Why Mike Vrabel’s controversial Week 1 decision was the right one
NASHVILLE — Late in the fourth quarter of his team’s season opener, Tennessee Titans head coach Mike Vrabel faced a difficult decision. With 2:20 left on the clock and all three timeouts remaining, the Titans had the ball in the red zone (NO 11). 4th & 6, trailing 16-12. Instead of playing for the first […]
NASHVILLE — Late in the fourth quarter of his team’s season opener, Tennessee Titans head coach Mike Vrabel faced a difficult decision.
With 2:20 left on the clock and all three timeouts remaining, the Titans had the ball in the red zone (NO 11). 4th & 6, trailing 16-12. Instead of playing for the first down and an eventual touchdown, Vrabel made the controversial choice to take the points.
Kicker Nick Folk trotted onto the field and drilled a 29-yard field goal. But after a defensive breakdown from Kristian Fulton on the ensuing possession, New Orleans was able to run the clock out. Tennessee never got the ball back and lost, 16-15.
Vrabel's decision to kick has expectedly drawn criticism from fans and analysts. After all, according to ESPN's analytics, Tennessee's win probability dropped nine percentage points with the field goal attempts.
As always, hindsight is 20-20. It's easy to knock the move looking back and knowing that the Titans would not get another chance to possess the football. But in the moment, I think Vrabel actually made the right call. Here's why.
Anybody who watched that game saw just how pathetic and uninspired the Titans looked offensively. Ryan Tannehill was uncomfortable in the pocket from start to finish and the offensive line was inadequate in pass protection.
I have serious doubts that the Titans' would have been capable of either A.) Converting that 4th & 6 and finishing the drive with a touchdown, or B.) Driving the length of the field and getting in the end zone in very limited time with no timeouts if they failed to convert on 4th down.
On the flip side, Tennessee's defense was strong all afternoon. The Titans' front four got after Derek Carr, recording eight quarterback hits and 10 quarterback hurries during the game. Let's not forget that Tennessee also had the league's best run defense in 2022 and had allowed just 54 rushing yards up to that point in the game.
Vrabel assessed the situation and believed the Titans had a better chance of winning that football game by trusting their defense. I would have to agree with him there.
"I think at the time it wasn't a difficult decision," Vrabel told me on Monday. "I thought our chances – and still believe that – is to play defense with three timeouts and get the ball back with our offense with one timeout, get the ball somehow into the 35-yard line and make a kick."
"We had converted two third downs and fourth-and-6 with that amount of space for them to cover? I didn't think that was going to be our best way to win the football game. I believe our best way to win that game would have been to play defense and stop them, which we didn't do, which is unfortunate, and then somehow find a way to make a kick."
Vrabel was hoping the Titans could get a stop using two timeouts and the two-minute warning, preserving one timeout for a drive at the end of the game. Nick Folk had already hit from 50 yards out on the day.
The analytics really don't tell the full story here. As Vrabel pointed out on Monday, momentum is one of many variables not accounted for in statistics like win probability. The vibes and trends of games matter.
"Well, you can run the numbers, but also, I think we all watched the same game and points were hard to come by," Vrabel said to Titans media. "Both defenses were doing a nice job and competing and getting red zone stops. Just the flow of the game and the way that I felt like what our best chance for victory was to do that to make the kick, to cover the kickoff, use the two-minute warning and get a stop."
This is not the first controversial decision Mike Vrabel has made in his coaching career, and it certainly won't be the last. In the National Football League, you're going to ruffle a few feathers. It's part of the job.
But I think the Titans' head coach made a good call on Sunday putting the game in the hands of the team's best unit.
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