Should the Tennessee Titans end the Treylon Burks experiment?

The Tennessee Titans have started 0-2, and much of the talk has been around Will Levis and the boneheaded mistakes he has made to cost his team crucial points. The offense as a whole has not had much consistency, particularly struggling in the second halves of games.

Brian Callahan's offense remains a work in progress with a brand new coaching staff and various new starters. In all likelihood, we have not seen the best of the Titans offense just two weeks into the season, and you would certainly like to believe that Levis will lessen the egregious turnovers.

The general rule right now is to be patient with this group, but one clear outlier is Treylon Burks. Now in his third year as a pro, he has not come close to meeting expectations, and everything we have seen up to this point suggests that his struggles will continue.

Treylon Burks has failed to take advantage of opportunities with Tennessee Titans

Everything was lining up for Burks to break out last season, as he was coming off of a rookie campaign that was riddled with injuries, but had flashes. The thought was that he was going to put it all together in Year Two and become a legit receiver, and that did not happen in the slightest.

Burks battled injuries again, yes, but he still disappointed when he was on the field. He had a major problem with dropping passes and just could not be relied on to make plays when targeted. And he started to get fewer of those, showing in the final game of the season when he had zero targets and catches.

A total of 16 catches for 221 yards and zero touchdowns was brutal for Burks in a season where he was supposed to take that next step. It meant he would come into this season with lots of pressure with his career potentially on the line, and it would be hard for him to get a ton of snaps after the Titans added Calvin Ridley and Tyler Boyd.

There were some hints that this could be the year Burks finally breaks out, but the majority of the fan-base took the "believe it when I see it" approach. And there is a good reason for that, as he has been an absolute non-factor in the first two games of the season.

Burks has a total of one catch for two yards and only on three targets despite receiving ample playing time. DeAndre Hopkins has been limited with a knee injury, so Burks has been filling in more than usual and registered 70.5% of offensive snaps in the first game, and 50% of them in the second game.

That's not an overwhelming workload overall, but certainly one with which Burks should have much more production. We saw one of Burks' major weaknesses in the Titans' Week 2 loss at home on a play that resulted in an interception for the Jets.

Levis deserves partial blame for the result of this play as well, as it was the first offensive play immediately after his other worldly gaffe that cost the Titans three points in the red zone. The worst thing you can do is turn the ball over again, and throwing deep like he did on that play is quite risky given the situation.

The ball Levis threw was also a bit under-thrown, and he arguably went with a completely different read from the one he should have gone with. The film shows that Calvin Ridley was wide open in the middle of the field, and it would have been a 20+ yard play easily, so Levis probably like to have that one back.

In spite of that, Levis gave the big-bodied Burks an opportunity to make a contested catch on a deep ball. Burks had every chance to make this catch, as he got his hand on it and it was a definition of a fight to come up with possession.

Burks is considerably bigger than Brandon Echols, a backup player who picked off the pass. The fact that Burks could not come up with this football is inexcusable, and that's usually a throw that quarterbacks can get a way with slightly under-throwing, because they expect their big-bodied first round receiver to make those contested catches.

But it is simply a repeat of what we saw last year, as Burks has way too many drops, especially on deep balls, and he cannot use his size and his strength to his advantage at the catch point. He's a body catcher that wastes his size. If there is anything else to criticize Levis for on the aforementioned turnover, it is trusting Burks to come up with it, as he has failed to deliver way too many times on similar plays.

You have to wonder just how many more opportunities Burks is going to get. This was supposed to be his last real chance with Hopkins going down early in training camp, and he has been nowhere to be found. It certainly does not look promising for the third-year wideout with his fifth-year option decision looming.

It's one that looks to be a no-brainer until proven otherwise.