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Titans prove no match for high-flying Eagles




Titans quarterback Ryan Tannehill was sacked six times Sunday in a 35-10 loss to the Philadelphia Eagles.CBS BROADCAST SCREENSHOT

Titans quarterback Ryan Tannehill was sacked six times Sunday in a 35-10 loss to the Philadelphia Eagles.CBS BROADCAST SCREENSHOT

The Tennessee Titans were exposed Sunday in Philadelphia.

The inability of the offensive line to open holes for Derrick Henry and to pass protect for Ryan Tannehill; the wide receivers lack of speed and separation necessary to create explosive plays and the secondary left vulnerable to former Titan A.J. Brown and his new teammates. All of it was in plain view in Sunday’s 35-10 shellacking courtesy of the Eagles.

Brown served up a stark reminder of what the Titans lost, countering Tennessee’s punchless attack with two long touchdowns among his eight receptions for 119 yards. It provided the Titans with a painful reminder of the explosiveness they traded away back in April.

“We struggled at everything today,” Coach Mike Vrabel said.

By comparison, all was disastrous for the Titans. Even their only touchdown was tainted when rookie Treylon Burks made a spectacular catch, holding on despite a helmet-to-helmet hit from Eagles safety Marcus Epps that knocked Burks out of the game with a concussion.

It also essentially knocked the Titans out of the game as well, as the Henry could not get going with just 30 yards on 11 carries behind a porous offensive line that also yielded six sacks and plenty more hits on Tannehill. Things were so inept that Tannehill wound up being the Titans leading rusher with 34 yards on three scrambles with none of his quarterback runs of the planned variety.

After Burks’ touchdown, Brown and the Eagles got going. Brown scored his first TD on a 40-yard pass where he was wide open after a collision with Kristian Fulton, who not only fell down on the play, but was called for illegal contact and a short time later ended up leaving the game with a groin injury.

It was that kind of day for the Titans, who yet again failed to give a good showing against an upper echelon team in the NFL. Tennessee has just won win this season over a team with a .500 record or better.

Leading 21-10 at halftime, the Eagles poured it on in the second half, and Brown was a ringleader in doing damage to his former team. The former Titans hauled in a 29-yard pass, out-fighting rookie Tre Avery in one-on-one matchup to grab his second TD and essentially put the finishing touches on the blowout win for Philadelphia.

“A.J had a great game. We can’t give up big plays on defense. We tried to make them earn it, but we clearly weren’t able to,” Vrabel said.

The Titans fell to 7-5 on the season, but maintain a comfortable lead in the AFC South where no other team is close to contention.

Still, that does not fix the problems that showed up again Sunday and manifested themselves even more as the Titans showed no ability to keep up with the high-powered Eagles attack.

In addition to Brown’s big game, Jalen Hurts was masterful at slicing up the Titans’ defense. Hurts was 29 of 39 passing for 380 yards through the air with three scores as the Eagles improved to a league-best 11-1. Philadelphia rolled up 453 yards of total offense, compared to just 209 total yards for Tennessee, which managed just 11 first downs and lost time of possession by more than five minutes.

In his post-game press conference, Vrabel stated that the Titans “are at a crossroads.”

“I think we’re at a crossroads. I told the team we’re at a crossroads of how we want to continue down this season,” Vrabel said. “We can’t point fingers. We have to assume that each and every one of us didn’t do a good enough job, because we didn’t. We have to come to work with greater energy and greater resolve to win a football game against a division opponent. It sucks losing. It sucks getting beat the way we did, but we’ve got to make a decision on how much are we willing to invest in and trust in what the coaches are doing and trust in what other players are doing. I think it’s a critical time for us.”

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