The Tennessee Titans Need To Bring Trey Smith Home

By Jonathan Reed

It looks like the Tennessee Titans will have a chance to right one of their biggest wrongs in recent memory now that reports are out that the Kansas City Chiefs will not be using any version of the franchise tag on their star guard.

The franchise tag number for an offensive lineman is set to be $25,156,000 because they do not differentiate between tackles, guards, and centers. The Chiefs have some expensive veterans and not a lot of cap space, although that can always change with contract restructures and the salary cap sometimes seeming like it isn’t real. Kansas City’s offensive line was dominated in the Super Bowl by the Eagles, so it doesn’t seem wise to let maybe their most reliable guy just walk out of the building. However, KC has shown that it likes to prioritize the defensive side of the ball while trusting Patrick Mahomes and Andy Reid to elevate the offense.

Can they really afford to make Trey Smith the highest paid guard in the league? Probably not! But they could always change their minds.

If they don’t, then the Tennessee native would be set for free agency and would likely be the unanimous choice for the top available guy.

And that’s where the Titans come in.

Fixing the offensive line has felt necessary for three years and running. Yet, somehow it is still broken. Adding an elite talent like Smith could be the final missing piece to fixing the trenches and giving whatever quarterback the Titans decide to trot out there in 2025 a legitimate chance to succeed.

The obvious in-state ties are there. The 25-year-old Pro Bowler and two-time Super Bowl champion is from Tennessee and was a three-time All-SEC player for the Vols.

Yet, the Titans passed on him EIGHT TIMES in the 2021 NFL Draft.

I do not side with the fanbrain mentality of “the in-state pro franchise must take the good players from the in-state college so that the fanbase will be happy” in most instances. Most instances. Not this one. It hurt back then, and the scab was ripped off every time you saw him maul someone while protecting Mahomes and winning games for the Chiefs.  

On one hand it would be unfair to crush the Tennessee Titans for passing on him in the first couple of rounds; Trey Smith had some legitimate health concerns with his history of blood clots battles in college. As you can see with him falling all the way to number 226 in his draft, every team passed on him multiple times despite his talent being undeniable.

However, on the other hand, the Titans selected Caleb Farley with their first round pick, a cornerback that was a walking red flag with an injury history that consisted of a torn ACL, TWO back surgeries, and a COVID 2020 opt out. It wasn’t like they were going with a super conservative method of avoiding any injury concerns. Again, their first round pick was coming off of TWO BACK PROCEDURES AND MISSED ALL OF 2020!

That entire draft was terrible. Eight picks and really only two contributors. And they traded an extra pick to move up to draft Dez Fitzpatrick three spots ahead of Amon-Ra St. Brown. This is how you end up with the number 1 pick and losers of 23 of your last 32 games. And with two brand new front office regimes.

The newest one is led by rookie GM Mike Borgonzi, who was hired after sixteen seasons in Kansas City with the Chiefs. He was the Assistant General Manager when the Chiefs selected Trey Smith.

There’s at least a level of familiarity there just like there is in Chicago, a team some consider the frontrunner in the Trey Smith Sweepstakes due to their GM Ryan Poles, who was the Executive Director of Player Personnel with the Chiefs at the time Smith was a rookie.

The Titans won’t necessarily win a bidding against some of their biggest competition as Tennessee is only set at the moment to have the 11th most cap space in the league, but maybe the appeal of staying “home” and the state’s tax benefits could help. Smith DID pick the Vols over the likes of Alabama, Ohio State, and Clemson in December of 2016.

Let’s hope history repeats itself with the Two-Tone Blue.

The Titans franchise needs a reset of vibes. There is uncertainty surrounding the number 1 overall pick in the 2025 NFL Draft, but there is a hopeful optimism that comes along with it. If the front office can either land a franchise quarterback or trade the pick for a haul of assets, the rebuild can be expedited expeditiously. 

Bringing the best free agent in the class back home would both improve the team and the morale of a beaten down fanbase.