Bounce Back Coming After Titans Embarrassing Loss?

Originally posted on Tennessee Titans on SI
By Lane Mills | Last updated Oct 5, 2025 7:00 AM ET

It's now been nearly an entire week since the Tennessee Titans dropped their fourth straight game, this time on the road against the then-winless Houston Texans. What seemed like a potentially winnable matchup for Tennessee, against one of the only other 0-3 teams in the NFL, turned into the Titans worst loss in more than a half-decade.

Shut out for the first time since 2019, the team debuted their new play-caller Bo Hardegree in painfully unconvincing fashion, losing 26-0 in a rout that could only be described as properly season-shattering.

Moving to 0-4 as a result, the wave-by-wave reaction from those in and around the franchise felt appropriately apocalyptic. As the first month of competitive football has developed, expectations for a Cam Ward-led offense has gone from "let's see what the rookie can do," to "let's find ways to build around the rookie," to "do we have to watch anymore of this?"

Put plainly, the Tennessee Titans have been a marked disappointment on the season thus far. While the defense certainly hasn't impressed, somehow, the offense's equivalent letdown seems to pack a harder punch given the unit's spread of on-paper talent.

So what's to be expected of the rookie-dominant scoring squad now? Up to this point, having tallied more turnovers (5) than touchdowns (3), the best news is that it truly cannot get much worse. At least, it seems that way right now.

Tennessee can't really be judged, as a team, by their wins, at least not as a whole. The numeral in the victory column is a greater indicator at this point to HC Brian Callahan's longevity than it is to the quality of talent across the roster. Instead, given the aforementioned rookie concentration, the Titans' subjective success is more a matter of those players' effectivity specifically.

With both of Cam Ward's touchdowns being thrown to his fellow rookie Elic Ayomanor, who was taken in the fourth round of the 2025 NFL Draft, early signs throughout the system point to a future in the team's younger talent. Even if the team isn't consistently winning - which feels like an unfortunate fact of this year's reality, despite being only a month in - these milder, progressive statistics feel like wins within themselves.

Further, if Ward, by way of connecting with his scoring options, can develop their chemistry for when the team has their specifics figured out on a higher level, perhaps the team can get ahead of the (seemingly) inevitable staffing overhaul and shorten the generally difficult wake that comes with that.

Either way, in the now, Tennessee will face off against the 2-2 Arizona Cardinals this weekend in their second straight road battle. There isn't a specific metric of expectation for the offensive beyond simply scoring a point. Let's start there.

This article first appeared on Tennessee Titans on SI and was syndicated with permission.

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