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Posted: 24th October 2008 09:46
LenDale White and the Titans are running wild
Jeff Fisher is showing he can get it done with this football team, they're sticking together and Indianapolis had better beware. One thing you can't do with a wild animal is let it get comfortable and let it get confident - and that's what the Tennessee Titans are right now.
Kevin Cadle
Quotes of the week
The Titans might have run right through Kansas last week, but this week they are coming up against one of the very best rushing defenses in the NFL.
OK, you gotta give Chris Johnson and LenDale White credit for coming up with 332 yards between them, but the Colts are second on the list and are giving up around 70 yards a game, compared to the Chiefs 200-plus, so something's gotta give.
What that means is there's now two guys who can run the ball behind an offensive line that's basically geared to Kerry Collins and the passing game - it compliments it perfectly and keeps people honest.
But what I like most about Tennesse is its defense. It's on the ball. They're playing tough and they're taking pride in their work, especially when you consider how people kept writing them off, saying the guys they had got in just weren't the same quality as the ones they let go.
But Jeff Fisher is showing he can get it done with this football team, they're sticking together and Indianapolis had better beware. One thing you can't do with a wild animal is let it get comfortable and let it get confident - and that's what the Tennessee Titans are right now.
They are brimming with confidence looking around wondering who's next? Who are they gonna take on now? That's the mentality they are playing with right now.
It's not quite the same for the Colts, who just had a bad day at the office against Green Bay. Peyton Manning had a bad day, everyone had a bad day.
And the one thing about the NFL is teams copy what they have seen other teams do, so you can expect Tennessee to go out there and make it tough for Peyton. Green Bay just didn't give him any time and when your defensive line chops and changes so much, you'd better get used to that as a quarterback.
One week the rookie Jamey Richard is at center, the next he's the starting guard and I don't care how experienced your quarterback is, that's tough to work with. Indianapolis need that continuity on the offensive line because I thought it would be close against Green Bay, but in the end that's what let them down.
And there's no use complaining either, they have just got to deal with it. There's nothing they can really do about it, so all they can do is work on communication and commitment and start working as a unit.
When you see a defensive line getting blasted you know that someone in there hasn't quite bought into the philosophy and when people start filling other people's gaps, well that's when the big holes start to appear.
Tennessee are playing as a team and the Colts could do a lot worse than copy that. They don't even need to do anything more, anything spectacular, just doing their jobs properly would be a start.
CADLE'S CALL: Divisional match-ups are never that straightforward but this is a choice between Indy going 4-3 and Tennessee 7-0. I like the Colts, but I gotta go with the 7-0!
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