Tennessee Titans hire Super Bowl-winning analytics expert Sarah Bailey
By Will Lomas
The Tennessee Titans were the last team in the NFL to start trusting analytics, but they are trying to catch up now with the addition of analytics expert and Super Bowl Champion, Sarah Bailey.
When the Tennessee Titans hired Ran Carthon as their GM, the big takeaway from the introductory press conference wasn't about Carthon's history as a talent evaluator. Instead, the focus was on the idea of building a team through the collaboration of several different voices.
Make no mistake, the biggest voice in the room will belong to Mike Vrabel and Carthon said as much in his introductory press conference. However, since the Carthon hire the team has continued to invest in more voices in the front office to help enforce true collaboration.
First, the Titans hired Chad Brinker from the Green Bay Packers, who specializes in free agency, and contract structures, and he also has some sort of proprietary algorithm that is supposed to help identify injury risks.
Next, the team hired Anthony Robinson from the Atlanta Falcons to be their new Assistant General Manager. While Carthon and Brinker have backgrounds that heavily skew towards the free agent and pro personnel side of things, Robinson is an elite college scout and draft expert. Since he was promoted in 2019, I would stack his 6 first-round picks against anyone else in the NFL.
Today, the Tennessee Titans added another prominent voice to their front-office collaboration when they officially hired Sarah Bailey as their new Director of Football Research and Development.
What does this mean for the Tennessee Titans going forward
Both Bailey and Brinker are going to be incredibly important behind the scenes even though it will be hard to identify exactly what they are doing.
What we do know is that Bailey was the Manager of Football Analytics for the L.A. Rams for the past five years until the Tennessee Titans hired her for her new role with the team.
According to the Rams website, a big part of her job description was, "analyzing and presenting on all data on the football side including scouting/personnel, medical, and coaching" which means that she is tasked with collecting information on nearly every variable that affects the product on the field.
The Tennessee Titans have gotten into the habit of adding strong voices even if there might be some redundancies in their backgrounds. It seems like the thought process is that you should try to collect as many talented evaluators and informed voices as you can. Instead of relying on one particular vision for the Tennessee Titans, the best method might be to lean on this collection of specialists and come to a consensus.
While you may not find as many outliers by going against the grain, you are much more likely to have a higher hit rate and produce more C+ and B+ type picks and additions.
It might not end up being as exciting, but it will almost certainly make for a more consistent team with consistent results, and if you have great coaching that just might be enough to turn the Tennessee Titans into contenders again.