The inactives are out for tonight’s game at Everbank Field between the Jacksonville Jaguars and the Tennessee Titans, and here they are:
JACKSONVILLE JAGUARS: RB Joe Banyard, DT Michael Bennett, C Luke Bowanko, TE Nic Jacobs, CB Nick Marshall, RB Bernard Pierce, DE Chris Smith
TENNESSEE TITANS: DE Mike Martin, RB Bishop Sankey, G Quinton Spain, WR Andrew Turzilli, NT Al Woods, CB Blidi Wreh-Wilson, WR Kendall Wright
No surprises for me among the Titans inactives, at least once we learned Wright did not practice on Tuesday. Tre McBride makes his regular season debut. We’ll see how many snaps he and Rico Richardson play. Richardson has barely played since his elevation to the active roster as the Titans have stuck with the three more experienced receivers. With just two experienced receivers, we could see even more of an emphasis on the tight ends if they don’t feel McBride and/or Richardson is likely to be up to the task. I’m particularly interested to see who plays in the one-receiver sets, particularly 13 personnel. That was (almost?) exclusively Justin Hunter’s province this season. Dorial Green-Beckham would make sense, in terms of still threatening the defense, but he must know and be able to execute his assignment and the coaches must feel they can trust his blocking, at least a little bit.
For Jacksonville, they had their own key player put on injured reserve this week in former Titan Sen’Derrick Marks. T.J. Yeldon was questionable with a hamstring injury on the short week, but he is dressed and listed as one of the starters. We still might see some Toby Gerhart and/or Denard Robinson.
The matchup: Jacksonville is mostly upgraded to thoroughgoingly mediocre. They’re 21st in offensive DVOA (I write for Football Outsiders perma-disclaimer) and 17th in defensive DVOA. Special teams is still a weakness, with punter (third round pick on Bryan Anger still looks incredibly awesome, Gene Smith!) and kicker (Jason Myers) liabilities. Blake Bortles doesn’t suck and Allen Robinson and Allen Hurns (probable, foot) is a nice pair of young receivers, both of whom are capable of making plays. Like most young players, Bortles will make a bad decision or three, and that, plus some decent run defense, is probably the Titans’ best chance of stopping the offense.
On the other side of the ball, David Cobb might do a little bit for the running game, but they didn’t do much on the ground even against a Saints team that isn’t so good against the ground that my expectations are low. That means it will fall once again on Mariota’s shoulders and particularly his right arm. They don’t have Carolina’s defense, but the Jaguars are not New Orleans. Unless Bortles is melting down and the injury-plagued secondary takes advantage of his mistakes, the Titans will need to get an explosive play on offense (Green-Beckham?) or on special teams (Dexter McCluster might have an opportunity to get off a good punt return for a change) to get the win. The Jaguars are currently favored by 3, and something like a 21-17 Jacksonville win feels like a good median prediction from a very broad range of outcomes.
Add The Sports Daily to your Google News Feed!
