Tennessee Titans defensive lineman Jordan Elliott was suddenly released by the team Tuesday following an incident at the team facility Oct 15.

Tuesday night, sources told A to Z Sports that Elliott allowed practice field frustration to carry over after practice and stormed off to the player’s parking garage to retrieve his firearm. The situation was defused before there was any altercation with the firearm.

Right tackle JC Latham was the player Elliott was frustrated with, and defensive tackle John Franklin-Myers was the defuser, according to Aaron Wilson who added extra details to the original A to Z Sports report. (How hard was that, Aaron and Adam Schefter?)

Wednesday head coach Robert Saleh stepped up to the podium for his regular weekly press conference and was asked necessary questions about the incident at hand. Saleh was extremely open and transparent about the situation, showing empathy and recognizes a “call for help” for a “good man.”

Robert Saleh beautifully fielded questions about the Jordan Elliott firearm incident

Saleh was… incredible, if I’m being honest. I was not expecting an NFL head coach to open up like he did about a player pulling a gun toward another teammate. Here’s the full reporter and coach conversation from Wednesday.

Reporter: Jordan’s incident here raised the concern of a gun on the property, which is I know against league rules. Have you looked into and discussed with the team guns in the parking lot and on the property?

Saleh: Yeah, the league is aware. The locker room is aware. Unfortunate the way everything went on on Thursday, but everyone in the locker room is aware of what the policy is.

Reporter: Was the incident in any way for this team a rally point is not a great phrase, but did that in any way give you guys a way for everybody to kind of congeal a little bit?

Saleh: No, I don’t think so. I think that’d probably be more of a question for the locker room.

Reporter: JFM’s reaction and his presence of mind to kind of de-escalate things?

Saleh: Yeah, JFM is great. You know, the the D line room is really close, and you know, for for JFM to go out there and just kind of kind of help Jordan through with whatever he was dealing with at that moment, I thought was really admirable on JFM’s part.

Reporter: Does this worry you at all, Robert, about a greater problem in the locker room in chemistry or anything like that?

Saleh: No, not this, but no.

Reporter: You said (Elliott) had stuff going on last week. Did he have stuff going on that built into some sort of situation with with J.C. that that maybe in hindsight there could have been some you couldn’t see this coming necessarily, but that there could have been some signs that things were escalating for him.

Saleh: No, here’s what I’ll say, guys… I think the organization in the NFL did an outstanding job with regards to pausing, which I think everyone needs to do in the situation is pause, with regards to the news that Jordan had a had a gun, and the reason why I think NFL and the organization did an outstanding job is because this is a man who is a father, a great husband. He’s never committed a crime in his entire life, and he pulled a gun in the parking lot. And the first question that I think everyone forgets to ask is why would a great man, a great father, a man who shows up on time every day, works his ass off every day, contributes the way he’s supposed to contribute, is well liked in the locker room? Why did he go off the rails and grab a gun? And to me, those are small signs of a cry of help, if you, in terms of, obviously there’s something greater happening, and I thought the team in the NFL did an outstanding job with regards to pausing and asking those questions and checking every single box with regards to getting him the help that he needs.

Saleh continued: In the last year, the NFL has lost two outstanding young men to taking their own lives because they may have had help, they may have been crying for help, and everyone ignored it. And and I’m not saying that’s where he was. I’m not going to speak on that. But these kids go through a lot, a lot, and and and I like I said, I thought I I will stand on the table for Jordan’s character, unfortunately, rules are rules with regards to guns on on property, and and sometimes it’s far greater than the knee-jerk reaction of kicking somebody and kicking somebody when they’re down. My message to 31 other teams would be: if you need a hell of a run-stopping D tackle that can help you on a playoff run, give me a call. I’ll tell you everything you need to know about him.

Saleh: He’s a good man. made a made a terrible had a terrible lapse in judgment that I recognize as a call for help more than a than a criminal act, and it’s unfortunate the way it went down, and but but as as far as Jordan’s concerned and and the locker room and all that, I think, I think, I think the locker room in Jordan. I think people see it differently here than than the knee-jerk reaction of the world. Because you know of his character, like you mentioned, that went into the decision to handle it internally and not. Yeah, we wanted to make sure that he, we got him all the help he needs.

Saleh: The NFL and the and the organization did an outstanding job getting him with the clinicians that he needed to speak to help him in that moment. And again, like I don’t know if it helped anything at all, but I know that the NFL has been struggling with keeping its kids from. And I’m not saying he had mental health issues. I’m not saying all that because there’s many many forms of ways people deal with things, and like I said, it’s a young man who’s never had a problem in his past ever, and so when when something like that happens, I think it’s important for the entire world to step back and ask why, and attack it head on, for the sake of the kid, and thankfully, nothing happened, and I hope by the actions of the organization and the NFL over the course of the weekend, it prevented something from happening. And and like I said, the man deserves another chance. Unfortunately, rules are rules, and it can’t be here. But but he’s a good man. He’s not a problem, and he should be on an NFL roster.

Reporter: How did JC (Latham) react to it?

Saleh: JC is great. J.C. been great, and it’s a. I’m not going to get into the details of the full story, but but J.C. J.C. fine. But you you guys will get a chance to talk to him.