Is Ryan Tannehill done?

Man, the #hawttakes about Ryan Tannehill have been flying over the last 24 hours. There is no doubt that yesterday was a terrible game for the Tennessee Titans quarterback. He was 16 of 34 for 198 yards with 0 touchdowns and 3 interceptions. That was good for a QBR of 10.3 and a QB rating of 28.8.

Those numbers don’t even tell the whole story. He missed two wide open throws that probably would have resulted in touchdowns. There were also about 3 more passes that could have been intercepted but were dropped by New Orleans Saints defensive backs. It was a terrible performance by any metric.

That has prompted people to declare that Tannehill is done. He has fallen off the cliff and the Titans should go ahead and move on to Malik Willis or Will Levis. Most of those people probably hated Tannehill already, but to be fair, if Tannehill was going to fall off a cliff, that is what it would look like.

However, it is way too early to make that declaration. Keep in mind that this was his first game action after missing the end of last year with a pretty serious ankle injury that required surgery. He was also playing behind an offensive line that returned zero players playing in the same place from last season. It was also his first game with DeAndre Hopkins and Tyjae Spears, and the first game with new offensive coordinator Tim Kelly. I am not trying to make excuses for him - just pointing out some facts that could have contributed to a bad performance.

The logical thing to do is to give him the month of September before passing any sweeping judgments. If he comes back on Sunday and throws 3 touchdowns against the Los Angeles Chargers the narrative of logical people will be very different. There will be some people who are still ready to run him out of town, but that has been the case ever since he took over for Marcus Mariota.

Week 1 is a liar, as the saying goes, so let’s give this offense some time to work together before we start screaming from the mountaintops to move on from Tannehill.

For more of my thoughts on Tannehill and the Titans' offense in the loss to the Saints, listen to yesterday’s Homerun Throwback podcast.