TITANS HEAD COACH BRIAN CALLAHAN
Opening Statement:
"We had a couple guys injured and did not return. Otis (Reese IV) – ankle, didn't return to the game. We will see where he's at. Kenneth Murray (Jr.) had a wrist and did not return. Not probably encouraging for him. (Dillon) Radunz had a shoulder and did not return. (Amani) Hooker had a shoulder and did not return. (Tony) Pollard's ankle is the same. He did not return, but he's the same as he was before, so nothing different. Obviously disappointed the way that first half got away from us early, did not play well at either line of scrimmage. Didn't stop the run at all. Didn't run the ball well. That's a recipe to lose against a team that is built to do both, and we didn't do a good enough job. Guys fought. We didn't stop. We kept swinging at it. We had a chance to get the ball back with an eight-point game in the fourth quarter. I appreciate the effort and the fight. Ultimately, it wasn't enough, but too many things that we didn't do well enough in that game, all the way around, myself included."
How do you kind of justify the way the game spiraled in the first half?
"I'm disappointed all the way around and on the final outcome. I just wish we played better early in that game. We were in a good spot to go down and miss the field goal, but a chance to go up. And then offensively we have a critical spot where we get about a 60-yard gain to Calvin (Ridley), and we get a hands to the face, and that one gets called back. That's kind of where the momentum shifted. We turn the ball over, and then once we the turn the ball over late in the half, which made it even harder when we throw that pick in a two-minute drill. The whole thing is disappointing because I thought we were going to play better than we did early. The run game, they had a couple really, really big, explosive ones get away from us, and made it challenging to have to come back into the game. I wish we didn't have to come back, and we didn't have to show that kind of effort. I wish we could have won the game."
What's happening on the run defense that you're getting gassed to the degree that you did?
"Again, super disappointing performance. Really, not at all what I think that we've shown over the course of the year, but didn't get out blocks, didn't win the line of scrimmage, and didn't tackle in space. We had, then the speed of Jonathan Taylor showed up, and we couldn't get him on the ground, and he had two extremely large runs, and the quarterback had the other. Sometimes that's all you need to have a day like that is two 70-yard runs to put you in a pretty rare category to begin with. So not good enough. We've got to be able to get the ball carrier on the ground. We've got to be able to fit gaps better than we did. So, disappointing performance."
Regarding defending the soft accusations, how do you go about it? Did you present that to them?
"No, I didn't present that to them. If they saw it, they saw it. I didn't make anything of it. And again, it's disappointing that we ended up giving up the amount of rushing yards we did. You can look all the way around. You can say whatever you want about it. It wasn't good in any area in the run game. So not a whole lot of defense there for that. But I didn't bring it up to them."
What did you think about Mason Rudolph's play?
"Yeah, the turnovers were unfortunate. The one turnover at the end of the half is killer. It kind of predetermined and forced the ball in there, and then the ball should have went to the adjacent receiver. But other than that, I thought he battled. We held up okay in protection. We lost some guys up front. We had to shuffle some guys around. (Daniel) Brunskill had to go to guard. (Corey) Levin had to go to center. John (Ojukwu) went in at tackle. We were moving pieces all over the place. I thought they fought in a drop back passing game, which was good to see. Didn't give up a ton of pressure in a rush game. And ultimately, Mason (Rudolph) responded well to that part of it, but needed him to play cleaner. We need to be able to run the ball better than we did. So disappointed."
In the first half. You go down, you get the touchdown, get the early score, then the offense just kind of goes dormant until the game is out of hand. Why weren't you able to sustain any rhythm there?
"We failed in a sequence there after that ball comes back on a penalty. We kind of get back into in a manageable distance, and we don't convert, which is disappointing. Trying to take an aggressive throw on a third-and-one and a half to see if we could generate another explosive there. We didn't end up converting and we had to punt. But that really was, about where we missed a field goal too driving down there. So just the down and down consistency, which has been sort of our issue all year long, and it showed up again."
You had an eight or nine play offensive drive at the end of the first quarter and second quarter break. The defense comes on the field and Jeffery Simmons doesn't play the first four or five snaps there. Can you explain the logic between the substitution pattern there?
"Yeah, that's pretty standard operating procedure for most defensive lines, as you're trying to get those guys a breather so they can play the entirety of the game. You want to try to keep a healthy rotation. Jeff (Jeffery Simmons) has played a ton of snaps this year in general out of necessity. You're just trying to rotate and make sure we're fresh for the entirety of the game. I'd have to look back on the rotation numbers and all that, but there's a rhyme and a reason behind it."
Can you put a finger on the lack of composure?
"I have not. I can't put a finger on those things. Those are challenging, and it comes down to we have to make less mistakes. That's ultimately on me to figure out and fix. We make too many mistakes that put us in holes. It's been that way all season long, and it keeps showing up at critical moments, particularly again, like the end of the half, where we end up with a turnover in plus territory and they go down and score. It's just one of those things that we've got to find an answer to, and it's been a struggle to do that thus far, and I've got to do a better job."
How do you go about finding a spark? What would that look like?
"I was just looking for more consistency. And I think he (Mason Rudolph) started the game out really well. I think he was eight-for-eight or nine-for-nine, whatever it was to start. We put ourselves on two scoring drives back-to-back. We missed the field goal – we were in position. That's what I was looking for. We just didn't sustain that over the entirety of the first half. We did some good things in the second half, but again, the game was so out of hand that we had to do those things. Mason (Rudolph) responded and battled and kept swinging. That part was great, but I was hoping to see more consistency than we had. And really, the same kind of problems reared their head again on us."
In the second quarter, Kenny Moore II, was he kind of playing both routes?
"He's playing Two Tampa. He's playing in between both. We have two different levels. It's meant to stretch him, and he squeezed inside and just you'd like to hit the ball on the outside. It's not going to be for a crazy gain. It would probably be a completion for five to eight yards, but he played it well. Played it like he had showed he played between both those guys, and we were trying to just put some stretch on him. Has a little bit of horizontal stretch and some vertical stretch. He played it well. And would like to see Mason (Rudolph) come off it quicker."
When you look at the mistakes today, is that consistency having Mason Rudolph as the quarterback again next week?
"We will see. This a week-to-week thing right now and we'll see where that lands. I'm not going to make any determination on it right now."
What's the cause for any hope the next two weeks based on how you guys are trending?
"I don't really deal in that. My job is to try to put the best product we can on the field and try to go win the game. Whatever that looks like, I'm not really in the Christmas spirit right now for hope. I'm just trying to play good football. Right now, we haven't done it well enough. Our job is to go try to play another game next week. We've got two more (games) to play. I'd love to find a way to win both of them and play better than we have. And that's all my focus is at, and that's where we're going to do our best to do. Outside of that, I can't control the rest of that, just trying to do our best job we can."
Don't you guys need to have some hope? Is that not part of the factor for them?
"Oh, I'm sure it is. I mean, they want it, but we all have to play better. We've got to do a better job doing what we're supposed to do. I've got to do a better job coaching. Everybody has got to be better. The hope comes from doing things the right way over the course of an entire game at a better and higher rate than we have. That's the ultimate sign of hope is when you play well. We've got to find a way to play well with two weeks to go."
Why has the complementary football been so hard to find?
"That's a good question. There are a lot of reasons for it. A lot of it has just been putting ourselves in bad spots on both sides. We can't stop the run today, and we give up turnovers in plus territory the week before – we give up turnovers for touchdowns. So as of right now, we don't complement each other very well at all, and that's a large reason why we haven't had as much success as I think we're capable of. But those things have got to be better. We have to be able to complement when one side of the ball is playing well, and be able to capitalize on those things, and thus far, not consistently enough over the course of the season."
