefeated Titans team. Problems are beginning to pop up fast as the schedule becomes a tougher challenge.
With three losses already and three very losable games against three very good teams left to go, and two more against a pair of sneaky tough teams, Tennessee finds themselves, once again, on a crash course to where they always end up. Just a step above average. Just good enough to be sweating out a playoff spot in Week 17. For now, and maybe forever, the Tennessee Titans look like a 9-7 football team.