NASHVILLE (TENN.) WTVF — Mike Vrabel will remember his return to Tennessee fondly. His Patriots posted a resounding 31-13 win, spoiling the debut of Titans interim coach Mike McCoy, capped by a chorus of traveling fans chanting Vrabel’s name in the closing seconds of the game.
Vrabel made sure to avoid any substantive talk about his time with the Titans or his end in Tennessee this week, calling the storyline “interesting, but not very important.” But you have to think the emphatic win feels good for a man who won 56 games as Titans head coach and took the team to three playoff appearances but was fired two years ago amid a 6-18 slide.
The ending was not pretty on the field with a roster that lacked depth to overcome the retirements and injuries that knocked the Titans off the pedestal of no. 1 seed in the AFC in 2021. Still, for many around the league it was shocking to see Titans Controlling Owner Amy Adams Strunk part ways with a man who was a NFL Coach of the Year.
Sunday’s result will only further add to Vrabel’s reputation as one of the top coaches in the league while emphasizing the mess the Titans have become. McCoy put on the headset as interim coach, replacing Brian Callahan who was fired Monday with a 4-19 record in less than a season and a half as Vrabel’s replacement. It was the fourth straight year the Titans have fired either their general manager or their head coach.
Moves like that can provide a momentary jolt of energy as the Titans displayed in the first half. Cam Ward hit Gunnar Helm and Elic Ayomanor on back-to-back passes to start the game on the way to a first drive field goal. He threw a beautiful 38-yard ball to Chimere Dike for a touchdown on a well-designed playaction rollout on the next drive. It was the first career touchdown for Dike and the first time this season the Titans have scored a first quarter touchdown.
Ward and the Titans mounted another field goal drive to take a 13-10 second quarter lead, but then were shutout in the second half as the Patriots scored the game’s final 21 points. The no. 1 overall pick also extended his dubious streak of turning the ball over in every game of his career with two more giveaways.
The first came with the Titans clinging to life with a 24-13 deficit in the third quarter when Ward, similar to the end of the game last week in Las Vegas, just lost grip of the football as he went to begin his throwing wind up. K’Lavon Chaisson scooped it up at the four-yard line and walked in for a touchdown that all but put the game away. Ward, who finished the game 25-of-34 for 255 yards also threw the fifth interception of his season late in the fourth quarter on a ball thrown behind Chig Oknonkwo, which bounded off the tight end’s hands and was picked by Marcus Jones.
Meanwhile, Drake Maye showed the promise that had Vrabel and others coveting the Patriots job. New England’s young QB threw two first half touchdowns, including a backbreaking 39-yard strike to Kayshon Boutte who ran by L’Jarius Sneed in the final minute of the first half to give the Pats the lead for good. The two touchdowns matched the number of incompletions Maye had for the game as he finished 21-23 passing and with 284 total yards, including 62 yards on the ground as the Patriots ran up a season-high 175 yards rushing and held a nearly 15:00 edge in possession.
Maye started his career just 2-10, so there is time and hope for Ward to turn it around. But through seven games he’s turned the ball over 10 times, been sacked 30 times and won just once.
Maye also has the benefit of Vrabel who is now 5-2 and coaching a first place team in year one in New England where the Patriots won just four games each of the past two years. The Titans, on the other hand, have won just four games since he left. It should be noted that one of them came against Maye and the Patriots last year when Jerrod Mayo was head coach.
Asked about what it meant to get a win back in Tennessee and hear his name chanted towards the end of the game, Vrabel again downplayed the importance of the day.
“We’ve moved on,” Vrabel said. “Again, there’s a lot of guys over there and support staff that helped us do some decent things, but you kind of move on and this is a whole different challenge and I’m excited of where I’m at.”
Vrabel’s excited because he knows what is possible in New England. He won three Super Bowls there as a player and believes he will be successful there as a head coach in an organization that is aligned perfectly with him.
Over the last four years the alignment within the Titans organization has gotten all out of whack. And Sunday’s result made it clear that the Titans needed Vrabel way more than he needed them.
