When multiple teams finish the regular season with the same record atop the NFL Draft order, tiebreakers determine who actually gets the 1st overall pick. But in each subsequent round, those teams rotate the order in which they pick for fairness. That's why this year, the Titans have the first pick of the 1st Round, but the third pick of the 2nd Round. Because they finished with the same number of wins as the Browns and Giants, they have to go to the back of the biggest loser line to begin Day 2.

The system is understandable from a fairness standpoint, but for the Titans, it's a bit of a bummer. Having a pick at the top of Day 2 gives teams serious leverage. The 20 or so hours between the end of night 1 and the beginning of night 2 is a flurry of activity, as teams work to maneuver in the 2nd and 3rd Rounds to get their favorite "faller" who wasn't selected in the 1st Round. The Titans certainly have some of that leverage at pick 35, but having pick 33 means you're the team who is most in charge.

But what if the Titans could still be the team actually calling the shots after all?

Brewing Quarterback Chaos

The narrative tide on this QB class has been flowing in the direction of the 2nd Round for a couple of weeks now. We've gone from a pair of top-10 picks in Cam Ward and Shedeur Sanders with the possibility of a 3rd or 4th QB slipping into Day 1 as well, to only Cam Ward at 1.1 being the surefire 1st rounder. Everybody else, Shedeur Sanders included, has an unclear floor in terms of where they may fall to.

NFL Insider for The Ringer Todd McShay shared on his podcast "The McShay Show" Monday morning that his preconceived floor for Sanders has fallen out over the weekend. He heard from another person with high-level information on the topic that "Yea, Pittsburgh likes him and Mike Tomlin does like Shedeur… uh, don't know if it's enough to take him at 21."

The QB-needy teams who will be most firmly in the fight for QB2 and beyond are the Browns, Giants, Saints, and Steelers. The Browns will be taking Travis Hunter at number 2, all indications are that the Giants at least aren't likely to take Shedeur at 3, and local and national reporting on the Saints is that they aren't interested in Shedeur at 9 (or even in the 2nd Round). If Sanders isn't in even the Steelers plans at 21, then all bets truly are off for where he falls to.

ESPN NFL Insider Adam Schefter wrote Monday morning about the brewing QB chaos at the end of the 1st and beginning of the 2nd, saying there's a very real world in which the story of this part of the draft is entirely about which QB goes where:

"There is a scenario in which Friday night could be more interesting and active for quarterbacks than Thursday night. If fewer quarterbacks are drafted in Round 1, Rounds 2 and 3 set up to be explosive. Currently, the Browns are scheduled to hold pick No. 33, Friday night's opening selection. The Giants are next at No. 34, and the Saints are scheduled to pick No. 40 but already are making calls about trading up. In the eyes of some around the league, It's possible there could be more signal-callers selected in the first eight picks on Friday than there are in the 32 picks on Thursday."

Tennessee Regains Control

This is all great news for the Titans. If Cam Ward truly is the only 1st Round QB this year, that means there will be at least 4 QB-hungry teams eyeing down Shedeur Sanders, Jaxson Dart, Jalen Milroe, and Tyler Shough at the top of Day 2. And with the Browns and Giants picking ahead of them at 33 and 34 overall, they stand to potentially be the first non-QB pick of the day.

This would give them a couple of options. First and foremost, it could mean they get first pick of the best non-QB to fall out of the 1st Round. Perhaps that's a top wide receiver or edge rusher, two positions they desperately need. They could happily take that player and feel like they got the steal of the 2nd Round, or they could leverage the opportunity and trade back with a team willing to send them another top-100 pick which they've been so desperate to acquire this spring. This would be especially ideal if the top non-QB who falls is at a position they aren't as needy at, such as CB or OT.

The third option that would be available to them is simply leveraging the pick for the highest QB bidder. If every QB not named Cam Ward falls into Day 2, that means that at a minimum they'll have QB4 available on the board at pick 35. If the beginning of the round looks like a run on passers with the Browns and Giants taking their swings, that could turn up the heat on the other teams interested in taking a QB to come get while the gettin's still good! There's no trade tax like a quarterback trade tax, and the Titan may could squeeze their second pick for all it's worth in that kind of trade.

They'll have to play their cards right, but having the rest of the QB class fall into Day 2 for a good-ole-fashioned Mexican Standoff to begin the Friday proceedings would be great news no matter what for Tennessee.

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