Hall of Fame running back LaDainian Tomlinson hasn’t forgotten everything the Tennessee Titans accomplished in 2019, and he’s making the case that the Titans are the biggest threat in the AFC to the Kansas City Chiefs in 2020.
In a segment featuring Tomlinson, Michael Robinson and Willie McGinest for NFL.com, each analyst picked who they thought was the biggest threat to the reigning Super Bowl champs in the AFC.
While McGinest liked the Baltimore Ravens and Robinson picked the Indianapolis Colts, Tomlinson gave his reasons for why he thinks Tennessee is the answer.
“Let’s remember, guys, this team is coming off an AFC Championship Game against the Kansas City Chiefs where they felt like they had the game won,” Tomlinson said. “And then, also, they beat them during the season.”
After Robinson interrupted Tomlinson to remind him that Ryan Tannehill is the quarterback, showing an obvious lack of faith in the signal-caller, the Hall of Famer went on to give more detail about why he picked the Titans.
“You know why I like them? It’s all about the identity and make-up of this football team,” Tomlinson explained. “They returned pretty much everybody but Jack Conklin… but they drafted Isaiah Wilson, the tackle from Georgia. So, this team is virtually the same. And Willie, I love what your former teammate Mike Vrabel has done with this team. It really reminds me of your old teams; physical, disciplined. And at the end of the day, they’re going to play their brand of football. I think that matches up well with the Kansas City Chiefs.”
It’s pretty comical that Robinson would doubt Tannehill and the Titans, yet he picks the Colts, a team that sports Philip Rivers, who had a worse season by far than Tannehill and looked finished in 2019.
It’s amazing how quickly people forgot how good Tannehill was prior to the playoffs. He was the catalyst that turned the Titans’ season around and enabled the team to get to the playoffs in the first place.
The biggest issues the Titans had with the Chiefs in the conference championship game was their inability to get the run game going and the failure to generate pressure on Patrick Mahomes, which exposed the secondary’s lack of speed against KC’s insanely fast receiving corps.
The addition of a faster corner like Kristian Fulton should help, and Vic Beasley will be an improvement off the edge. Also, the Titans are still in the running for Jadeveon Clowney, who could really put this team in a better position to compete with the Chiefs in 2020.
As Tomlinson pointed out, the Titans have already proven they can beat KC even with those deficiencies and had the eventual Super Bowl champs on the ropes in the playoffs with an early 10-0 lead.
If we’re talking teams that have the best chance to knock-off the Chiefs in the AFC next season, right now the Titans have to be near the top of the list.
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