NASHVILLE, Tenn. – The Titans' defense threw a lot at Cam Ward and the offense Wednesday. It sure seemed like an effort to confuse and test him and see how he reacted then take the results to the meeting room and build off of it.
For the second day in a row, he performed poorly, forcing too many throws and completing too few.
He didn’t do particularly well discussing it, getting defensive during his conversation with the media. Brian Callahan talks before practice rather than after, so there was no clarification from there, either.
So we’re left with another bad day, a semi-grumpy quarterback and people bound to overreact to the course of things.
Ward did give a broader assessment of the offense over the last few days, expanding on what he said after the team’s opening day of practice a week ago.
“I just think we’re very mid right now,” he said. “From my position to up front to the receivers’ position but at the end of the day it all starts with me. I just don’t think we’re at where we need to be. But we’ve got a little bit of time. Everything we get better as a whole. We’re a young team. But that’s no excuse. We’ve got to come out with the right mindset every day and go to work.”
Xavier Restrepo is mostly catching passes from Brandon Allen and Tim Boyle right now, but as a good friend from their time together at Miami, he still has a keen sense of Ward.
“Sometimes in practice, you’ve got to try things that you might not try in a game,” Restrepo said. “But that’s just him trying himself out too. Because if he was the best at what he does, then there would be no room to improve.”
I get trying stuff you wouldn’t try in a game in practice. I wonder about trying a ton of it with a rookie quarterback five practices in before he’s got a handle on the stuff he will do in a game.
On a bigger level, Ward insists he has no care for the media while telling a national outlet that he feels mistreated by the NFL already.
“I don’t think I’m being welcomed in (the league) with open arms,” Ward said in The Athletic. “I was the first pick. I’m blessed to be that. But at the end of the day, there’s a target on my back. There’s a target on everyone’s back in the league, but I’m trying to prove myself to my teammates.”
For a guy who’s not made a stop at another NFL stadium yet, who very strongly told us he does not care about the media and who said he talks to about five people outside of the team facility – counting his Rottweiler as one -- how exactly does he know how he’s being welcomed in the league, and why does he care?
Ward tested some things Wednesday, but his completion percentage in team drills has been poor in the last two sessions, and he threw a pick that Cody Barton tipped and Roger McCreary collected. That was his fourth interception between Tuesday and Wednesday, though a couple were not his fault. He’s also had at least five balls batted or tipped.
Even given the defensive test, I’d expect him to be cleaner.
Since pads came on, there has been more action in front of him. On that first tipped pass, he lowered his throw to get under something and, in turn, nicked T’Vondre Sweat’s helmet.
“It’s football, shit happens,” he said. “I throw sidearm and it doesn’t get tipped, I through sidearm and it gets tipped. So…”
At another point he said: “I’ve been throwing sidearm since I was six years old. I had tipped balls in high school, college, and I have tipped balls here in practice. I’m going to have a tipped ball during the season. I’m not real worried about that, it’s just about how you bounce back the next play.”
I'm not really worried about it either. But the Titans have three practices before they are on the field in Tampa with the Bucs and if they go like this things could be ugly in Florida.
Ward has talked a lot about hard work, and no one questions his ethic. He said things are getting easier every day.
He was asked a thoughtful question about when he knows he can rely on those things he talks about doing since he was six and when he needs to consider making a change that is needed at football’s highest level.
I’d like to know about that.
He pivoted and shared something from the article in The Athletic.
“Growing up I watched my dad wake up at 4:30 doing a job he didn’t like,” Ward said. “If I can’t wake up early and do what I need to do for a job I do like, I shouldn’t be playing football. …I just think good things always come to those who work.”
