When you don't have weapons to throw to, it's difficult to score ...

And of Kern were to kick him, he would be gently placed somewhere inside the 10.

 

not gonna try lying.

Earlier this year I defended downing because of the PPG the titans were scoring. His inability to adjust, utilize the talents available, slim as they might be, and read how a game is rolling, I’ve lost faith.

Hopefully with Henry and Brown back, he can pick up where he left off when the roster was still loaded, but I have my doubts.

 

A good read with data.

You think Ryan Tannehill is THE problem?

 

It’s never just one person. It’s a multitude of things. But I simply do not understand how people can point to all of these reasons Tannehill isn’t successful and in the same breathe turn around and say Todd Downing is a bad coach. Wouldn’t those same reasons prevent Downing from being a successful OC?

Since Henry went down they have all sucked but how can you expect an OC to be successful with “no weapons and a bad OL”?

 

And that's it right there. If you use the excuse that Tannehill can't be talked about because of "weapons and a bad OL," than the exact same thing can be said for Downing.

And all these stats being pulled out.... where is the one that shows overthrows by Tannehill. Since the beginning of the year, his accuracy has been off. Throwing a bit high, throwing a bit behind. It's just not as spot on as it had been the past two years,

 

That's dead on .he's not the problem but a big part of it ..the OL, OC, JRob and Vrabel as well.
Granted he doesn't have the weapons but he still needs to be better than he has been at times..that's what leaders do ..but our leader is on IR with his foot in a boot...that's THE problem

 

Titan Jeff had it exactly right...it is the turnovers that are crushing this team.

Only 3 teams in the league average fewer punts per game than the Titans.....Chiefs, Chargers, and Rams.....we are tied with NE, Packers, and Cards

That list includes pretty much the top offenses in the league.

Even with the backups that we have been playing the offense has still been moving the ball. Got to give Downing and Tanny credit for that.

We are going to get guys healthy and the offense is going to round into shape....the defense has been playing stellar the last few games....really flying to the ball...we will see the turnovers start coming.

 

The passing offense this year has been abysmal, so I wanted to see if there was anything statistically that could be used to understand what's happening. Here's some advanced passing stats to put things in perspective on Tannehill and the rest of the league (Per Pro-Football Reference):

Bad Throw%: 17th best
On Target%: 6th best
Pressure Rate: 17th best
Pocket Time: T-14th best
Intended Air Yards: T-25th best
Completed Air Yards/Attempt: T-20th best

So what this all tells me is that Tannehill is around the middle of the league in terms of getting pressured and time in the pocket, he's making some bad decisions at times, but also top tier in terms of his accuracy. This goes counter to the argument everyone wants to make that he has absolutely no time to throw. The OL has protected him better as of late, and he's middle of the league in terms of protection. It's not a complete turnstile.

The most damning thing to me is those last two categories about air yards. Those are the distances that the ball is intended to travel on a per throw basis. This is saying that our offense is not throwing the ball down the field at all, and we're not even trying. Now is that Downing being a crap play caller/coordinator, or Tannehill just having to dump it off more? I don't know. Probably some combination of both. Obviously not having AJB and half the WR corp out for half the season can't help, but that's not the only thing that is at play.

Another stat that has tanked in comparison to recent years is our play action%. In his time as a starter in 2019 and 2020 we ran play action on 29 and 32 percent of our passing plays respectively. In 2021 we're down to 23%. We also have our lowest yards/play action pass of any year as well, down from 14.8 in 2019 and 9.8 in 2020 to 8.6 this year. Losing Henry hurts, sure, but we had him for 8 games and run game has still been effective, yet we're still not running nearly as much play action and not putting the ball down the field when we do.

All of this says to me that part of the blame has to lie on the offensive scheme and play calling. It's not the only reason for the offensive woe's we're having, but it certainly deserves some share of the blame.

 

^ it is things like that, that makes me see how stats are only a small piece of the entire puzzle.

The OL is horrible and definitely doesnt give Tannehill the time he needs.

I dont care who the receivers are, Tannehill is constantly throwing high and behind them, almost every throw.

 

An OC should be making a game plan that best utilizes what the team has. Running the ball seems to work, then he just puts a bunch of passes together at inexplicable times.

THill just has to run the plan with the tools he has. Between the 2, the OC is supposed to adjust the plan but the QB is expected to execute the plan.

by that, downing does deserve the criticism more so than THill although execution could be more on the QB.

the real overall problem is that both are working well enough to win with the exception of execution holding on to the ball which is all over the field.
3 RB fumbles against NE
THill has thrown INTs in all 3 losses
2 WR fumbled against Pit.