10 biggest surprise NFL teams thus far on the season
By Andrew Garda
Tennessee Titans: 1-1
Like the Jacksonville Jaguars, the Tennessee Titans are tied for the AFC South, as everyone predicted. Most people thought there was a good chance the Titans would beat the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and there was a fair chance they would beat the Cleveland Browns, though they fell short in that effort.
What the real surprise here isn’t the Titans themselves—they look about as average as they ever have before. No, the real surprise is rookie quarterback Marcus Mariota.
A lot of people not in Tennessee thought Mariota was going to need quite a while to really start looking like the starting quarterback we all think he could be. Has he been perfect? Absolutely freaking not—not when he coughs the ball up twice against the Browns due to massive pressure.
But if you put both games together, the bad is minimal and the good is exceptional.
Mariota has completed 34 out of 53 pass attempts, for a completion percentage of 64.2, with 466 yards and six touchdowns and no interceptions. That’s pretty impressive, even if it’s not against the highest quality opponents, though the Browns have a solid defense.
Again, he’s not perfect overall, but he has shown some nice poise, a coolness under pressure (for the most part) which isn’t always present in a new quarterback.
What’s most interesting here is how we will, perhaps, watch the difference a very good quarterback can make to a team. We haven’t seen that since Andrew Luck and Russell Wilson since 2012.