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Titans WR Ruled Out vs. Patriots
Tennessee Titans wide receiver Calvin Ridley Steve Roberts-Imagn Images

After dealing with mild, day-to-day injuries for most of the 2025 season, the Titans (intended) leading wide receiver is set to miss his first game due to an ongoing hamstring issue.

For Calvin Ridley, the problem first caused him to miss time in last week’s loss to the Las Vegas Raiders. After pulling down just one catch, Ridley would exit the game and ultimately not return as Tennessee fell by a final score of 20-10.

While Ridley hadn’t yet practiced this past week leading up to the team’s first home game in a month, much of the attention of fans and analysts went to the team’s firing of head coach Brian Callahan, as well as the subsequent elevation of senior offensive assistant Mike McCoy to the interim HC position.

Callahan’s departure has been a long time coming for the Titans franchise, and the media craze that has resulted - from coaching search rumors to reactions from relieved fans - has been long expected given the impending decision.

But the Titans still have football to play, with or without a tenured coach at the helm, and they’ll have to do this week, at least, without Calvin Ridley.

To make matters worse, Tennessee is slated to butt heads with the New England Patriots, ironically led by the Titans’ former head coach, Mike Vrabel.

At 4-2, Vrabel and the Patriots have put the league on notice with the dominant performance of second-year QB Drake Maye leading the charge. Whether or not the Titans had moved on from Callahan, the matchup wouldn’t be favorable.

Ridley’s absence, in spite of his subpar performance on the season thus far, looks only to worsen those odds. While the veteran WR leads the time in yardage this season with 290 (only good for 44th in the NFL), he’s only managed 16 receptions and, to this point still, hasn’t scored a touchdown.

Essentially, the Titans are paying Ridley on a 4 year, $92 million dollar deal to play on par with their rookie receiver, Elic Ayomanor.

One of those guys has two scores, and it isn’t the former.

Going forward, Tennessee still surely hopes to see Ridley return to health soon, both to give first-year quarterback Cam Ward his full breadth of options under a new coach, as well as to hopefully find a way to procure whatever potential remains in the 30 year old wideout as his career, and construct, continue to wear.

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

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