Titans Film Room Friday: What Tim Kelly Can Add to Titans’ Offense
NASHVILLE — The Tennessee Titans' promotion of Tim Kelly to offensive coordinator wasn’t received with unanimous praise. Some were incredible skeptical that Kelly is the upgrade the Titans needed at the helm of the offense, but if Kelly’s days as Houston’s offensive coordinator are any indication, the Titans’ offense should get a boost in productivity, in the passing game specifically.
Some of the elements of Kelly’s offense could quickly and easily be added to the Titans’ scheme. As Mike Vrabel said earlier this week, “the offense isn’t broken.” With that in mind, if the Titans continue their success in the running game while increasing their efficiency in the passing game, they could be right back to having one of the better offenses in the NFL.
How can they do that though? Tim Kelly had a few key philosophies in his offense that were not major parts of the Titans’ offensive plan the last few years. The three we will focus on today are marrying similar looks, countering your own route tendencies and using vertical routes as clearing mechanisms.
Marrying Similar Looks
Football is a game of deception for some. A lot of coaches will try to show their opponent one thing and then use that as a way to fool them later. This is the basis of play action, for example. Make a pass play look like a run play in an attempt to confuse your opponent. Kelly uses this basic concept in a more advanced way in the following plays.
Our first play has three elements to pay attention to. First, the Texans bring an outside receiver in motion across the formation. Second, the Texans utilize a play action fake. Third, post snap, the tight end comes across the formation and into the flat. In this play, Texans’ quarterback Deshaun Watson flips it out to the tight end for a quick and easy gain on first down. Another note here, this is on first down and the Titans desperately need to be better on early downs this season.
Now, our next play is what I mean by marrying similar looks. This play looks EXACTLY like the previous play. Outside receiver comes in motion, play action fake and a tight end leaking into the flat. However, this time the defense is influenced by the Texans' motion man and tight end. It pulls the defenders towards the sideline, opening up a hole over the middle for Watson to stick a throw to a receiver on a quick slant.
This quick-hitting pass over the middle was puzzlingly absent from the Titans’ offense the last two seasons despite it being the foundation of what they did in 2019 and 2020. This is beautiful manipulation of a defense. Again, this was on first down, so not only is the look the same, but the situation is the same. Only heightening the ability to deceive the defense.
Countering Route Tendencies
One of the biggest issues with the Titans’ offense over the last few seasons with Todd Downing was predictability. The Titans did not do enough to counter their own tendencies whether that be in play calling or in play design. Far too often the Titans ran the same routes and the same plays while the defense seemed to know what was coming. Infamously, in the 2021 playoff loss to Cincinnati, the Bengals’ defenders were laughing on the sideline after Tannehill’s second interception(bubble screen to Chester Rogers) because it was so obvious what was coming. This should no longer be the case with Tim Kelly.
Tim Kelly(and the Titans when they are at their best) like to run deep posts and crossers. The Titans often face 8-man boxes and single-high safety looks, so these routes can take advantage of those. After you do that enough though, defenses are smart enough to be waiting on it. So, what is key is countering those expected routes. Make the route concept look like the plays you normally run, but add a twist to catch the defense off-guard.
Kelly shows that here in a few ways. The first two examples we see of that utilize the same route: Blaze Out. A Blaze Out is when you sell the post or an inside-breaking route, but quickly turn it outside and head to the sideline. Former Titan Julio Jones is sometimes credited for popularizing this route. With so many in-breaking routes as part of the Titans’ core on offense, adding these counters is critical to keeping defenses on their toes. Doing this off of a play action fake and out of 21 or 12 personnel is something that would fit into the Titans’ offense seamlessly.
The third and final example of countering your route tendencies is something that could lead to big plays for the Titans, as it did for the Texans here in a game against the Titans. The Titans’ offense often goes with this formation. Singleback Twins. Two tight ends with two wide receivers. Both receivers being to one side. As mentioned above, the Titans love to run crossers and posts to attack the middle of the field, where Ryan Tannehill is most comfortable throwing.
This play design should get all Titans fans excited because of how perfectly it matches what the Titans want to do. Two tight ends in the game, play action fake on a stretch zone run, but the best part of this is how Kelly showed a double post combination. Immediately after selling the inside post, the inside-most receiver darts back outside and turns it into a corner route. Changing course and in turn, getting the defensive back in a bad position. This pass wasn’t completed, but the design led to a pass interference penalty that set up a Houston score from the one-yard line.
Vertical Routes to Clear
Again, the Titans like to attack the middle of the field. It is where Tannehill does his best work, but defenses know this by now. Throughout parts of 2021 and all of 2022, defenses started to creep forward towards the line of scrimmage. For two reasons. First, they were aware the Titans’ offensive line was not very good so Tannehill needed to get the ball out quickly and, for a lot of the year, the Titans simply did not have a dynamic enough receiver to threaten anyone vertically.
The first counter for that problem is obvious: get better receivers. The second is to use your receiving options strategically to open up more space. We see that with the route concept here. I want to point out an alignment strategy being used here. Kelly has a wide receiver come in motion and stop inside a tight end(closer to the ball). This already is setting up the play. If a receiver is inside of a tight end it becomes more likely the linebacker will have to fear the receiver while the slot corner will think they are going to have to deal with the tight end. Good start because often the tight end will be the inside-most eligible receiver.
The inside receiver(#12) takes a vertical release off the snap and threatens the linebacker immediately. This causes the linebacker to follow him vertically. It leaves a space for the tight end to slide into and makes an easy throw for the quarterback. This is a nice, easy gain on an early down that keeps the Texans offense ahead of the chains. Now, the Titans, as mentioned before, will need to add more dynamic threats in the receiver room to execute this consistently, but if this target is to a guy like Chig Okonkwo, the Titans will be in business. Kelly can scheme up these opportunities.
Tim Kelly’s offense in Houston wasn’t a juggernaut by any means, but there are simple things he showed on film consistently that would make a major impact on the Titans’ struggling offense. If Kelly can quickly incorporate these three philosophies, it would set the Titans up to be much better on offense and, hopefully, score more than 27 points in a game in 2023.
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