There are no guarantees in football. No team is guaranteed success if you base potential results on what’s already happened. The Tennessee Titans are, in no way, guaranteed a division title or a deep playoff run. They’ll have to earn it. The results of the last game played have no bearing on what happens in the next.
There’s one thing the Titans have been able to hang their hats on though, Derrick Henry. He’s been as consistent as they come, so much so that, he hasn’t even played the first snap yet of the 2021 NFL regular season, his sixth, and some of the NFL’s most trusted voices are already of the belief that his career arc has the words Hall-of-Fame trajectory written all over it.
You don’t have to take anyone else’s word for it. Take a look for yourself. The team over at NFL Network’s Good Morning Football all seem to be in agreement.
"You can't describe this era of football without Derrick Henry. That's the mark of a Hall of Famer." -- @nateburleson
— Good Morning Football (@gmfb) August 10, 2021
What would another 2k yards mean for @KingHenry_2's legacy? pic.twitter.com/74h6DGnkvd
The Tennessee Titans star is absolutely Hall of Fame worthy.
Nate Burleson, a guy that’s played with Hall-of-Famers (so he knows what one looks like), hits the nail on the head here. Derrick’s era isn’t done yet, but it’s getting relatively difficult to talk about this era of football without bringing up his name.
If he has another season with the Tennessee Titans in 2021 that resembles his last two, especially with Julio Jones and A.J. Brown as teammates (they’re certain to rob him of a few touches), we’re really going to have to start having a few discussions about where he ranks historically.
What if he leads the league in rushing touchdowns and rushing yards for a third straight season? Dare we say it? What if he rushes for 2,000 yards again during the 2021-2022 season? He’d be the only member of the 2,000-yard club to have accomplished the feat twice, and he would have done it in consecutive seasons. Remember, NFL teams play a 17-game schedule now.
As mentioned earlier. This is the NFL. There are no guarantees, but if King Henry stays healthy, aren’t you of the belief that he’s completely capable of accomplishing anything? If he duplicates what he did over the course of the last two seasons in the next one, isn’t his place in the history of the NFL secure?
People talk about things like longevity but forget that Terrell Davis and Gale Sayers played in the NFL for seven seasons. Perhaps it’s unfair to compare Derrick Henry to Davis and Sayers right now. He still has a little more work to do, but we can say that, like Davis and Sayers, he’s given about as much as he can give in the small window of time that we’ve gotten to know him?
Here’s a bold statement, and you can take it or leave it. Once he’s done playing Derrick Henry’s place in the Pro Football Hall of Fame is certain. Heck, some might say that he’s proven he belongs already.