Tannehill Ties Career-High With Four TD Tosses
NASHVILLE – Ryan Tannehill called the foul.
With just over two minutes to play in the third quarter Sunday, the Tennessee Titans quarterback stood in the pocket as Jacksonville linebacker Josh Allen, who is 6-foot-5, 262 pounds, bared down on him. At the last possible moment, Tannehill lofted the ball to the end zone, where wide receiver Adam Humphries caught it.
“He’s probably going to get mad that I said this,” left guard Rodger Saffold said, “but he got up and he said, ‘And one.’ I mean, that’s what you want to hear out of your quarterback. You want to hear that competitive nature coming from him so we can constantly see him improve and succeed.”
In one notable way, Tannehill never has been better than he was in the Titans’ 33-30 victory over the Jaguars at Nissan Stadium.
The connection with Humphries – despite Allen’s best efforts – was Tannehill’s fourth touchdown pass of the day. That tied a career-high for the 32-year-old in his 100th career regular-season start.
He did it twice in 88 games over seven seasons with the Miami Dolphins, the last of which was Oct. 25, 2015. The last time a Titans quarterback had four in a game was Nov. 13, 2016 when Marcus Mariota, the man Tannehill replaced last season, threw four against Green Bay.
“He’s our leader and we look to him in every situation,” Humphries said. “He’s handled every situation, and he handles it the way an NFL quarterback should. He leads our offense every day in practice and meetings and sets the example for us. He’s tough. He stands in the pocket and takes some hits and delivers great throws to us. As receivers and tight ends, that is all we can ask for.”
Against the Jaguars, he spread out his scoring tosses among three different receivers, tight end Jonnu Smith (two), wide receiver Corey Davis and Humphries. The first came in the opening minute of the contest, when he and Smith hooked up for a 13-yard score. Humphries’ was the longest – and the last – of the four and made it 30-17.
“Really, just hats off to the guys around me,” Tannehill said. “They were making plays all day. I have a lot of confidence in those guys that if I put the ball in the air that they're going to make a play on it, and that's exactly what they did (Sunday).”
It has been happening often since he became the Titans’ starter last October. Tannehill has thrown multiple touchdown passes in 11 of 12 regular-season games, including the last nine.
Through the first two weeks of this season, he has six touchdown passes and no interceptions. Prior to Sunday’s game between Seattle and New England, he was tied for the league lead in scoring throws.
Tennessee (2-0) is one of two teams that has not yet scored a rushing touchdown this season. That is OK because Tannehill is averaging one touchdown for every 11.2 passes.
“Part of playing quarterback is being able to stand in there in a tight pocket,” he said. “Obviously sometimes you want to throw the ball away. Sometimes you want to run. Sometimes you can see your receiver is about to be breaking open and you have to stand in there, stare down the barrel, and make the throw. I was able to do that (Sunday) and (Humphries) made a huge play in the end zone for us.”
Let the record show that he did not get his ‘and one.’ Kicker Stephen Gostkowski missed the extra point try that followe
