Got to be happy as hell for Tommie Campbell, who went from cleaning airport toilets to a 7th round pick to screaming down the sidelines for the opening touchdown. I can't express how happy I was with that play call. They really picked the perfect spot to try and kick-start this offense, which has struggled to score early all season. Interesting tidbit: Titans special teams assistant Chet Parlavecchio coached Raheem Morris in high school.
I was shocked that the officials didn't stop for a measurement before the Bucs tried that 4th down try. I don't think they had the first down, but it was certainly close enough to stop and make sure. Instead, they didn't, and the resulting confusion helped us seal the win.
Something to worry about: Matt Hasselbeck earned every bit of the praise he got for his play over the first half of the year, but over the past month he's been in a pretty brutal slump. The Bengals game was the last time Hass broke 80 in passer rating, and in those three games he's thrown 2 touchdowns and 4 interceptions. Now, I fear that Hasselbeck's elbow injury is worse than they're letting on, which will make getting back on track tough. Our sudden pass blocking woes aren't helping one bit either. We need more from Chris Johnson and the receivers either way, but Hasselbeck has to be working to get himself as healthy and as comfortable in the pocket as possible.
Good to see Nate Washington going after Preston Parker after the body slam that resulted in Tommie Campbell's shoulder injury.
The Titans scored the go-ahead TD on a play called 218 D Curl, which has been a bread-and butter play all year.
David Climer sums up the win with Dave Ball's performance: after seriously contemplating retirement while recovering from his latest concussion, Ball returned to the field to have one of the best games of his career. So to did the Titans knock off the cobwebs to salvage that game and keep some hope for an exciting close to the season alive.
I don't know how he did it, but Eugene Amano managed to look more natural catching that deflected toss than Lavelle Hawkins has in 4 years.
I usually stay away from the Yahoo! Contributor stuff, but this one pretty well sums up the mountain we still have to climb to top the Texans. Even with Leinart and Schaub out, we're running out of games to make-up. Outside of winning our games, what we really need is for the god-awful Colts to summon up the strength to beat the Texans in a few weeks. That's he only way we have a shot at getting to the point where we'd win the primary divisional tiebreaker.
Rumors are starting to surface that Titans DC Jerry Gray might be the main target for the University of Memphis' newly vacated head coaching spot. I'd be shocked if it happened, but you just never know how a career assistant will react to an offer to become a head coach.
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