NASHVILLE, Tenn. (WTVF) — The Titans season isn’t over. But it is getting late early after Sunday’s 27-14 loss to the Packers at Nissan Stadium that dropped Tennessee to 0-3 on the year.
Will Levis had another catastrophic turnover, Brian Callahan’s offense failed to score 20 points for the third consecutive game and a defense that entered the week no. 1 overall in the NFL was shredded by former Titan Malik Willis.
Making his second straight start in place of an injured Jordan Love, Willis looked like a different quarterback than the one Titans’ fans saw during his time in Tennessee. He completed a 30-yard pass to Jayden Reed on the game’s first play. He followed it up by hitting Christian Watson for 30 more over the top of Roger McCreary moments later, and capped off a six-play, 70-yard opening drive with a five-yard touchdown run on a zone read.
Willis led the Packers to scores on four of their first five possessions as they built a 27-7 lead, thrilling a huge contingent of Packers fans which made the trip to Nashville and made their presence felt with several loud, “Go Pack, go” cheers inside Nissan Stadium.
This is the same quarterback the Titans traded at the end of the preseason for a seventh round draft pick the day before he was likely going to be waived. It seemed like a good deal at the time, picking up a future draft pick for a QB that was clearly behind Will Levis and Mason Rudolph on the Titans depth chart after struggling in every appearance he made over his first two seasons.
But on Sunday Willis made a triumphant return to Nashville, completing 13 of 19 passes for 202 yards and a touchdown. He also ran for 73 yards in the best performance of his young NFL career, helping the Packers get to 2-1.
Meanwhile, Levis’s struggles continued, intensifying the concern that he may not be the long term answer for the Titans. After a beautifully scripted response on a 10-play, 70-yard touchdown drive on the team’s first possession, Levis began the next possession with his second pick six in three games. Jaire Alexander jumped an out route intended for DeAndre Hopkins and returned it 35 yards for a touchdown that made it 17-7 Green Bay.
But it wasn’t all on Levis this week. The offensive line was completely overwhelmed by the Packers front, giving up eight sacks and Callahan’s offense once again couldn’t find its footing after that opening drive.
Right tackle Nicholas Petit-Frere was benched after a dreadful performance that included a total whiff of a block that got Levis sacked and stripped, leading to his second turnover. The Titans substituted Jaelyn Duncan in at right tackle, but he wasn’t any better. Not even Bill Callahan seems to be able to fix this unit.
A late interception was Levis’s eighth turnover in three games, the most by any NFL quarterback. And Brian Callahan will be criticized for playcalling that was unable to get a running back going Sunday or find Calvin Ridley with any consistency. The Titans don’t have a go-to option right now on offense in part because they don’t trust their offensive line or quarterback to hold up.
That indecisiveness was apparent early in the third quarter when the Titans faced a fourth and a long two yards from their own 37. Callahan initially decided to punt the ball away, but a chorus of boos from the home crowd seemingly caused him to reconsider, call timeout and send the offense back out on the field. After a Green Bay timeout, Levis rolled to his right but didn’t find any one open and tried to run for the first down only to be stopped well short of the line to gain.
The Packers would score a touchdown on the ensuing drive thanks to a defensive holding penalty on Jeffery Simmons that extended the drive after the Titans appeared to avoid damage with a missed field goal from Brayden Narveson. It’s the second straight week Simmons had a costly penalty to extend a drive and the Packers capitalized when Willis found Emmanuel Brown in the flat on a screen and watched him slice through the Titans defense 30 yards for a touchdown and a 27-7 lead.
After dominating opponents the first two weeks the Titans defense struggled Sunday, giving up 378 yards including 188 on the ground. That’s simply not good enough. Not with the struggles this team has offensively.
And they’re not generating any turnovers, which was one of their keys entering the season. Tennessee has one takeaway through three games – a muffed kickoff by the Bears in week one – which means they are now -7 in turnover margin in their winless start.
Only four teams since 1990 have overcome 0-3 starts to reach the NFL playoffs, so time is running out for the Titans already. More importantly, questions are starting to pile up about Levis, Callahan, this offensive line and the entire leadership on this team as to whether or not the offseason changes actually have them heading in the right direction.
Right now the results speak for themselves. This is a bad football team, and only time will tell if the personnel is in place, on the field and off of it, to turn it around and get this organization back on track.
