[FREE] The Titans & Their Draft Misinformation

Tre'Jean Watkins has an interesting takeaway regarding the 2024 draft that just concluded

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Leading up to the draft, the Titans engaged in a little game that threw us off the scent of their draft plans.

Well, it threw some of us off.

Their little strategy wasn’t one full of mystery and disguise, in fact it was one of the oldest tricks in the book. All they simply did was lead everyone on with pre-draft chatter, while their actions led away from the sweet words that were said before the 2024 NFL Draft.

Do you remember Callahan’s comments about the Titans’ 7th overall pick and the decision between taking a tackle and a receiver?

Something along the lines of “I'll always lean, when all things are equal, (on) guys that can score touchdowns tend to make more of an impact”.

You remember right?

Those comments sent everyone into a frenzy, making some say Callahan really could be leaning towards valuing a receiver over a tackle at #7, equating the situation to the Bengals’ in 2021 when they selected Ja’Marr Chase over Penei Sewell, one of the best prospects at a position the Bengals desperately needed help at.

It was truly a wild time.

However, as we saw last weekend, instead of taking one of the few remaining receivers worthy of a top ten pick — one Rome Odunze — the Titans decided to take offensive tackle J.C. Latham, making it seem like he was their guy all along after the selection was made.

As a matter fact, the team didn’t address the receiver spot until the 6th round when they took former Tulane receiver Jha’Quan Jackson.

No receiver taken in the top 100, no value found at the spot in the middle rounds either. It was a little shocking, but not as shocking because the team did find a way to reel in Calvin Ridley during free agency.

But nonetheless, still a little surprising given the team’s receiver situation right now, with Kyle Phillips being the only remaining option to play in the slot.

Former Bengals standout Tyler Boyd could change that if his visit with the Titans ends with a deal being signed to play in Tennessee. But in retrospect, no one saw this kind of route coming based on comments made by Callahan earlier in the off-season.

You could say the same based on his evaluations of the team’s EDGE situation. At the owners meetings, Callahan described Arden Key as a bit of a rotational/situational rusher, which threw some doubt into the overall standing of the position.

We thought there’d be a more contested effort towards addressing that spot, but like receiver, the Titans didn’t address that spot specifically until the 7th round. Of course, there wasn’t much expectation for them to address this spot in a significant way unless their most important needs were addressed first.

But still, after how Callahan described Key, you’d think there would’ve been an aggressive push to find some answers at a spot that seemingly doesn’t have a bonafide second starter opposite Harold Landry.

Now this isn’t some gripe against Callahan or anything.

If it does sound like that, then I apologize. It’s 3 AM and I’m stuck trying to put words together before I get 4 hours of sleep, wake up, and go about my Thursday.

What I’m really trying to get at, is Callahan and how his words threw off so many people ahead of one of the more crucial drafts for the Titans in recent years. Of course, you don’t expect a coach to be loose-lipped and truthful about their teams’ roster plans, because if they were, then that’d just be plain ol’ stupid.

And the Titans haven’t exactly been vocal about their plans in the past either, this dating back to the days of [redacted] Robinson.

But this felt a little different.

So many words were being thrown around, only for the teams’ route to be way off the previous calculations.

This could all be a result of the board falling in a way the team maybe didn’t expect, with Joe Alt and Malik Nabers going sooner than 7, EDGE depth being destroyed in the second round, and receiver depth taking a nosedive into the middle rounds.

Or this could be some sort of attempt by the team to throw the dogs off the trail and move in a way that’s invisible to the rest of us.

I don’t know, these are just some thoughts I’ve been pondering for a couple days now.

Is this really a new era of team functionality and its details being held close to the vest, leaving even the most tuned in media and fanalysts confused about the direction of the teams’ thought process?

Or did circumstances prevent the original idea from becoming reality? The original idea being Callahan’s preference for guys that score touchdowns.

It’s an interesting question for me at least, but unfortunately I won’t receive an answer anytime soon. Which sucks, but what can you really do about it?

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