ESPN analyst plants flag on one side of the fence against the Titans’ free agency signings

National media reaction to the Titans’ free agency spending spree is a mixed bag, and a lot of the criticism is only half-hitting the mark.

Easton Freeze — Tennessee Titans Beat Writer
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Tennessee Titans Offensive Coordinator Brian Daboll addresses the media during his first press conference at Ascension Saint Thomas Sports Park in Nashville, Tenn., Wednesday, Feb. 18, 2026.

The Tennessee Titans wasted no time spending big in free agency this week. They entered Day 1 with nearly $100 million in cap space, and they used it on some big names with big fat contracts. You can see the running list of signings right here.

Free agency is a fickle thing. It’s a time of hope springing eternal for fans of teams who acquire new players. Every team who adds good players gets better on paper, which is exciting in a vacuum! The problem is the cognitive dissonance of knowing that “winning” free agency is almost always a recipe for disappointment in the fall. This is the lens through which we judge the free agencies of other teams, but often struggle to see our own team’s in the same way. “It hasn’t worked for other people, but it will for us!”

Not all free agency spending is the same, though. And the national reaction to the Titans’ league-leading first day of contracts is in some ways missing the mark.

Two different national perspectives on Titans’ free agency spending

ESPN’s Bill Barnwell did a winners and losers column following the first day of action and, spoiler, he listed the Titans as a loser. Double spoiler: Titans fans took up arms to defend their team’s honor against him on social media. Before we get to the criticism, I want to point out the gentleness with which he deemed the Titans losers. Here are the positive things he had to say:

“I don’t mind their moves on the defense. I’ll start with the positive… Franklin-Myers will go from making $7.5 million per year with the Broncos to $21 million per year with the Titans, the sort of massive salary bump we don’t typically see for players on their fourth NFL contract. Given the lack of alternatives, I can understand why the Titans prioritized Franklin-Myers… Tennessee also needed help at cornerback, where moves for Sneed and a bevy of draft picks haven’t worked out. They signed two solid, young players in Cor’Dale Flott and Alontae Taylor , both of whom have the ability to play above-average football as they enter the peak of their careers.”

Frankly, dear readers, I may be the wrong man to give you the full satisfaction you seek here. Because if I was forced to bucket Day 1 winners and losers for a national free agency article… I’m not saying I’d put the Titans down as certified losers, but I can at least understand someone coming to that conclusion. Who are the other obvious losers from the day? The bad teams who spend oodles of money on 110% market contracts for starters are, historically, the losers of these days!

I will push back on Barnwell’s analysis though. Because if you’re going to call your shot on the Titans being losers, I think you have to do so for the right reason. Here is what he had to say that was critical of their signing spree:

“Adding one or two players the coaching staff already knew made sense. Adding five seems a little much. In addition to Flott and Franklin – Myers, the Titans made more curious moves on offense by riding the Giants for tight end Daniel Bellinger (three years, $24 million) and wide receiver Wan’Dale Robinson (four years, $78 million). Offensive coordinator Brian Daboll added another player from his past in Bills backup Mitchell Trubisky , who comes in on a two-year pact behind Ward.”

His bottom line was that “these offensive additions don’t move the needle in the right way… Will the Titans be better in 2026? Yes. But they came into Monday needing playmakers for Ward , edge-rushing help and significant investment in the secondary. Between Flott and Taylor, they solved the latter issue, but I’m not sure they meaningfully addressed either of the first two problems.”

I don’t see that as a very valid criticism. The criticism that is logically sound, which I have made myself on some of these signings, is that spending big at the top of the market on free agent starters, especially on premium positions such as wide receiver for example, is very often a mistake. Trying to import tentpole players of your roster with giant contracts in free agency, handed out to players whose previous teams were content to see walk out the door, is a very dangerous game. And so criticizing how and where the money is spent is fair. Criticizing that the money was spent is, well, misinformed. Teams that draft poorly (like the Titans in the 2020’s) have no choice but to spend on starters in March. It’s the sin tax you pay in this league. A blanket criticism of spending is shallow and a good way to sound uninformed.

Barnwell doesn’t really make that his main gripe here, to be clear. But that’s been a sentiment you’ve seen passed around this week by others. Barnwell’s issue with the Titans’ haul is that they only addressed two of their three biggest needs as he saw them. I understand wishing Cam Ward’s support system was upgraded, and if the player acquisition cycle was over for this team, I would agree they are losers on that front. Adding Robinson and Bellinger is far from enough for this offensive roster.

But the cycle is not, in fact, over! And you cannot in the same breath be critical of the process behind spending big on certain positions in free agency but also be mad they are waiting until the draft to address other critical positions! That is called good process. I grant that the Titans’ plan at center is dubious at the moment. But in terms of weapons for Ward and additional EDGE bodies, those are things any team would be better off turning to the draft for. It’s not hard to connect the dots on what the Titans are setting themselves up to do here.

The other thing Barnwell pokes fun at here is the fact that it seems OC Brian Daboll was operating as the shadow GM, with head coach Robert Saleh in tow. And Titans fans, you’d be best served to be good sports about this teasing line about “hiring all the players who got us fired in New York”. It is, on the surface, a funny thing to do. Don’t get all twisted up over it.

But when the idea that signing too many players you’re familiar with becomes a serious knock, I do think it’s fair to point out the reality of the modern NFL. Familiar players brought back into the fold is only a bad idea of they are bad and/or overpaid. The payment is one thing, free agency is rife with overspending. The price is the price. But these aquisitions are not exactly playing the Jets and Giants’ “worst hits”.

I do think people are right to point out the amount of “buddy” connections this team has made recently because the reality is that fans are giving them a pass on it today while things are happy. But if things go south, it doesn’t take a genius to know what will suddenly become a local talking point early on. Fans love to accuse their team of making foolish buddy hires, that’s just a fact. I actually understand why teams do these things anyways, because in our increasingly microwaved society, the leash on coaches and executives is as short as ever. That is certainly the case for the Titans lately.

Albert Breer wrote about this at SI, and I think he hit the nail on the head in terms of the logical argument the Titans are making with these moves:

“The Titans followed a blueprint that worked for the Commanders in 2024 and the Patriots last year, leaning into a new coaching staff’s existing connections to selectively and very aggressively pick off free agents early in the negotiating period. The logic is sound. By doing it, the guys you’re acquiring are known commodities and can become instant torchbearers for your program… Of course, a huge part of the Washington and New England stories was that those signings all coincided with young quarterbacks breaking through. And that’ll need to be the equation for the Titans with Cam Ward, if they’re to take the sort of step those other two teams did.”

So if you’re one of these guys who sees how short their runway may be, I completely understand bringing in people you know, trust, and can count on having your back if things are more thin than thick at first. It’s just floor-setting in the name of self-preservation at the root of it. And when you combine that with the fact that each of these player signings make sense for what this team needs, I think the cap allocation can be bickered over. But waving this away as a string of silly buddy hires is lazy. And failing to recognize the rest of the player acquisition cycle that’s being set up here is an incomplete picture.

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