No one benefits more from the Julio Jones trade than Ryan Tannehill
Though A.J. Brown and Derrick Henry can't complain, either.
Ryan Tannehill has had one hell of a second act.
Tannehill’s seven-year run as a Dolphin was, in a word, uneven. Stretches of competence were sanded down by pulses of mediocrity. He recorded zero playoff wins in Miami and played only 24 games in his final three seasons. His run there ended when the Titans engineered a swap of Day 3 picks to land the faded franchise QB before the Dolphins could release him outright.
Then came a 2019 renaissance few saw coming. Marcus Mariota was ineffective in a 2-4 start, ceding his snaps in the process. Tannehill, buoyed by MVP-caliber runs from Derrick Henry and an offensive line that wasn’t held together by duct tape and bathroom caulk, led Tennessee to the AFC title game while leading the league in passer rating. In 2020 he ranked first among quarterbacks in comeback wins and posted a 33:7 touchdown-to-interception ratio for the AFC South champions.
Now he’ll get to throw passes to Julio Jones.
Tennessee paid a decidedly un-stately ransom for one of the greatest wideouts to ever take the field. Sunday’s deal was a stunning self-own from a franchise with one of the most poorly managed salary caps in the league. Moving on from Jones means they now have the spending room to sign their rookie draft picks. It also strengthens the Titans’ odds to fend off the Colts for a second straight division title.
Jones offers immediate relief to one of the league’s most shallow WR corps
This offseason had been rough in Tennessee. Two of the team's top three targets, Corey Davis and Jonnu Smith, signed $87 million worth of contracts to leave Nashville. Adam Humphries was released after two disappointing and injury-marred seasons. Combined, those three made up more than 41 percent of Tannehill’s targets in 2020 and 45 percent of his passing touchdowns.
The Titans’ front office chose to address their 29th-ranked defense with the cap savings from those departures rather than re-beef their receiving corps. The only notable wideout to join the roster in free agency (so far) was Rams WR3/4 Josh Reynolds. They took a pair of receivers in this year’s draft, but neither before the fourth round. Heading into June, the team’s depth chart looked like this:
A.J. Brown (good!)
Josh Reynolds (uh, sure)
Cameron Batson (uh oh)
Nick Westbrook-Ikhene (oh no)
Dez Fitzpatrick (ok, maybe this won’t be so…)
Chester Rogers (... dammit)
And a bunch of low-priority roster invitees not as good as Chester Rogers
Jones immediately becomes WR1 or, at worst, WR2 in that lineup. He’s coming off one of his least productive seasons as a pro at age 31, but that was because he missed seven games due to injury. In the nine games he *did* play, he recorded career highs in catch rate (75 percent) and yards per target (11.3). He’ll be fine.
He joins another veteran quarterback who offers a different approach than the one he left behind in Georgia. Ryan Tannehill and Matt Ryan averaged a similar average passing depth in 2020 — 8.5 yards for Ryan vs. 8.4 for Tannehill. However, Ryan was more than twice as likely to throw deep than his Titan counterpart. He threw 74 passes that traveled at least 20 yards past the line of scrimmage last season. Tannehill, for comparison, had 73 passes the last two seasons combined.
This would be concerning a decade ago, but Jones has transitioned from lights-out deep threat to more of a midrange game-breaker now that he’s in his 30s. His average target depth slid from 14.5 yards downfield in 2017 to 13.7 to 12.2 and then 11.5 last year. That’s right on par with the 11.3 yard target depth Corey Davis averaged in four years in Nashville.
Davis wasn’t necessarily a deep ball connoisseur, but he could certainly manage as a downfield target. His size and speed meant opponents had to respect his playmaking after he averaged 14.0 and then 15.1 yards per catch the last two years. This allowed Brown and Jonnu Smith to thrive in space created by the former No. 6 overall pick.
That should continue in 2021. Jones will be 32 years old this season, but he’s still a field-stretching threat on par with Davis:
Few players in the league are as adept at creating space downfield despite tight coverage. He’s proven he can thrive in play-action situations. The Titans were relatively average when it came to calling play action passes last season — they ranked 16th in the league — but that rate should increase with the dueling All-Pro threats at wideout and running back in the lineup. Factor in Tannehill’s useful scrambling and ability to throw on the run, and you’ve got one of the league’s most versatile QB-WR-WR-RB combinations.
The Jones trade also helps AJ Brown and Derrick Henry considerably
The knee jerk reaction for anyone who owns Brown in a keeper fantasy league might be regret, but there’s reason to believe his 2021 just got better. Jones’ presence and diverse route tree means opposing secondaries can no longer opt to double Brown every snap. Mike Vrabel had already noted he was going to move his young WR1 all over the lineup in 2021, a move that had roots in Brown’s versatility but also spoke volumes to the lack of depth around him. He can still do that! Except now he’s got an even more versatile piece to move across the lineup in order to create passing game leverage.
Let’s look at how that worked last season alongside another budding superstar wideout. Calvin Ridley saw his targets and catches both increase when Jones was out of the lineup due to injury — but the quality of those passes dropped considerably. His catch rate fell by 12 percent, and he averaged three fewer yards per reception than he did with Jones distracting opposing defenses. His yards per target number fell from 10.7 (which would have tied for seventh-best in the NFL last season with former Titan Corey Davis) to 7.1 (102nd best).
Yes, Brown isn’t going to get as many targets as he would have if the only other semi-threatening wideout on the roster was Josh Reynolds. His target quality should improve, which means last year’s stellar 10.1 yards per target number may just be the baseline for a breakthrough 2021. Brown averaged a healthy 6.2 yards after catch last year thanks to his stellar athleticism and the space created when opposing defenses gravitated toward the line of scrimmage to prep for Derrick Henry’s bruising runs. He’ll have even more space to operate with Jones stuck in the forefront of defensive coordinators’ minds all year.
Pairing Jones with Brown suggests teams would put two safeties deep to combat a pair of home run hitters at wideout. Except, you can’t do that because the Titans have a baby rhinoceros waiting in the backfield to absolutely ruin your day if you can’t muddle his lanes near the line of scrimmage.
Henry, as you’d expect if you’ve watched any Tennessee game the past three years, is one of the league’s top five runners when it comes to yards after contact (2.8), but his yards before contact number (2.5) was only 21st best despite a strong offensive line in front of him. Bringing Jones aboard will limit the static he would have faced up front with just a Brown-Reynolds WR punch. This will allow him to build up even more momentum before he gets touched and lead to an even bigger yards after contact number.
On any given snap, one of Tennessee’s three elite playmakers will have a matchup advantage. Even if they’re handled you still have to worry about Anthony Firkser, who had 39 catches last season while looking like a proper replacement for Smith at tight end, as well as any of the previously mentioned underwhelming goofballs, who could outperform expectations.
The former Falcon’s presence is a balm in Tennessee’s first season without offensive coordinator Arthur Smith — hired away as head coach with, coincidentally, the Falcons — calling plays from the booth. The Titans’ former tight ends coach, Todd Downing, has replaced Smith, and now he’s got the personnel to outshine his predecessor.
The only real concern is whether Jones will drop off now that he’s 32 and come off the first season in which he’s missed significant time since 2013. We saw A.J. Green deal with a leg injury and then transition to a new quarterback in Cincinnati the past three seasons, a combination that turned him from perennial Pro Bowler to below-average receiver last fall. Jones is big enough that even a lost step or two would only serve to turn him into a possession receiver thanks to his 6’3, 230lb frame. That wouldn’t be ideal for the Titans, but it’s something they could certainly use across from a rising playmaker like Brown.