More than anything else, these Tennessee Titans are still a group of strangers

NFL franchises can't buy instant gratification with free agents. A struggling Tennessee Titans team full of strangers is a good example.

Given the circumstances, I found it instructive to see which players represented the Tennessee Titans at Monday's press conferences:

Receiver Tyler Boyd and linebacker Ernest Jones IV.

Of the two players who were ready and available on a dreary Monday to answer questions about how the Titans can start winning games, neither of them has actually won a game as a Titan.

Boyd wasn't here last season. Jones wasn't even here during training camp. Her insight and presence touched on an important aspect of the Titans' early-season woes that isn't talked about much because it sounds too much like an excuse (and the team's bigwigs didn't, after all). choose their adventure).

But cohesion, leadership, responsibility and culture within a football team do not simply arise.

Those are just buzzwords. They matter. They're the reason the Titans aren't good right now and why they might not be good all season. Frankly, no one should have expected anything different so soon.

Because these Titans are still, for the most part, a collection of strangers.

They have a quarterback in Will Levis who is learning a lot on the job. They have a new head coach and offensive playcaller in Brian Callahan. He is also learning on the job. They have a new defensive coordinator in Dennard Wilson and a number of new assistant coaches.

And most of the key players are new. Too many Titans, either veterans from this offseason's spending spree or inexperienced hopefuls like Levis, have been pushed into leadership out of necessity without having had time to earn the locker room's trust naturally.

Many of the Titans have gone through such a crisis in the NFL, but they have never had a together.

“We just have to come to an agreement. That's all,” Boyd told reporters on Monday. “And I think we just have to play for each other. I think the relationship and the chemistry isn't quite there yet.”

It takes time for a team to grow together and for players to know and respect each other enough to honestly and confidently demand more from each other. It also takes time to figure out which players are valuable enough to make demands on others.

And let’s be honest: which of these titans is currently powerful enough to achieve that?

Related: Old NFL Draft mistakes still haunt Ran Carthon's new-look Tennessee Titans | Estes

This newly assembled cast has a lot of supporting actors and few proven leads. In other words, there aren't enough people on this team.

“Dudes” are the players that other players talk about, worry about, and vote into the Pro Bowl and top 100 lists.

Who are the guys for the Titans?

I saw one on the field on Sunday: DeAndre Hopkins.

He's 32 years old and his knee is way less than 100%, and he's still making plays that others can't. That's a guy. Those are the players that decide games in this league, and they're usually unavailable. Teams don't let them go, and the longer they stay in a city and a franchise, the more loyalty and investment they build as figureheads of the franchise.

The Titans no longer have these players.

She Do have some good players (Jeffery Simmons, Calvin Ridley, Harold Landry III, L'Jarius Sneed) who have played well in this league before and are paid that way. But Ridley is new. So is Sneed, who barely practiced in training camp. Simmons keeps getting backbreaking penalties. Landry can be hard to spot out there sometimes.

Of course, individual players need to play better. But it's more about the whole team playing better collectively. The “collective” part of that will require patience.

For this reason, the preferred path to success in the NFL is not the one the Titans take in 2024.

A franchise cannot buy instant success with free agents. This 0-3 start by the Titans should underscore that.

Reach Tennessean sports columnist Gentry Estes at [email protected] and on the X-Platform (formerly known as Twitter) @Gentry_Estes.

More than anything else, these Tennessee Titans are still a group of strangers

ByVanessa

NFL franchises can't buy instant gratification with free agents. A struggling Tennessee Titans team full of strangers is a good example.

By Vanessa

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