It just feels like football today after the Titans press conference. St. Thomas Sports Park has bleachers up all over and is decorated and ready for fans to flock to practice tomorrow morning at 9:50 AM. To kick camp off, the team had a press conference today where Jon Robinson, Mike Vrabel, Ben Jones, Brian Orakpo, Kevin Byard, and Derrick Henry all addressed the media.
Jon Robinson, who was not originally scheduled to speak, jumped in before the action really got rolling in order to address the two big storylines surrounding the team. He said he did sit down and talk with Kevin Dodd yesterday before his release and he is also glad to have Taylor Lewan ready to go at training camp even though the Titans and Lewan’s camp haven’t ironed out all the details of his contract situation quite yet.
Following Robinson was head coach Mike Vrabel. When asked about whether or not the team is distraction free, Vrabel kind of brushed the question off saying “we’re going to have to deal with all types of distraction.” On what he noticed about position groups coming back, he noted that there has been a lot of improvement in the receiving corps over the past 5 weeks, and that the group as a whole has taken a big step. Later he touched on players coming back and being in shape. He pointed out the offensive line in particular saying Ben Jones and Quinton Spain look to be in good shape and Taylor Lewan is at the forefront of players coming back and looking ready to play after the break. Vrabel also pointed out that it’s easy to look good now, but we will see who is really focused and ready to play when the pads first come on. As of now, the first padded practice is scheduled to be Saturday. Vrabel closed off his time at the podium with an analogy, saying that the hunt for a Super Bowl is very similar to a horse race. The horses (teams) aren’t focused on what’s happening to the left or right, they’re focused on themselves, running as hard as they can to the finish line. That’s the attitude from this point on, put in work to put yourself in a good position towards the end of the race, and don’t worry about the competition.
Ben Jones really echoed Vrabel’s point of point that the offensive line looks to be well conditioned. Jones did not give himself any praise, but preferred to talk for the offensive line as a whole and said “we’re in shape, now we just have to go out there and execute.”
After Ben wrapped up, Brian Orakpo stepped up to the podium. Off the bat, he was asked about what it was like having a team that has the starting lineup pretty set for the most part. In response, he made a strong point that depth is more important than who is starting. He cited the Eagles last year and the Giants of old with Michael Strahan and Osi Umenyiora as teams that had a lot of success rotating the linebackers and defensive lineman often, and he wants the Titans to be able to do that as well. Orakpo said his ideal number of snaps would be around 25, saying there would be nothing better than being able to go “balls out” for a smaller number of snaps, and keep everyone fresh and ready to go. One reason being fresh and keeping a constant rotation in there is a good idea is because of the mentality this defense has going into the season. They don’t want to be conservative, with Orakpo describing the attitude as “attack, attack, attack.”
Kevin Byard was the third player to step to the podium. He started by saying there is a different vibe in the building this year and he can feel the excitement from his team and the entire city of Nashville. Byard also understands that he’s expected to really take on a leadership role and is ready to be more vocal in the secondary. Just like Orakpo, Kevin seemed excited about the defensive “attack” mindset. He had a different take on Orakpo’s ideal number of snaps being around 25 a game, saying that he wants to be on the field for every snap of every game, and that durability is better than any other ability you can have on the field.
Derrick Henry capped off the press conference by saying he’s focused this season on becoming a dominant back. When asked to elaborate on what dominant meant to him, he said he just wants to have a great game, every game.
Training camp starts tomorrow and we’ve caught the football bug. We’ll have training camp recaps posted right here every day so stick with us as we prepare for the Titans 2018 season. We will be posting live updates from practice on our twitter and instagram. Both @titansradio
