Tag: 2021 NFL Power Rankings

The Touchdown Wire NFL podcast: Dueling power rankings!

Touchdown Wire’s Doug Farrar and Mark Schofield get ready for the 2021 NFL season with their dueling power rankings!

Now that we have real football again (even if it’s Mason Rudolph and Ben DiNucci football, we’ll take it), it’s time for Touchdown Wire’s Doug Farrar and Mark Schofield to fire up the podcast again, and get into the season. Doug and Mark will preview every week of the season with advanced metrics and matchup notes based on extensive tape study, but since we’re starting from square one with the Hall of Fame game, we thought it would be fun to discuss dueling power rankings — to get a sense of where every team is, and how we might see things differently.

Mark’s power rankings:

Touchdown Wire’s pre-training camp power rankings

Doug’s power rankings:

Touchdown Wire’s preseason power rankings

We also get into Mark’s victory in the Sports Info Solutions Data Challenge (woo-hoo!), and you can watch the presentation by Mark’s team here.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=efSjcSl4_lA&t=5380s

Listen to the podcast on BlogTalk Radio:

Watch it on YouTube:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cylhq3YaWxI

Touchdown Wire’s preseason power rankings

Chiefs, Buccaneers, Bills, Ravens. The top four teams in Touchdown Wire’s power rankings heading into the 2021 preseason.

The 2021 NFL season is upon us, and a lot has changed since the 2020 NFL season, which was nearly the Season That Never Was. Vaccinations have made things a lot easier for those coaches and players smart enough to partake. Fans should be back at full capacity in the stands at every stadium. And hopefully, no team will have to forfeit a game because its backward thinking on vaccinations renders its roster unable to take the field.

(Spoiler: We’re talking about YOU, Vikings).

There are differences on the field, as well. Free agency and the draft have added the usual number of new stories, and we tried to cover as many of those as possible in our pre-season power rankings. But as you’ll see from the teams up top, very little has changed, as well. The best are still the best, and as the Buccaneers are the first Super Bowl champion to return all 22 of its starters since the 1979 Steelers (who repeated as Super Bowl champs), we could be in for “same as it ever was.”

Then again, there are those teams in prime position to knock the crown off Tom Brady’s head, and as we go through our preseason preview of all 32 teams, that’s where it always gets interesting.

Here are Touchdown Wire’s preseason power rankings for 2021.

Titans land outside top 10 and behind Colts in PFF’s power rankings

The Titans will face seven of the teams ranked ahead of them in PFF’s power rankings.

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The Tennessee Titans should be considered the favorite to win the AFC South in 2021, but apparently Pro Football Focus doesn’t see it that way, at least based on their most recent NFL power rankings.

PFF placed the Titans at No. 12 on their list, which was also one spot behind their division rival and the biggest threat to Tennessee’s AFC South crown, the Indianapolis Colts.

Here’s a look at the 10 teams ranked ahead of Tennessee and Indianapolis:

  1. Kansas City Chiefs
  2. Tampa Bay Buccaneers
  3. Buffalo Bills
  4. Baltimore Ravens
  5. Green Bay Packers
  6. Los Angeles Rams
  7. New Orleans Saints
  8. Cleveland Browns
  9. San Francisco 49ers
  10. Seattle Seahawks

While the Titans certainly have plenty of promise on defense in 2021 after a putrid 2020, there are a lot of question marks as well, which has made some experts hesitant to crown them favorites in the division.

Tennessee’s offense figures to be elite once again, though, especially after the addition of wideout Julio Jones to an offense that also includes Ryan Tannehill, Derrick Henry and A.J. Brown.

The Colts have plenty of talent on their roster, also, but they do have question marks on both sides of the ball, and particularly under center with Carson Wentz, who struggled mightily during his final two years in Philadelphia.

If you ask us, we’ll take the Titans’ elite offense and promise on defense over the Colts’ seemingly superior defense but very questionable offense.

When the 2021 campaign is all said and done, we fully expect the Titans to at least grab their second-straight division title, something the franchise hasn’t done since originally joining the NFL in 1970.

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Titans move up one spot in USA TODAY’s power rankings

This is the second NFL power rankings that have the Tennessee Titans in the top 10.

The Tennessee Titans have made the top 10 of yet another power rankings after their moves in free agency thus far.

USA TODAY’s Nate Davis ranks the Titans at No. 8 in his latest power rankings, up one spot from where he previously had them.

8. Titans (9): They sacrificed some offense (WR Corey Davis, TE Jonnu Smith) to bring in needed defensive reinforcements – and OLB Bud Dupree, DL Denico Autry and CB Janoris Jenkins should plug gaping holes.

Clearly Davis is a fan of the moves the Titans have made, as has been the case with most analysts who have graded what Tennessee has done.

Here’s a look at the rest of the teams who made Davis’ top 10:

  1. Tampa Bay Buccaneers
  2. Kansas City Chiefs
  3. Green Bay Packers
  4. Los Angeles Rams
  5. Buffalo Bills
  6. Baltimore Ravens
  7. Cleveland Browns
  8. Tennessee Titans
  9. San Francisco 49ers
  10. Seattle Seahawks

Of the three power rankings we’ve covered of late, this is the second that has the Titans in the top 10. ESPN listed Tennessee at No. 8, while NFL.com had the Titans just outside the top 10 at No. 11.

The Titans still have some moves to make in order to plug holes, whether that be through free agency, the 2021 NFL draft, or both, so we could see another move up in the weeks and months ahead.

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Titans crack top 10 in ESPN’s early 2021 NFL Power Rankings

The bar has been set relatively high for the Titans heading into 2021.

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The Tennessee Titans put together something special in the 2019 season, going from complete underdogs to a team that came up just short of a Super Bowl appearance in the AFC Championship Game.

This past season, the Titans didn’t make it quite as far, falling 20-13 in the Wild Card Round to the same Baltimore Ravens team they defeated in the playoffs the previous year, and in the regular season in 2020.

But if there’s one thing that stands out above all else, it’s that the Titans’ offense is considerably better than it has been throughout recent history, and it has performed at a high level on a consistent basis.

There are several players to thank for that, though rock-solid quarterback Ryan Tannehill, powerhouse running back Derrick Henry and budding superstar receiver A.J. Brown immediately come to mind.

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The expectations are pretty high (and rightfully so) for the Titans heading into 2021, as ESPN has the team sitting at No. 10 overall in its early power rankings for the upcoming season.

Here’s what the network’s Turron Davenport had to say about the offseason and this year.

Mike Vrabel promoted tight ends coach Todd Downing to replace offensive coordinator Arthur Smith, who is now the Falcons coach. Vrabel chose Downing to avoid a total change in terminology and scheme. The Titans are also giving Shane Bowen a chance to “run it back” as the defensive playcaller, this time with the defensive coordinator title attached to his name. Tennessee finished with an 11-5 record last season and won the AFC South division title but suffered a disappointing first-round playoff loss. We’ll see how the coordinator decisions impact the Titans taking the next step.

It will be interesting to see how things shake out for the Titans when they hit the field again in September, especially with the absence of Smith, who quickly became an appreciated name in Nashville.

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