PFF inexplicably called a Titans offseason upgrade a downgrade

Whether you are talking about the Tennessee Titans or the Kansas City Chiefs, this is the time of year when you can find people who think your favorite NFL team is underrated if you look hard enough.

For example, PFF named the Titans as one of the five most overlooked teams in the NFL mere days ago.

That is great, and I think there are a dozen reasons why fans should be very optimistic that the Titans will overachieve this year. However, it is easy to see why the Titans aren't getting the respect or national attention they deserve, and you don't have to go very far to see an example.

Let's turn to another PFF article and something that Ramon Foster coined as the "Titans tax" in effect.

Titans fans are fully aware of how bad Aaron Brewer was at both guard center, and at one point PFF knew that too. However, that didn't stop them from ranking Brewer ahead of Lloyd Cushenberry in their latest center positional rankings.

I need someone to explain to me how Cushenberry can be ranked below Brewer. Cushenberry is coming off of a campaign where he allowed just 14 pressures and one sack, while Brewer allowed 34 pressures and six sacks.

Trying to make sense of this, I went back to see if the reasoning was that Brewer was better than Cushenberry throughout his career, but that wasn't it either.

Over the last three years, both Brewer and Cushenberry have played over 2,500 snaps and over that time PFF's grading scale says that Cushenberry (64.5) was better than Brewer (63.1).

What makes this ranking even more confusing/aggravating is that PFF's free agency rankings had Cushenberry ranked ahead of Brewer:

Despite all of that, PFF still ranked Brewer higher on their center rankings than Cushenberry, and that is just downright fishy behavior.

I'm not certain it is even a conscious decision to do these things, but this is exactly how the Titans have gotten the leauge-wide reputation they have.

For example, go back to the myth of Mike Vrabel. When he was the head coach he was given all of the credit for making the most out of bad rosters. Recent history indicates that narrative was put forth by national analysts who didn't consistently watch the Titans.

Everyone knows that the Titans are never going to be media darlings. When it comes to analysis that ranks Brewer ahead of Cushenberry because he the former now play for the Miami Dolphins, it feels like a blatant and obvious upgrade is being ignored because of the small-market nature.