Ryan Tannehill says next to nothing about Week 1 woes
NASHVILLE — Tennessee Titans quarterback Ryan Tannehill had the worst quarterback rating (28.8) of his career in Sunday's 16-15 loss to the New Orleans Saints. Tannehill threw for 198 yards, no touchdowns, and three interceptions. But when faced with questions from Titans media on Wednesday about his shortcomings, the veteran quarterback wouldn't go into details […]
NASHVILLE — Tennessee Titans quarterback Ryan Tannehill had the worst quarterback rating (28.8) of his career in Sunday's 16-15 loss to the New Orleans Saints.
Tannehill threw for 198 yards, no touchdowns, and three interceptions. But when faced with questions from Titans media on Wednesday about his shortcomings, the veteran quarterback wouldn't go into details about how he can improve.
While Tannehill acknowledged that Week 1 was not his best game, we have yet to identify "the why" behind the poor performance.
"It definitely wasn’t my best day, obviously. I think there’s no qualms about that. A lot of areas where I can get better. I’m excited to be better in those areas this week," said Tannehill in Wednesday's press conference.
Tannehill referred to the "areas he can be better" five different times throughout the press conference, but would not elaborate on what those areas were.
"I’m not going to get in and break down the whole game right here. But there are definitely areas where I can be better for sure. Every area where it looked like I can be better, that’s probably it," said the 35-year-old quarterback. Eventually, Tannehill moved on from questions about New Orleans all together.
"I just want to move on to San Diego. I’m not going to answer any more questions about what happened Sunday. What happened Sunday happened. I’m not happy about it. No one in this building is happy about it. At the end of the day it’s over. We can learn from it. We can move on," said Tannehill.
To some extent, Tannehill has a point. Week 1 is in the past and continuing to dwell on his failures from Sunday isn't productive. But simply moving on and ignoring the questions doesn't do much to give the fanbase confidence that the problems have been identified and addressed either.
Fair or not, quarterbacks are going to get the most praise when things go well and the most heat when things go poorly. Standing in and taking that heat is part of the job.
I don't want this to come across as me saying Ryan Tannehill is not accountable. He was awful in New Orleans, he needs to be better, and he has admitted that in the days since. Tannehill told the media on Wednesday that it will "definitely be easy to be a lot better" than he was on Sunday, adding that he watched the game film five times afterwards.
The only concerning thing for me is that we are still yet to a find the why behind Tannehill's performance.
Was Tannehill's internal clock moving too fast? Has his arm strength deteriorated? Was he not on the same page as his receivers? Or can it be chalked up to something as simple as rust? Nobody is asking for detailed schematics or secrets, but something as small as identifying poor decisions or underthrown passes goes a long way.
Head coach Mike Vrabel told the media on Monday that he didn't know why Tannehill was so off. "I wish that I knew. I wish that I could tell you," Vrabel said. But when Tannehill gets asked directly where he can improve, he avoids the questions entirely.
Perhaps Tannehill will return to form against the Los Angeles Chargers at Nissan Stadium on Sunday and this conversation will be rendered irrelevant. But for now, I'm more concerned about Tennessee's starting quarterback than I have ever been. His answers didn't do much to change that for me.
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