Armchair Quarterback: Tennessee makes its final cuts
The cuts ran deep this week as the Tennessee Titans made their final slices leading up to the regular season.
Most notable of the departures was long-time backup Neil O’Donnell, who was given his walking papers in favor of the younger Billy Volek. The cut was a long time coming, as some had questioned why O’Donnell was taking up valuable cap space with his fat second-string-quarterback contract.
Granted, he has contributed in the past during injuries to Steve McNair. There was even a time when many fans supported a move to make O’Donnell the starter. However, the undoing for O’Donnell was not his performance, seeing he’s always been a capable number-two in Nashville. Instead, the play of Volek during preseason was the final nail as coaches saw Volek had evolved to a point where he could be trusted as first backup as he enters his fourth year. Many, including myself, had made the observation that Volek had passed O’Donnell in the skill level, as far back as last season, meaning O’Donnell was expendable.
Another factor for the release was the good play of rookie third-string quarterback Jason Gesser out of Washington State. I think the coaching staff used the preseason to see how the quarterbacks performed before making the cut. Sure, given his loyalty to the team, I would have liked to have seen O’Donnell released prior to preseason so he could catch on with another team, but I understand the coaching staff’s apprehension as they had to be sure the other quarterbacks could carry the load. After all, McNair is a mobile quarterback, meaning he will be injured at times during the year so, for Volek, the question is not “if” he will see playing time, the only question is “when” it will happen.
While I agree with the O’Donnell cut, I’m still scratching my head on the cut of John Simon. I’ve seen this undrafted free agent play since his opening preseason game last year and he’s got moves like no one else on the team. Last year, I was on the sideline and saw him make a move on a punt return that almost broke the defender’s ankles. If nothing else, Simon can return kicks better than anyone else. And, he did nothing in preseason to hurt his stock.
Instead, what we’ve got left is a stable of Eddie George clones in MTSU rookie Dwone Hicks, who had a decent preseason after he missed the key block on a punt play against the Browns, and Colorado rookie Chris Brown, who didn’t play a down this preseason due to injury. Now don’t get me wrong, I like Hicks because he has potential. As for Brown, who knows. We really only saw this kid in a few games his last year in Colorado, the most notable being his insanely productive game against Texas.
As for change of pace, only Robert Holcombe offers a different look with the departure of Simon. Perhaps it would have done the Titans better had they kept six wide receivers instead of the seven they have now since there’s no use for seven. This would have left a spot open for Simon who could have been a special teams specialist and another change-of-pace back.
As it is now, Simon will catch on with another team before long. I just hope he doesn’t latch on with a divisional opponent, as Lawyer Malloy did with Buffalo days after he was cut for cap reasons by the Patriots.
Now they’ve got to face one of the better secondary players in the game, who knows their offense inside and out, twice every season. If nothing else, the Titans needed to keep Simon to prevent him from falling into enemy hands.
But, all in all, it wasn’t a horrid cut like the ones in years past where the team was hamstrung due to salary cap concerns. The Titan team which is left should make a strong run at a trip to Houston this year.