The Tennessee Titans are in Tampa Bay doing some joint practice with the Buccaneers on Thursday before their Saturday preseason game. As is the case in most every joint practice ever held in NFL history, things got a little chippy! Turns out, the first time you unleash 180 extreme competitors on one another to hit somebody on a different team for the first time in months, tempers tend to run hot!
And in Tampa this morning, Titans starting cornerback Jarvis Brownlee Jr. made a splash with an already viral video chirping at Buccaneers fans. Here’s the clip if you haven’t seen it:
Brownlee approached the fan tent as they were hurling taunts his way, and had to be restrained by CB Jalen Kimber, RB Jordan Mims, and a member of team staff. My favorite detail in this video is the non-ball knower behind the camera proudly screaming “practice squad!” at the starter. Just awesome, awesome stuff. But a lot of the social media response has been along the lines of, well, read these:
I couldn’t disagree more. What better time to get a fundamental take off my chest than when a Titans player tees me up with a prime example like this! Here’s why:
NFL Defenders Should Have A Screw Loose
It’s true! They absolutely should. Not a big screw, just a small one. In the vast majority of cases, good defenders are a little bit crazy. They aren’t quite right in the head.
That’s because playing defense in the NFL is unbelievably hard. You’re at an increasingly unfair disadvantage to the offense. A lot of what you do is losing slowly these days. You have to play with some reckless abandon. Whether you’re fitting a run or trying to ruin the quarterback’s day, having much regard for your own wellbeing doesn’t get you very far. These guys need to be nuts!
That’s how I’ve always felt about defense. And based on conversations I’ve had with NFL coaches over the years, they tend to agree. There’s a reason why a guy like Abdul Carter can have a college reputation for being kind of delusional and kind of crazy, and he’s still a top 3 draft pick. Because being crazy is almost a prerequisite for these guys.
Now, it does need to be a small screw. When a guy is crazy enough to constantly cause extracurricular problems, draw regular penalties, or punch somebody with a helmet on (still one of the dumbest things a person can do), then it becomes a problem. For Brownlee, his nine penalties last year were no doubt a problem. Though, when you evaluate each individually, there’s a lot of ticky-tack junk in that sample. Sometimes the calls just don’t go your way.
His ultra-physical play style is always going to have a negative side effect of penalties. You can’t totally erase that. But as he refines his game, he’ll learn how savvy veterans get away with playing aggressively. The hope is that this will knock down the number of calls against him. Just this week, he spoke to us in the media about heading to Tampa and how big a focus it’s been for him to avoid giving Mike Evans and Co. the penalty calls they’re known for drawing. He’s working on it.
But when it comes to unhinged moments like this one—or last week when he got into it briefly with Calvin Ridley after he threw him to the ground late in a rep—I am perfectly fine with it. I’m old enough to remember the past two weeks, when everybody on the planet was pining for Titans camp to have some more juice.
Well, on the defensive side of the ball, sometimes this is how juice manifests. And I don’t have a problem with it (in moderation!) at all.
