During his two-year stint as the Tennessee Titans’ offensive coordinator, fans often believed that Todd Downing was actively working against the team thanks to his questionable play-calling.
Part of the issue was Downing’s insistence on running the ball on first down, which would have been fine if the Titans found success.
But that was not the case thanks to teams stacking the box at the fourth-highest rate in the league against them, and Tennessee having a putrid offensive line.
The result was the Titans being forced into third downs often, and many times those third downs were less than manageable, especially for a Tennessee team that struggled to move the ball through the air.
Making that situation more frustrating was the fact that the Titans were actually the third-most efficient team when it came to throwing on first downs, as NFL analyst Warren Sharp pointed out.
there is no reason a team that sits where the Titans sit on this graphic should be running the ball at the #2 highest rate in the NFL
absolutely no reason pic.twitter.com/PS04OIi8hZ
— Warren Sharp (@SharpFootball) June 21, 2023
When taking everything into consideration, Sharp is hilariously convinced that Downing was a “double agent” working against the Titans, something Tennessee fans have certainly considered.
In case you’re not familiar with this spy term, a “double agent” is “a spy pretending to serve one government while actually serving another.”
I spend a lot of time objectively researching every team each offseason…
looking for the good & bad as open minded as possible…
but one thing I will never be talked off of is my belief that Todd Downing was a double agent trying to make life difficult for the Titans offense
— Warren Sharp (@SharpFootball) June 21, 2023
this was literally Tennessee every series the last two years pic.twitter.com/Rwl3VqXmHX
— Warren Sharp (@SharpFootball) June 21, 2023
Thankfully, the Titans came to their senses and fired Downing this offseason.
Since then, Downing has taken the passing-game coordinator job with the New York Jets, which is hilarious considering the Titans sported among the worst and least imaginative passing attacks in the NFL the past two years.
The good news for the Jets’ offense is, Downing is the pass-game coordinator of an offense led by a future Hall of Famer in Aaron Rodgers, so how badly could he really screw it up?
I’ll say this: if there’s anyone who can, it’s Downing.
While Downing certainly deserves the blame, one has to wonder how much influence head coach Mike Vrabel had on this approach. After all, the Titans have pretty much been this way throughout his tenure in Nashville, and we know Vrabel loves to run the damn ball.
If we see new offensive coordinator Tim Kelly running Derrick Henry into a wall on first down all year long once again without an adjustment, we’ll know that, at the very least, Vrabel has more to do with it than not.
