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Is there a franchise with more trendy rookie sleepers than the Tennessee Titans over the last few years? Seemingly every year the Titans happen to draft a player that generates buzz. Whether it’s Bishop Sankey or Justin Hunter, someone always ends up in Tennessee with fantasy hype, and this year is no different. You'll notice a recurring theme in this preview that keeps reverting to rookie players rather than veterans, an unusual situation in both real-life and fantasy football alike.
Offseason Acquisitions: QB Marcus Mariota, WR Hakeem Nicks, WR Harry Douglas, WR Dorial Green-Beckham, WR Tre McBride, RB David Cobb,
No Longer on the Roster: QB Jake Locker, WR Nate Washington, RB Shonn Greene
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Quarterbacks
It can be argued that the Titans held on much longer than they should have in regard to quarterback Jake Locker. Locker retired this offseason after several injuries and inconsistent play seemingly cut his career short. I’m sure a contributing factor to his decision was the presence of Zach Mettenberger and the lingering possibility that the Titans would select Marcus Mariota in the 2015 NFL draft. Not only is Mettenberger still on the team, but the Titans did in fact take Mariota with the number two overall pick in the draft.
Questionable social media posts aside, Mettenberger actually wasn’t all that bad on the field. Mettenberger ended up starting six games for the Titans and finished the year with 1,412 passing yards and eight touchdowns. Granted, his completion percentage of 59.8 and interception total of seven in just six games could have been better, but his numbers were decent for a rookie who wasn’t supposed to be the starter. However, Mettenberger’s 2014 season can pretty much be forgotten in favor of rookie Marcus Mariota.
Mariota is expected to be the starter come week one, as he should be. Is Mariota an improvement over Mettenberger? Almost certainly. Does he possess any sort of fantasy value outside of a dynasty or keeper league pick? Not really. Even with guys like Andrew Luck and Cam Newton putting up solid fantasy production in their first seasons, it’s hard to put faith in a rookie at any position for fantasy purposes, especially a quarterback. It certainly helps that head coach Ken Whisenhunt has had major success with talented quarterbacks in the past, but let’s give Mariota some time to develop before we start hurling him into our lineups. This isn’t exactly a high powered offense to begin with, so it’s not like he’ll have stellar weapons right away either.
I will say, however, that Mariota is a talented enough quarterback to possess some upside in leagues that start two quarterbacks. In a situation like that I’d much rather take my chances on Mariota than say Alex Smith, a guy who is as safe as it gets but has an extremely low ceiling. For now, Mariota in Tennessee is a lot more relevant in real-life than he is in fantasy.
Wide Receivers
If there’s one thing that’s for certain in regard to the Tennessee offense it's that they love to combine a random assortment of wide receivers. The Titans usually head into the season rostering a bunch of receivers that have a lot of potential and a ton of question marks. Here’s a quick rundown of some of the wide receivers currently on the roster: Kendall Wright, Justin Hunter, Hakeem Nicks, Harry Douglas, Dorial Green-Beckham. If you’re at all familiar with fantasy or the Titans in general, you’ve probably heard of at least four of those names.
Wright and Hunter have been sleepers in the past but never really panned out. Neither receiver hit the 1,000 yard mark last season, and the two combined for just nine touchdowns. Hakeem Nicks has struggled with both performance and health over the last three seasons, declining in production in each. Harry Douglas has shown flashes of playmaking ability when filling in for Julio Jones and Roddy White in Atlanta but has never been able to achieve more than non-traditional handcuff status as far as fantasy is concerned. That leaves us with rookie Dorial Green-Beckham.
Green-Beckham might have four other players to compete with for the number one spot, but it’s not like he’s facing top-notch competition here. The biggest threats to his playing time are Wright and Hunter, two guys who we’ve already seen fail to live up to the hype. This is a situation that could be best described as preferring to deal with the devil you don’t know than the one you do. If I own any Titans wide receiver this year, it’s Dorial Green-Beckham, and I don’t think it’s close. Besides, DGB has the benefit of having a rookie quarterback in which he can grow with and develop a rapport with right away. He’s a rookie that has been very overlooked but is absolutely worth a stash. He’d likely be your last bench player, so it’s not like there’s a whole lot of risk involved in owning him anyway. Worst case scenario, you can drop him in week four or so if he disappoints.
Running Backs
Remember how excited everyone was about that Bishop Sankey fellow last year? Those were some good times…if you didn’t draft him. Sankey was last year’s darling sleeper out of Tennessee, and it cannot be stressed enough how disappointing he was. There were some projections and rankings that had him as high as a second round pick in fantasy. He didn’t even come close to holding that value, yet it’s possible his situation has actually improved even after a disappointing rookie year.
A large part of Sankey’s lack of success can be attributed to the fact that he had to compete with Shonn Greene of all people for carries. Listen, I’ve got nothing against Shonn Greene, but I don’t think there’s a single fantasy analyst out there who would argue with me in saying how astounding it is that they have to mention Shonn Greene in 2015. It’s not like Greene had himself a stellar year, he just consistently ate into Sankey’s workload and actually outplayed Sankey at times. Greene possessed a 4.2 average yards-per-attempt compared to 3.7 for Sankey. Even during the latter part of the year when Sankey was often doubling Greene in attempts, Sankey just couldn’t do anything with them. Sankey didn’t crack 100 rushing yards once all season, which is to continue to hammer home the point that he’s just not a very good running back yet. With Greene gone, however, Sankey will get the first crack at the starting gig while having to fend off newly drafted David Cobb.
Cobb was selected in the fifth round, so he’s by no means a lock to even challenge for the role. However, the fact that Sankey has yet to impress certainly leaves the door open. The safest bet for how this shakes out is a true running-back-by-committee, with the guy who does the most with his touches getting the larger portion of the carries. If you’re asking me who I think that is, my money is on Cobb. There’s just no way I can have any faith in a player who couldn’t beat out an old Shonn Greene even if it was in his rookie year.
Cobb is absolutely worth a flyer at the end of your draft, but I wouldn’t bother with Sankey. Even if Cobb weren’t in Tennessee, there are simply better players around the area Sankey is being drafted. Give me Charles Sims, Ameer Abdullah, Duke Johnson, or Shane Vereen. Those are guys who have much clearer and likely paths to fantasy relevance. Cobb will likely be drafted higher than Dorial Green-Beckham given his position and situation, but the same logic applies; you can easily give him the axe should he fail to produce within the first few weeks.
Rookies and Tight Ends
Marcus Mariota, Dorial Green-Beckham, and David Cobb are the three rookies you should be concerned about as evidenced by their mentions in the previous sections.
Tight End Delanie Walker had himself a solid year last year, ending up with 890 yards and four touchdowns on 108 targets. The most telling number there is his target total. Those 108 targets were good enough for the fifth most amongst tight ends. Even with a head coach that's unreliable when it comes to utilizing the tight end position, I still like Walker's talent enough to consider him a fantasy option. With a presumed upgrade at quarterback, Walker should produce once again but rookie QBs have not bode well for Tight Ends in the past. I’m a little surprised to see him ranked as a borderline starter in a 12-team league, but there’s an argument to be made that he possesses considerably less upside than guys like Coby Fleener and Jordan Cameron. Either way, if I wait till the very end to grab a TE, I’d be satisfied with Walker.
Summary
Hopefully the Titans manage to produce some useful rookies this season as opposed to prior years. It’s always tough for a first-year player to put up relevant numbers right away, but this offense kind of doesn’t have a choice this time. Between Mariota, Green-Beckham, and Cobb, this is a young offense that needs to come together quickly if they want to be competitive.
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