The Tennessee Titans lost to the Cleveland Browns on Sunday, and the conversation in Nashville is going to start and end with quarterback Cam Ward. I get it. It’s always going to be about Cam.

But after JT Ruhnke and I broke it down on our Titans postgame show, I wanted to go back through every drive where the Titans’ offense came up empty. You’re never going to score on every possession. So how much of each failed drive was on the quarterback?

Grading Cam Ward drive by drive against the Browns

The first two drives were close to flawless. Tennessee ran the football at will, and Ward completed two impressive passes, one on each drive. The first was a second-and-14 throw to rookie wide receiver Carnell Tate. The second was a third-and-3 conversion to Michael Carter. Both drives ended with running back Tony Pollard touchdowns shortly after.

The third drive was a three-and-out. Wan’Dale Robinson looked like he ran his route a little too deep, and Ward put the ball where nobody could get it. I can live with that. You’re up 14-0 early. There’s no reason to throw a pass anywhere near an interceptable spot.

Then came the goal-line stand, and that’s partially on Cam. Two of those plays belong to him: the failed quarterback sneak and the pass play where he couldn’t get it into the end zone. Honestly, everybody involved deserves a failing grade for the end of that drive.

On that drive before the goalline failure, however, Ward was legitimately good. He converted a 3rd and 7, and a 3rd and 9 with accurate, on-the-money throws to Elic Ayomanor. He added an earlier 17 yard pass, catch and run to Tate. After the first four possessions, Ward was 7-8, 58 yards, while being 3 of 4 on third down conversions. The one incompletion was to Robinson. 

That’s when the good feelings ended. The Titans should have been up 21-7, but blew the opportunity.

The interception immediately after Anthony Hill Jr.’s forced fumble? Awful. That one is on Ward. Tennessee had another opportunity to extend its lead, and he gave possession right back. Terrible. I hated the idea of the Titans thinking they could take a shot down the field instead of sticking to what had this offense moving to that point. 

The next punt came after Tate dropped a third-and-6 conversion that went right through his hands. 

On the first drive of the second half, Tate caught a first down and fumbled. A later punt came after a penalty wrecked the possession, and I thought Ward could have been better there, too. Then the field goal, then the touchdown drives to end the Titans’ offensive day. 

So I count two drives, the goal line ending and the interception, where Ward had bad moments with real chances to put points on the board, and they were the difference in the outcome. You can overcome the interception. The fourth-down stop is where the game was truly lost, and you still had a chance to overcome that. The problem is those two things happened back-to-back.

My instant reaction grade for Ward vs the Browns is a flat C. 

Four outcomes for every Titans pass play

What do you want him to do when he hits Tate in the hands, or when Tate catches it and fumbles? A Titans pass play only has a few possible endings right now:

– Cam’s accurate, the guy catches the ball. 

– Cam’s inaccurate and misses. 

– Cam’s accurate, the guy drops it. 

– Cam’s accurate, the guy catches it and then fumbles it.

All four happen. All four are frequent… even the good options.

The late fourth quarter throw down the seam to Daniel Bellinger as an inexcusable miss. Ward deserves credit for responding with two clutch throws after it, including a great ball to Tate that set up the game-tying score at the 1-yard line. But that miss can’t happen.

He also didn’t use his legs enough. Ward ran twice for five yards, and one was the sneak that went nowhere. The high throw to Gunnar Helm and the cross-body throw to Bellinger after a long scramble were both plays where he should have just taken off.

Browns’ goal-line stand exposed a Titans offensive problem

Pollard’s best game of his life got spoiled, and it all started with that Browns goal-line stand. Ward is BAD at the quarterback sneak, and you’re hurting your team when you can’t execute it. Pollard had to leap on the fourth-down stop because Peter Skoronski, a guard Tennessee recently extended, fell down and got blown up.

To me, this offense lacks alphas. Even Pollard, as awesome as he was, leaves that extra couple of inches out there. Maybe it adds up to half a yard over a whole game. Against Cleveland, that half a yard was the difference.

Then Tate fumbles again. We’ll give you one, rookie. Kyle Hamilton is a dude, and that happened in Baltimore. Don’t let it happen again. It happened again.

This team feels like it’s playing roulette over who makes the next crappy play. Somebody drops a pass. Somebody whiffs on a block. Cam throws one way off target. Somebody draws a holding penalty. Titans offensive coordinator Brian Daboll said last week nobody is consistent. Daboll included.

Ward was not good enough to beat the Browns, and he hasn’t been good enoough for 24 starts. Cam Ward conversations are like mopping a floor with dirty mop water. You move stuff around and think you cleaned something, then realize it’s still dirty.

But I’ll say this confidently: Cam Ward was not the reason the Titans lost Sunday. This is a bad football team that keeps making compounding mistakes over and over, and in my opinion, that’s why it loses games.