It's a big news day for the Tennessee Titans, so I'll have a couple posts tonight.

First, the Titans released two of their own players, setting free strong safety Jordan Babineaux and offensive guard Mitch Petrus. Babineaux was the bigger name of the two, and had a very nice 2011 season as a bargain basement free agency pickup. He was never that great in coverage, though, and his run defense slipped in 2012. With the signing of George Wilson a couple weeks ago, his release was pretty much a matter of time unless something unexpected happened. By setting him free now, he has a better chance to catch on with another team at a good time. Maybe I'm positively disposed toward him because I won a signed football from him in a Twitter contest, but best of luck to him in his pursuit for an opportunity elsewhere.

Petrus was a waiver wire pickup in December, when the Titans were desperate for bodies on the offensive line. He got the start in Week 16, and unfortunately his most memorable moment as a Titans player proved to be a blown protection call that resulted in a sack. That's the sort of thing that can happen when you're around teammates for a week at a position where continuity is so important. I thought there was a chance he could stick around as the non-center interior backup, but apparently not.

Write-ups on Andy Levitre, Delanie Walker, and any other signings coming later.

With the start of the new League Year fast approaching, the Titans took care of some necessary business on Monday, putting a restricted free agent tender on Fernando Velasco. Jim Wyatt indicated it was the second-round tender amount of $2.023 million. I'd expected the Titans to tender Velasco at that level; it's $680,000 more than the lowest possible tender, but as Velasco was an undrafted free agent, the Titans could have lost him for no compensation. Since nobody is giving up a second-round pick for Velasco, write his name in pen as a starting interior offensive lineman for the Titans in 2013, with center the most likely position.

In a move I didn't expect, the Titans did not choose to tender Kevin Matthews. He was an exclusive rights free agent, so the tender amount was only for the relevant league minimum of $630,000. The cynic in me wants to say that with Mike Munchak's job on the line, and likely Bruce Matthews' as well, it was time to give up the scholarship program and find a real interior backup lineman. I'd expected the Titans to tender Matthews, just because the only reason not to do so was if he wasn't in their plans at all. The Titans also did not tender Kyle DeVan; I thought he was a UFA, but did not expect him back in any event.

Meanwhile, as first reported by Jay Glazer, guard Steve Hutchinson plans to retire on Tuesday. While Matt Hasselbeck indicated last month Hutchinson was working out like he planned to continue playing, Glazer indicates he realized it was time to move on. If your interpretation is that the Titans told him they planned to release him rather than pay his roster bonus in a couple days, well, we are on the same page (as is Paul Kuharsky). As GM Ruston Webster noted at the scouting combine, "You have to be careful when you bring in older players that you're not getting injured older players."

Including the Velasco tender and the cap effects of Hutchinson's retirement, my best estimate is the Titans have about $17.5 million in cap space available.

Since I wrote about the Titans' depth chart holes, that also means I can look at positions where the Titans may be looking for a player in free agency. I've already covered the tight ends, but another position where I strongly believe they'll be looking for a veteran (or maybe more than one) in free agency is offensive guard.

If it feels like I've done one of these before, it's because I did last year. Once again the Titans are probably looking for a right guard to fill the hole caused by one departing, while left guard is a position the Titans once again may or may not address. There's a chance we will know pretty quickly if the Titans will address left guard, as my understanding is Steve Hutchinson has a roster bonus due within the next week.

With that in mind, let's see who might be available.

Naturally, since in yesterday's post I noted the Titans hadn't been very active in re-signing their own players, they went ahead and reupped two, re-signing kicker Rob Bironas and defensive end Keyunta Dawson. Bironas's deal is reportedly for $6.7 million over two years, while Dawson's is apparently another one-year deal for the league minimum.

As I noted in my special teams analysis, Bironas was a below-average kicker in 2012 after spending several seasons at or among the league's best. An APY for $3.35 million is a very good one for a kicker, and I believe better than the one in the four-year deal that ran through 2012. While kickers are able to perform effectively even at advanced ages, paying a kicker more at age 35 than at age 31 when the most consistent skill among kickers, leg strength, tends to decline is not a very intelligent move. There will probably be a half-dozen kickers who were better than Bironas in 2012 who get less than $3.35 million per year this offseason, but hey, scratch a kicker off the list of team needs.

Dawson played 38 snaps at defensive end for the Titans in 2012 before going on injured reserve after Week 3. He played exclusively (or nearly so) right defensive end in place for Kamerion Wimbley. He looked okay in the preseason, but didn't do anything in his brief regular season action. In the defensive ends analysis, I wrote I couldn't see him back with the team. I backed down from that a bit in yesterday's post, because it's hard for me to distinguish one backup option who hasn't played much from another.

Still, I'm surprised by the timing of the move. Here's the question: Are there two roster spots for Dawson and Scott Solomon? I don't think either is the guy the Titans need to play on early downs or in base personnel to get stronger against the run. In that case, there might be two roster spots, but there probably are not two spots on the 46-man active roster. Maybe I'm questioning Dawson's judgment here more than the Titans', and he's in a position to know more than I am.  Still, I'm not sure he's much more than 50-50 to make it to September.

As I did last offseason, I thought it would be useful as a sort of macro overview of where the Titans stand in terms of holes on the depth chart. For purposes of this post, I'll be using a sort of hypothetical depth chart based on what might have been if everybody was healthy.

Holes Filled Since the End of the Regular Season
SS-?: Technically, the Titans don't have any holes on the depth chart at free agency, with both Jordan Babineaux and Al Afalava under contract for 2013. That said, I consider it a foregone conclusion newly-signed George Wilson will be either SS-1 or SS-2 Week 1 of the 2013 season (barring of course injury and the like).

Last offseason, the Titans had a number of their own free agents they wanted to keep and re-signed Lavelle Hawkins, Mike Otto, and Craig Stevens, plus used the franchise tag on Michael Griffin by this point in the process. This offseason, not so much.

Remaining Holes 

Well, contrary to what everybody expected, the Tennessee Titans did not end up using the franchise tag on Jared Cook. The biggest sticking point seemed to be the issue I mostly dismissed in my franchise tag analysis, whether he would be considered a tight end or a wide receiver. This could have been avoided if the Titans and Cook could come to terms on a longer-term deal, but apparently the two sides couldn't reach agreement there either, for unsurprising reasons. It's still possible the two sides could come to an agreement before or even after the new league year begins March 12, but I think Cook's done in Tennessee unless the money from the Titans is clearly better than the money elsewhere (which it won't be). As I noted on Twitter earlier, losing a player who seems like he doesn't want to be here doesn't bother me too much. Best of luck to Cook in his next stop.

Since we're pretty sure that the Titans will not have Jared Cook in 2013, they'll clearly be in the market for another player at the position. I like Craig Stevens a lot and think he could play a much bigger role than he has, even compared to the expanded role he had in 2012. Taylor Thompson at this point is a tremendous question mark, clearly able to function at a reasonable level in the run game but well deserving of doubt as a contributor to a major role in the passing game. In the Mike Heimerdinger years, the Titans used a good amount of 2TE sets, which means a pairing of Stevens and Thompson won't cut it. Given Thompson's youth and the need to win now, my expectation is they'll be looking for a veteran rather than a young player. Given that, who might be out there that they'd like?

The big questions to answer are:
1. Are they looking for another tight end who's primarily an inline blocker and can play some H-back like Thompson and Stevens, or are they looking for an oversized slot receiver who can play inline like Cook?
2. How much do they want to pay this player?
The answer to both questions depends to a good extent on what they think of Taylor Thompson's development. The conservative answer, but a reasonable one is that the need to be successful in 2013 means they're more interested in a player who can play significant snaps at a reasonably high level.

With that in mind, let's look at the available candidates.

Last offseason, I wrote an analysis of which Titans might be franchise tag candidates. Naturally, after I wrote that, every other starting safety scheduled to hit the market got franchised, and the Titans ended up franchising Michael Griffin and later signing him to a long-term deal. This offseason, I wanted to get the positional analyses done first. While I was in the middle of those, Jim Wyatt reported the Titans were expected to franchise tight end Jared Cook.

Approaching the franchise tag analysis from the same perspective I did last season, there are only two reasonable candidates for the franchise tag: Cook and kicker Rob Bironas. I just wrote about Bironas in my special teams analysis, so I won't rehash that at length here. Suffice it to say he was a below-average kicker in 2012, and the baseline expectation for his 2013 performance should probably be somewhere around average. For purposes of this analysis, it's also worth noting if the Titans wanted to franchise Bironas, his tag amount would not be the $2.977 million figure, but instead be 120% of his 2012 cap number. That 2012 cap number was, I believe, 3.675 million, so his tag amount would be $4.41 million. That would be a very, very large amount to pay a kicker.

As Cook was a non-first-round pick in the final year of his rookie deal, his tag amount is the base tight end figure of $6.066 million. I addressed what I thought of his skills in the tight ends analysis.That post came before Wyatt's report, but it was clear the franchise tag was a possibility. I indicated then, and I still believe, that franchise Jared Cook is not an ideal solution. He's a very, very good vertical seam threat, thanks to excellent straight-line speed, but is not an elite athlete and I would rate him as below average in the other skills involved in being a starter-level tight end in the NFL. Of course, it's possible the Titans think that combination is worth a lot more than I do, and Wyatt's report indicates they do tend to think so.