NASHVILLE, Tenn. -- Tennessee Titans president and CEO Tommy Smith has spoken of how he wants more of a physical football team.
As the team prepares to shuffle its roster for its second season with Smith as head of the ownership group, he reiterated those themes in an appearance on 3HL on 104.5 The Zone in Nashville.
Regarding the identity of a team that went 2-14 and will draft second overall, Smith said: "I don't think we have one."
Doesn’t the smashmouth idea he touts run counter to coach Ken Whisenhunt’s desire to emphasize a downfield passing offense?
“I think you’re going to see a run game this year,” Smith said. “We didn’t have much of that last year. We lost two of our three tight ends early, we lost O-linemen and so forth. But if you’re going to go down the field you also have to have a run game to compliment it. We have a lot of work to do on that.”
Smith also addressed pass protection, which wasn’t great early and deteriorated as the offensive line injuries mounted.
“Until we protect a quarterback, we can talk about going into the draft or to a free agent or whatever but at the end of the year, we’ve got to keep the man upright for goodness sakes. It’s unfortunate [Zach Mettenberger] got injured.”
Smith said the quarterback is tough and committed, but he would like to have seen more. A shoulder injury kept Mettenberger out of the final three games.
The team needs some quarterback competition for Mettenberger, to at the very least be “safe.”
Draft and free-agent decisions will be made by general manager Ruston Webster and his staff, Smith said.
While he’d prefer to have a franchise built predominantly thorugh the draft, the current roster demands help from all available avenues.
"We're going to be very active in free agency,” Smith said. “We need to be."
A few other items he hit on in the interview:
After top non-football executive Don MacLachlan was ousted, the team will now have multiple public faces rather than heavy representation by one high-ranking man.
Smith is sticking with goals he started earlier for the Titans: the playoffs in 2015, the Super Bowl in 2016.
While the team is returning to navy blue as its primary color, Smith didn’t offer any indication that uniform or logo alterations are in progress.