NASHVILLE, Tenn. -- The Tennessee Titans invested more in their defensive front than any other area when Robert Saleh took over as the coach this past offseason. General manager Mike Borgonzi immediately went to work getting Saleh the players they felt were necessary to develop the effective four-man pass rush that is essential to Saleh's defense. Tennessee committed $71 million in free agency contracts for this year to defensive linemen John Franklin-Myers, Solomon Thomas, Jordan Elliott, Jacob Martin and Malik Herring. The Titans also added to the front by trading defensive tackle T'Vondre Sweat for edge rusher Jermaine Johnson II and by drafting defensive end Keldric Faulk with the 31st pick.
So far, there hasn't been a significant return on the investment.
The Titans' 10-sack total has them tied with the Baltimore Ravens, New Orleans Saints and Indianapolis Colts for the 25th most in the league through five games. Sitting in the bottom quarter of the league is nowhere near where Tennessee intended to be after all the moves to improve the defensive front.
"I'm challenging them every day with regards to the fact that we need more," Saleh said Wednesday. "The heartbeat of the defense is the front, at least for the systems that we've ever had."
Saleh's preference is to use a four-man pass rush to attack quarterbacks. Rather than generating pressure by blitzing and pulling defenders out of coverage, Saleh's system seeks to control the line of scrimmage by using a high-frequency defensive line rotation. Typically, a defensive lineman will play roughly 60% of the snaps in a game. That rule hasn't applied to longtime Titan and All-Pro pass rusher Jeffery Simmons, who signed a three-year, $105.8 million contract extension with the Titans last June.
If the Titans' pass rush was a music group, Simmons would be the lead singer. He is performing up to the standards set by the coaching staff. The rest of the group is not.
Tennessee needs someone else to emerge and fill out the band. Opposing offenses are double-teaming Simmons at an 81.1% rate, 11th highest among qualified interior linemen this season, according to ESPN Analytics/NFL Next Gen Stats. That leaves one-on-one opportunities for the rest of the group to exploit, which is not happening.
"We have to be 100% better," Johnson said. "If they're going to dedicate two or three guys to Jeff, we have to come alive. There's no way around it. We are not doing enough to help Jeff, the defense and the team. That's something I take a lot of pride in. In cases where we are getting one-on-ones, and they slide to Jeff, we have to take advantage of that."
"The expectation is when you get a one-on-one, the expectation is you win," Saleh said. "With four hands being on Jeff pretty much every snap, we need more from the rest for sure."
Martin's 2.5 sacks ties him with Simmons for the team lead, and his six quarterback hits are the most on the team. A case can be made for Martin emerging as another option. For the most part, production everywhere else has been lacking. Faulk, a 2026 first-round pick, has one sack on the season and has played only 31.5% of the snaps. There were high hopes for 2025 second-round pick Oluwafemi Oladejo's continued transition from linebacker to pass rusher in Saleh's scheme that emphasizes getting upfield and attacking. But Oladejo has no sacks and only one pressure this season.
After signing his big contract, Simmons reported to training camp in what he called the best shape of his life with an eye on playing as many snaps as possible. Simmons has played 85.2% of the defensive snaps, including 57 out of 58 snaps in a 10-tackle, one-sack performance during a 12-7 loss to the New York Giants in Week 3. Saleh struggled to recall that level of dominance from any defensive lineman he has coached before.
According to NFL Tru Media, Simmons has 19 pressures this season, tied for the third most among defensive tackles, including six quick pressures (under 2.5 seconds), tied for the fifth most among defensive tackles. Since the start of the 2025 season, Simmons has 29 quick pressures, the most among defensive tackles over that span.
Pairing Simmons with Franklin-Myers was supposed to create a formidable duo up front. Franklin-Myers, who posted 7.5 sacks with the Denver Broncos last season, has 1.5 sacks through five games, one of which occurred last week when Houston Texans quarterback C.J. Stroud ran out of bounds behind the line of scrimmage while he was in pursuit.
Franklin-Myers has also been nursing a back injury, so the Titans haven't been able to fully deploy him in stunt and twist tandems with Simmons. But he's not using the injury as an excuse.
"It don't matter how I feel because nobody cares," Franklin-Myers told ESPN. "I know for the team to go as we want it to go, it starts with me, it starts with Jeff, it starts with Jermaine. It's on us to make plays."
Overall, the pass rush is not only failing to get home enough, but it's also failing to impact the quarterback and help force turnovers.
The Titans' defense is dead last in the league with 0.4 turnovers per game. Not all of it is on the defensive front, but dating back to training camp, Saleh made it clear that unit would be the catalyst for the defense. The front four hasn't caused many turnovers apart from the pressure and hit Simmons had on Philadelphia Eagles quarterback Jalen Hurts that forced a bad throw, which was intercepted by nickel corner Marcus Harris.
Opposing quarterbacks of the Titans, on average, have 2.99 seconds before the pass, third most in the NFL behind the Bengals (3.06) and Vikings (3.10). That's just not going to cut it, especially with a secondary that lacks marquee players. Saleh has tried to insert Harris as a blitzer off the edge, which has helped, but there is still no consistent pass rush.
How will it get better?
Titans defensive line coach Aaron Whitecotton says it comes down to better communication and cohesiveness.
"We have a group that hasn't rushed together, so we've got to continue communicating," Whitecotton said. "You can't stand there and say, 'Hey, I'm going here. You go there.' We got to be able to look at one another and know what we're about to do. We got to be able to be on the same page."
The next opportunity will come Sunday in an AFC South clash with the Colts (1:00 p.m. ET, Fox). The Colts' offensive line has allowed nine sacks this season, tying them with the Cincinnati Bengals for the fifth fewest in the league. The pass rush will need to be a factor for the Titans to break their 11-game losing streak against their division.