Brian Callahan Putting Titans at Odds with Their Patience Promise

NASHVILLE, Tenn. – Brian Callahan is coaching tight.

He’s been a big story in two out of the Titans’ three losses, and that’s not acceptable or sustainable.

For all of the problems in his first year as the head coach, he was not a regular post-game issue in the way he is now – when he’s made foolish play calls backed up before the half that helped set up the Broncos for a touchdown or showed incomprehensible indecisiveness through two timeouts and part of a play clock that resulted in a delay of game penalty, pushing his field goal kicker back, contributing to a blocked attempt and aiding 3 points for the Colts.

It all serves to contribute to organizational flailing and puts it at odds with itself.

Burke Nihill and Chad Brinker, the presidents of the business and football sides of the team, respectively, have been empowered by Amy Adams Strunk, and both have preached patience. Too much has changed too quickly and they know that good NFL teams are built on stability.

The Titans have gone from Jon Robinson, to interim GM Ryan Cowden to Ran Carthon to Mike Borgonzi from Dec. 6, 2022 to January 17, 2025. They do not want to follow a similar path with their head coaching position.

After a miserable 3-14 season that got them the first pick in the draft – which turned into Cam Ward – they fired Carthon and hired Borgonzi, but decided to stay the course with Callahan, who made a change at special teams coordinator that is netting big results.

How can John Fassel produce such a terrific turnaround after years of bad special teams while Callahan himself regresses and his and his dad, Bill, who’s got a fantastic resume as an offensive line coach, seems stuck?

It’s not easily answered.

But now the Titans either continue to stay the course with a coach who’s having too much of an influence on losses or they abandon the patience they pledged not long ago -- sending quite a signal to prospective replacements.

We want Strunk to leave such things to her football people. But results in Houston against the Texans always carry extra weight considering her primary residence is in a nearby suburb, and the fact that the Texans got the stadium deal from the city that he dad couldn’t get, which prompted the move to Houston in the first place.

The Titans play there on Sunday.

And after games in Arizona and Las Vegas, they return to Nashville for Week Seven against New England and Mike Vrabel. The Patriots are a struggling first-year team, but Vrabel will return to town seeking blood. Whatever you feel about him, he’s a superior coach to Callahan – and that makes things even worse.

A loss in Houston and/or a loss to Vrabel are the sort of emotional triggers that could prompt Strunk to reinvolve herself if Brinker and Borgonzi haven’t acted already.

“I never want any of it to be about me,” Brian Callahan said Monday, following a second game that was largely about him.

Nevermind Michael Pittman's claim that introductions revealed the Titans didn't want to play. L'Jarius Sneed, Roger McCreary and Peter Skoronski all said the team was flat. You may expect collegiate rah-rah from the coach, but it's the players who are responsible for having the right mindset. All the Titans' home games are on Sunday at noon. Be ready, fellas.

Vrabel sold me on the idea that energy doesn't arise out of sideline cheerleading or a coach or player's emotions, but out of plays being made. Stop dropping balls, missing tackles, drawing flags and go make one. Callahan's poor decision-making isn't the only thing culpable; it just stands out the most because it's so uncommon, so unexpected, so alarming.

His game-day faux pas were not a featured Sunday storyline in 2024.

“I don’t feel like we had anything come up from that point of view over the entirety of last season,” he said. “I think part of it is that we’ve been in some of these games and those things are getting magnified when they don’t go well and that’s just the way it goes.

How much conversation went on during two timeouts plus before the field goal decision near the end of the second half? I wonder if he's got too many people in his ear.

Last year he leaned on his OC in Nick Holtz and probably the senior Callahan; now he's added senior offensive assistant Mike McCoy and a trustworthy Fassel. Analytics man Rob Riederer, who almost certainly helped in the rule-interpretation rule screwup in Denver, also chimes in on probabilities

Brian Callahan wouldn't say who was involved in the conversation, but if it's four or five people beyond him, well it begins to explain how things could take so long and indicate he's overwhelmed by opinions. 

Which takes us back to the tightness, a regression. He’s somehow shrinking in the moment, and seeing that his players aren’t going to rise for him, it’s not the psychology of it. He needs to be decisive and come into games defaulting aggressive over conservative, given his bad team.

It would take something dramatic, dramatic and soon, for him to offset what’s unfolded so far. And level ground won’t suffice. He needs Ward growth, offensive growth and Brian Callahan growth to survive.

I bought into patience because I believe in stability.

But the Titans are wobbling, and it’s the sort of wobbling that’s awfully hard to steady.

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