Before they arrive in Atlanta to face the Falcons, the Titans plan to fix their offensive line woes.
Tennessee quarterback Marcus Mariota has been sacked an NFL-high 17 times. In the 20-7 loss to Jacksonville, he was sacked nine times and hit 13 times in an early-season collapse of the offensive line.
The Titans (1-2) are set to face the Falcons (1-2) at 1 p.m. Sunday at Mercedes-Benz Stadium. This will be the 15th meeting. The series is tied 7-7. The Falcons won the last meeting, 10-7 on Oct. 25, 2015, in Nashville.
The Titans opened the season with a 43-13 win over Cleveland on the road. The Titans lost to Indianapolis 19-17 at home and to Jacksonville 20-7 on the road.
Titans center Ben Jones, a former Georgia Bulldogs standout, guards Rodger Saffold and Jamil Douglas have struggled. Douglas was with the Falcons for parts of the 2017 season. The Titans have played their first three games without left tackle Taylor Lewan, who was given a four-game suspension before the season started.
Rookie guard Nate Davis, who’s 6-foot-4 and 316 pounds, played at Charlotte. He may get his first start against the Falcons.
Davis, who was heavily scouted by the Falcons during the pre-draft process, was selected in the third round of the draft (82nd overall). Davis’ play at the Senior Bowl against linemen from power conferences helped his draft status.
Davis’ offensive line coach at Charlotte last season was Chris Scelfo, the former Falcons tight end coach (2008-14) and former head coach at Tulane (1998-2006).
“I want to play Nate,” Titans coach Mike Vrabel said to the Nashville media Monday.
The only way to tell if Davis can play is to toss him into games. Vrabel noted that he can’t find out much about linemen with one padded practice a week.
“Those are difficult things,” Vrabel said. “We are going to have to get him ready to go as soon as we possibly can, and I’m hopeful that’s this week.”
Mariota has completed 56 of 92 passes for 706 yards, four touchdowns and no interceptions. He has a passer rating of 99.3.
“Practice well, just continue to stay focused and be crisp and execute,” Vrabel said of the plan to get Mariota back on track. “I think when you build trust and confidence on the practice field, when you can execute in practice that should lead to game reality. That’s what we always think.”
The Titans steamrolled the Browns behind a fine rushing day by Henry. He rushed 19 times for 84 yards and scored on a 75-yard pass play.
The Titans are hoping to secure the interior of the pocket for Mariota so that the Falcons can’t key on Derrick Henry.
“There are some things we need to fix, and that’s a collective effort throughout the offense and me and the coaching staff,” Vrabel said.
Like the Falcons, the Titans have been slowed by penalties. They had nine for 101 yards against Jacksonville. On the season, the Titans have had 26 penalties for 230 yards.
“The biggest things for us is that we stay on track and avoid the self-inflicted mistakes, the penalties, the negative plays, tackles for loss, sacks, and drops,” Vrabel said. “All of those things that we really do to ourselves on both sides of the ball.”
The Titans are searching for answers.
“I think if we need to simplify, we have to simplify,” Vrabel said. “We have to not get behind the chains and live in second-and-20 and first-and-15.”
The Titans are coming off a Thursday night game and will be well-rested. They also had a chance to watch the Falcons play the Colts on Sunday.
"Atlanta has very, very good skill players," Vrabel said. "They have a great quarterback. I mean Julio Jones is as good as you could be, but (Calvin) Ridley is as talented. (Mohamed) Sanu is versatile, tough. (Devonta) Freeman runs hard, runs violent and runs fast."
Matt Ryan completing 22 of 23 passes in the second half caught the Titans’ attention.
“You could see that when Matt got into a rhythm on Sunday, he completed a lot of passes and got his team back into the football game,” Vrabel said.
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