Treylon Burks injury could end the Tennessee Titans season before it starts

The Tennessee Titans had a lot of positive momentum heading into Wednesday's practice against the Minnesota Vikings, but we all know how that story ends.

Treylon Burks had to be carted off of the field with an apparent leg injury on Wednesday after he made a tremendous catch for a touchdown against the Vikings.

There are a few crucial pieces on this Tennessee Titans roster that can't be replaced by backups, and Burks was certainly one of those players. The short-term and long-term implications of an injury to Burks would be nightmarish for the Titans.

First, it should be noted that there hasn't been a diagnosis made on what exactly happened to Burks. If the Titans are lucky enough for it only to be a minor injury, it will be a small miracle and fans should be rushing to the pews on Wednesday night.

If it is a serious injury, then in the short term the offense is going to go from "potentially good" to "average at best" because similarly to how the DeAndre Hopkins signing was a positive domino effect, a Treylon Burks injury would be a negative domino effect that hurts everyone on that offense.

We would be back to the dark days of having Nick Westbrook-Ikhine as a starting boundary wide receiver, and the defense would almost certainly ignore any potential threat of a deep pass anywhere other than toward Hopkins.

How does this change the Tennessee Titans future?

Long-term, this would be another season where Burks would miss time with an injury. Despite doing everything correctly this year, Burks would have that black mark on his record and Mike Vrabel is extremely unforgiving to players with injury histories.

Unfortunately, this could be a situation where one of the most promising young pieces on the roster is on borrowed time on this roster like so many other players before him.

This is just a gut punch for Titans fans that have had to deal with watching the most injured team in the NFL over the last two years. Similar to Harold Landry last year, Burks is an ascending talent who was turning heads all throughout training camp, only to potentially have his season taken away from him before ever hitting the field.

While a serious injury to Burks isn't a "burn down the roster the season is over" thing, it isn't far away and it means that the Tennessee Titans would have to have incredible injury luck from here on out to compete with the like of the Jacksonville Jaguars who were one of the healthiest rosters in the NFL last year.