2023 Offseason Review Series: Tennessee Titans

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The original was posted on /r/nfl by /u/trick96 on 2023-08-06 13:19:11.

Tennessee Titans

Division: AFC South

2022 Results: 7-10 (3-3 AFC South), 2nd in AFC South

This will be very, very long. I put a lot of hours into this and very much enjoyed it. My goal for it is that if any NFL fan has been in a coma since the end of the season and woke up today, this post would be all they need to catch up on everything Titans-related they missed. So here goes.

I. FAQ

What the hell has been going on with the injuries the past 2 seasons and why is this the biggest thing everyone forgets about the 2022 season?

This is a question mostly asked by Titans fans and mostly ignored by everyone else. In 2022 the Tennessee Titans had the most man-games missed with 339, ahead of 2nd place by 36 games. This has now become a trend, as it is the 2nd year in a row that the Titans have been top 3 in this category. The Titans have been absolutely brutalized by injuries the last two seasons. The Titans were able to overcome this in 2021 and get the number 1 seed anyway, however in 2022 the injuries proved too much.

It’s not controversial to say that the only reason the Titans didn’t win the division in 2022 is because of injuries, it’s just something people forget about. The Titans were 7-3 before letting injuries catch up to them and going on a 7-game losing streak. Here is a direct comparison that I made of Titans and Jaguars injuries in the 2022 season. The Jaguars were the least injured team in the league in 2022, and the quality of players that were injured for both teams was also a major disparity. As I said in my post, my hot take is that the Titans and Jaguars will almost certainly not have such a wide disparity in injuries this season, and that is something that should absolutely be considered when discussing a potential 2023 AFC South Champion.

As for what it means? If we are to assume that the Titans players are taking care of their own bodies to the same level as every other player in the league, then a natural conclusion would be that injuries are almost entirely luck based. There have been calls to completely overturn the strength & conditioning staff and the training staff, but I just don’t see the real benefit to that. The most the team can do is offload some of the worst offenders of repeated injuries (e.g. Bud Dupree, David Long, etc) and maybe alter the practice schedule to be more in line with whatever it is the healthier teams in the league are doing and see if that works, which the Titans are doing. One thing they are doing is replacing all “jog-throughs” with “walk-throughs”. The idea is that during jog-throughs their players were running close to full speed when the idea is to give them a break.

Is Ryan Tannehill on the “hot seat”?

Not in 2023. Ryan Tannehill is, objectively (kind of), the most underrated quarterback in the league. Ryan Tannehill, since 2019, has been in the top 10 of pretty much every QB efficiency rating. For some reason though, he is the guy that every QB ranking list decides to put unproven guys like Justin Fields and Jordan Love ahead of. Here is a short video that goes deeper into the underrating of Ryan Tannehill.

There has been no indication from the team that they have any interest in playing a QB other than Ryan Tannehill this season. It’s comical to Titans fans that so many people this offseason talk about the Titans as if Will Levis is the starting QB in 2023. Tannehill is in a contract year this year, so next year is certainly up in the air, but he could play himself into a new contract. But for now, he is firmly the Titans’ starter this season. I do not see the Titans turning to Levis or Willis unless disaster occurs (like last season) or the Titans are eliminated from the playoffs early. Ideally, the Titans will redshirt Levis and Willis this season.

II. Front Office/Coaching Changes

Ran Carthon hired as Titans GM

I like the hire, Ran came from the 49ers and I like their team-building philosophy overall (even if I don’t like some of their moves like trading a haul for a non-elite QB prospect). He brings something the Titans infamously avoided under the Jon Robinson era: Analytics. If you want to know more about Carthon, here is the announcement article from the team.

Monti Ossenfort Hired as Cardinals GM

Frankly, the short time that Monti Ossenfort has been in Arizona has manifested evidence that he may have been the true issue in the Jrob era: he watched Dennis Daley and Geoff Swaim both attempt to play football from his box in Nissan stadium and decided to sign them to his new team on contracts that were MORE THAN VET MINIMUM (nobody was forcing this man to do this). Truly baffling how this man got a GM job if those are the moves he’s making. Maybe he’s really tanking? I hope so. Sorry Cardinals fans.

Tim Kelly elevated to OC:

This is easily one of the most significant coaching changes ever under Vrabel, as it’s the first time Vrabel has ever fired a coordinator. Todd Downing held this role previously for 2 seasons and, to put it nicely, was an underwhelming OC. For example, here is how Todd Downings’ basic and elementary passing concepts cost the Titans a playoff game in 2021. He has since been hired as the Jets “Passing Game Coordinator”. (if you’re a Jets fan or if you hate the Jets that video I linked is required viewing.) The biggest and most legitimate criticism of Mike Vrabel is that his loyalty to coaches hurts him. Not firing Todd Downing last offseason proved to be a massive mistake.

Tim Kelly was brought on to be the Passing Game Coordinator in the 2022 offseason. When asked about his role in 2022 Mike Vrabel said that he “asked him to focus and assist with TEs at practice and a lot of preparation during the week, working with former OC Todd Downing and Vrabel himself. Worked a lot on the 1st and 2nd down passing game.”. Okay sounds great right? It does until you realize that Todd Downing is still calling the plays and the Titans ran the ball on first and second down at a very high percentage relative to the rest of the league. For what it’s worth though, the Titans were above average in efficiency on 1st and 2nd down passing in 2022 while being a bottom 8 passing team on 3rd and 4th down. That’s not all Kelly did though, as he also had a major part in red zone offense. Naturally the Titans, who had one of the lowest-scoring offenses in the league, were probably bad in the red zone right? Actually no, the Titans had one of the most efficient red zone offenses and the most efficient goal line offense in the league in 2022. The problem with the Titans offense was the 80 yards it took to get to the redzone.

So, what else does Tim Kelly bring to the table as an OC? Well, he spent 2 years under Bill O’Brien at Penn State as a graduate assistant before following him to the NFL. He had a hand in developing the former Texans sexual predator (he’s still a sexual predator, just not with the Texans anymore) as well as essentially having complete control over the offense that led to rookie QB Davis Mills having a much better-than-expected rookie season (side note, but Mills struggled mightily without Kelly last season). The former Houston predator has said that Tim Kelly had a ton to do with his development, and his endorsement was the reason that Kelly was retained on the Texans staff in 2021 despite turnover to most other positions. Given his track record, there is a lot of hope for the Titans offense under Tim Kelly.

Grade: A+

**Chris Harris…

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