Former Houston Oilers defensive tackle Doug Smith died Thursday afternoon from a heart attack, Mark Berman, formerly sports director at KRIV, reports. Smith was 64.
“It was unexpected,” Smith’s wife, Becky, told Berman. “Two months ago, he got a clean bill of health for his heart. He went to his cardiologist and [the tests] came back his heart was good, but you know we know even healthy people can have a heart attack.”
The Oilers selected Smith out of Auburn in the second round of the 1984 draft, but he instead signed with the Birmingham Stallions of the USFL. His deal was a four-year deal reportedly worth $1.2 million with a signing bonus of $350,000.
Smith totaled five sacks and earned All-USFL honors as a rookie, but the league folded before the 1985 season.
He went on to play 101 games with the Oilers, starting 77, in his eight seasons. He totaled one interception and 14 sacks.
Smith’s career was threatened in 1990 when he was shot in the knee while at a gathering of friends and family near his childhood home in Bayboro, North Carolina. Smith, though, continued his career and retired after the 1992 season.
After spending seven seasons with the Texans and three with the Cardinals, wide receiver DeAndre Hopkins is heading into his second season with the Titans. And he couldn’t be happier.
Hopkins said today that there’s nowhere else he’d rather be than playing for the Titans.
“I love Tennessee. I love what Miss Amy [Adams Strunk, the Titans’ owner] is doing,” Hopkins said, via the Tennessean. “I think this is the happiest I’ve been in any organization, so I’ll just let that speak for itself.”
After injuries plagued him for his last two years in Arizona, Hopkins bounced back last year, playing in all 17 games and catching 75 passes for 1,057 yards and seven touchdowns. At age 32 he’s not quite the player he once was, but he heads into 2024 as the Titans’ No. 1 receiver. And in the final year of his contract, he may be looking to sign a new deal to remain in Tennessee in 2025 and beyond.
Shane Ray, an outside linebacker who was selected by the Broncos in the first round of the 2015 NFL draft but hasn’t played in an NFL game since 2018, is getting another chance with the Titans.
The Titans signed Ray and he is on the practice field in training camp today.
Ray’s career has been a long, strange trip: As a first-round rookie, he was a solid if unspectacular contributor who helped the Broncos win Super Bowl 50. In his second season he had eight sacks and looked like he was emerging as the kind of player the Broncos thought he would be when they traded up to draft him.
But after that Ray’s career collapsed, he managed just two more sacks in his final two seasons with the Broncos, and his last NFL game was almost six years ago.
Ray also spent some time in the training camps in Baltimore and Buffalo but didn’t make it on either team’s regular-season roster. He played two years with the Toronto Argonauts of the Canadian Football League.
Ray faces an uphill battle to make the Titans’ roster, but at the age of 31 he’s not giving up on his NFL career yet.
Derrick Henry has been the bell cow running back for the Titans in recent seasons, but the team is taking a different approach in the wake of Henry’s move to Baltimore as a free agent this offseason.
While they moved quickly to sign Tony Pollard in March, they don’t project the former Cowboy will play a similar role to the one that Henry filled in Tennessee. Last year’s third-round pick Tyjae Spears is also on hand and head coach Brian Callahan made it clear on Tuesday that he expects both players to see plenty of time in the offense this season.
“The fun part for me is: How are we going to deploy those guys?,” Callahan said, via the team’s website. “Maybe they both play at the same time, maybe one gets hot and you let him run, maybe we just rotate back and forth. I don’t know what that’s going to look like yet. But they are both going to play quite a bit of football for us, and I don’t view either one of them as a starter or a back-up. They are both starting players to me.”
It is Callahan’s first season with the Titans, so there are a lot of questions to answer about what the team is going to look like under his command. Running back deployment will be one of the closely watched ones once they hit the field.
After the Titans added Calvin Ridley and Tyler Boyd this offseason, it seemed like 2022 first-round pick Treylon Burks might struggle to receive playing time in 2024.
While that could still end up being the case, General Manager Ran Carthon said in his Tuesday press conference that Burks has taken significant strides over the last few months heading into his third season.
“I think Treylon has really grown up,” Carthon said, via Turron Davenport of ESPN. “He sent us a picture during the offseason, this little break here, showing his new physique. He came in and he really took to heart the conversation that he had with myself and coach [Brian Callahan]. And he’s completely bought in. I’ve messaged with him throughout the offseason and I think he’s in a really good spot. And, again, we added Tyler, we added Calvin, obviously D-Hop was here. But for a young guy like that, he has vets that he can learn from.”
Carthon added that Burks has the size, speed, and explosiveness to play multiple receiver positions in Callahan’s offense. And Carthon noted that when Burks was taking some special teams reps during the offseason program, it was something he asked to do.
“So I’m expecting things from him and just his unselfishness,” Carthon said. “I know there was some talk about him taking gunner reps, but that was because he wanted to. He wants to prove that he can stay healthy and play top-level football.”
Through two seasons, Burks has caught 49 passes for 665 yards with one touchdown. In 11 games last year, he had just 16 receptions for 221 yards.