Titans Film Room: Tim Kelly Creates Beautiful Opportunities Against New Orleans Saints

The Tennessee Titans may have only scored 15 points in their Week 1 loss to the New Orleans Saints, but it wasn't because they didn't have their opportunities. New offensive coordinator Tim Kelly was impressive in his debut.

When the Tennessee Titans promoted Tim Kelly to offensive coordinator this offseason there was renewed hope that the Titans' offense could improve from the low-scoring mess they were in 2022, but after Week 1 and only putting up 15 points, it was fair for some to wonder if that hope was misguided.

Look closer though and you will see Kelly created a ton of scoring opportunities that were missed for a variety of reasons. He carefully attacked the Saints' primary coverages and create explosive chances that the Titans just didn't execute well enough to take advantage of.

Attacking Man Coverage

Not only do the Saints love playing man coverage, but teams historically like playing ma against the Titans, whose pass catchers haven't always been intimidating over the past few seasons. Kelly knew this and tried to call plays that attacked it.

Kelly often had multiple players going in different directions behind the line of scrimmage. He would have a tight end come in motion at the snap from one side and send the tight end lined up on the opposite side crossing behind the motion man after the snap. All to twist the wires of the defense's coverage responsibilities. It had Saints defenders running all over the field.

Kelly also used specific routes to attack the man coverage, specifically, a wheel route. Kelly used wheel routes all day to try and get his guys running down the sideline with a defender trailing them. He created those chances consistently and even had wrinkles to counter the defense if they expected it.

Kelly also used his most explosive players in pre-snap and at-snap motion. Namely, Treylon Burks and Tyjae Spears. Burks was used in orbit motion, going behind the quarterback and running back while Spears was used on jet motion, running directly behind the offensive line. The Titans showed these motions, but ran different plays each time off of them.

Creativity

At the end of the day, I thought Kelly was incredibly creative with his design. All of the tactics I mentioned above were nice, but we also saw a slew of clever plays. A reverse to Burks, Swing screen to Derrick Henry, Henry in the pistol with Spears flanking, double reverse passes and deep-crossing play action concepts.

Kelly consistently showed similar looks to the defense, but gave them different results after the snap, layering his plays on top of each other in a way meant to paralyze the defense.

It was impressive on film and Kelly should be able to build on it going forward. If he gets a bit better execution this week, particularly from his quarterback, the Titans offense could be in business against a Chargers defense that struggled in Week 1.

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