Titans claim former Cardinals CB Tramaine Brock off waivers

With Malcolm Butler out for the year with a broken wrist, LeShaun Sims nursing an ankle injury that kept him out of last week’s game against the Colts, and Adoree’ Jackson picking up a new injury that knocked him out of the game in Indianapolis, the Titans were in big need of some help at the cornerback position. They made a move to try and find some help today by claiming recently released Cardinals corner Tramaine Brock off waivers.

Brock’s release by the Cardinals came as a bit of a surprise. He started 7 games for Arizona this season and had graded out as their best corner according to PFF with a mark of 66.4. Cardinals coach Kliff Kingsbury explained the move by saying that the 3-8-1 team was going to use the last four games to get a look at some younger guys on the roster.

“We’re going to play some younger players. We’re always looking to turn over the roster and improve, so that’s how it came about.”

He’s allowed 32 catches on 46 passes into his coverage (69.6%) for 419 yards and 3 touchdowns so far this season. Brock has no interceptions, 3 PBUs, 37 tackles, 2 tackles for loss, and 2 quarterback hits in 10 total games this year (he missed a couple games with a hamstring issue a few weeks ago).

The 6’-0”, 188 pound 31-year old brings some veteran experience to the table and can play both outside and in the slot if called upon. He should help a Titans cornerback group that was down to just Logan Ryan, Tye Smith, Joshua Kalu, and undrafted rookie Kareem Orr as healthy options by the end of the Colts game.

Hopefully this doesn’t spell bad news on the injury front for Adoree’ Jackson. The fact that Jackson hasn’t already been moved to IR seems to be a positive sign — the Cameron Wake and Malcolm Butler IR announcements both happened on the Tuesday following the injury and we haven’t seen any news on Jackson as of this writing — but we will know more about his knee injury by tomorrow afternoon at the latest.

The Titans waived backup offensive lineman Hroniss Grasu to make room for Brock on the 53-man roster, another good sign that Jackson’s injury might not be season ending.

Brock should come in and be able to help a hurting part of the Titans roster immediately with his experience. The Raiders receiving corps isn’t the most threatening in the league with Tyrell Williams leading the way with 33 catches for 489 yards and 5 touchdowns. Second-leading receiver Hunter Renfrow is expected to miss some more time with a rib injury that caused a punctured lung a couple weeks ago. That leaves Zay Jones and Keelan Doss as the other outside threats for the Titans to deal with this week, though as we saw against the Colts, even no-name receivers are capable of putting up numbers when the coverage isn’t great.