The Tennessee Titans’ offense had one of the more frustrating games the unit has seen so far this year, and that’s saying a lot.
While Ryan Tannehill and Co. were able to move the ball with relative ease between the 20s, the unit was unable to finish off drives, with the end result being a 1-for-4 showing in the red zone. In their three losses this season, the Titans are 1-for-9 in that area of the field.
Buy Titans TicketsOn their first trip, the Titans just missed the end zone on a pass from Derrick Henry to DeAndre Hopkins before the drive ultimately stalled thanks to a drop and offensive pass interference by Chig Okonkwo.
Chig then put the Titans behind the sticks on their second failed red zone attempt with another offensive pass interference Tennessee was unable to overcome.
On the final red zone miss, Henry was stuffed on a fourth-and-1 play that saw the offensive line fail to open up a hole for him, something that was common all afternoon long.
“I’ll have to go back and take a look. A couple times I feel like we got behind the sticks,” Tannehill said of the red zone issues. “When you get down there, everything gets a little more condensed and harder to come by. Giving free yards to the defense in those situations is tough. We’ve got to find a way to finish those drives. Had opportunities – didn’t execute well enough down there and we came up short.”
A big reason for the success between the 20s was the offensive line, which was very good in pass protection, allowing Tannehill to connect on longer developing plays. Unfortunately, it wasn’t very good when run-blocking.
“I don’t think (the Colts) dominated the line of scrimmage throughout the game,” Tannehill said. “I think our guys did a pretty good job. Had time in the pocket for most of the game, besides there at the end. So, I feel like our guys did a good job of playing strong at the line of scrimmage. But, you know, they outplayed us.”
One of the bright spots for Tennessee’s offense was wide receiver DeAndre Hopkins, who had his best game as a Titan. The performance also showed that the chemistry between DHop and Tannehill is quite strong.
“Yeah, he’s been huge,” Tannehill said of Hopkins. “Came up big today. Made some big plays for us throughout the game. Has a good feel for what we’re trying to do and getting himself open. He was able to use his savviness a couple times on finding some open space and taking advantage of it. Maybe it wasn’t exactly drawn up that way. So doing a lot of good things. Just have to keep building with him and get the other guys involved as well.”
Tennessee has been the model of inconsistency through the first five weeks of the season. Tannehill rightly noted that’s something that has to be fixed, along with the team securing its identity.
“Yeah, we’re working (on figuring out our identity),” he said. “You know, had flashes of it, but we haven’t been consistent. So that’s going to be the work that we have to put in, is being consistent, being able to play our type of ball week in and week out and take the question marks out.”
