Titans quarterback\u00a0Cam Ward\u2018s rookie season came to an unceremoniously early ending today when he exited today\u2019s season finale with an injury. Ward has been initially diagnosed with a Grade 3 AC joint sprain in his right shoulder, per The Athletic\u2019s Jeff Howe and Titans insider Paul Kuharsky.
\nWard landed on shoulder of his throwing arm while reaching for the end zone on the Titans\u2019 first drive of Sunday\u2019s game in Jacksonville. Jaguars linebacker Foyesade Oluokun\u00a0landed on top of the No. 1 overall pick, driving him harder into the ground. Ward briefly went into the blue tent before making his way to the locker room and was seen later on the sideline in sweats.
\nDespite the injury, the 23-year-old started every game for the Titans in his rookie campaign. Though Ward had appeared on the team\u2019s injury report back in Week 4 with ankle\/calf issues, and though Ward was the most-sacked quarterback in the NFL this year (55, tied with Raiders quarterback Geno Smith), Ward had played 100 percent of the team\u2019s offensive snaps up to that point of the season. Backup quarterback Brandon Allen\u2018s first snaps today were Tennessee\u2019s first offensive snaps without Ward on the field this year.
\nAC joint sprain recovery times vary depending on the degree of severity. A milder Grade 1 sprain may take a couple weeks to shake off, whereas a Grade 3 sprain could take several months to recover from. The team saw former starter Will Levis suffer an AC joint sprain early in his second year with the team. He was cleared after the Titans\u2019 bye week and started the next game without missing any time, but he reaggravated the injury in his first game after the injury and was sidelined for the next three weeks. Levis underwent season-ending shoulder surgery in July before this season, but it\u2019s unclear if the procedure was related to the AC joint sprain or a more recent injury.
\nWard\u2019s injury ended a rookie season that he will want to quickly move on from. Coming into the final week of the season, Ward ranked 25th in the NFL in passing yards per game and dead last in touchdowns per pass attempt. As mentioned above, he also led the league in sacks taken and yards lost from sacks. Many of these troubling stats can be attributed to Ward adjusting to the speed difference from college to the pros, but the quality of the players around him should not be ignored.
\nWhile Ward certainly needs to get the ball out quicker in certain situations, he was under pressure on 27.9 percent of his pass attempts, the third-highest percentage in the league. His receivers also racked up the 12th-most drops in the NFL and finished 27th in the NFL in yards after catch. Ward did show bright spots, though, like only throwing seven interceptions, good for an interception rate of 1.3 percent \u2014 the third-best such figure in the NFL this year. He also was able to keep plays alive with his legs and turn broken plays into highlights, something he was known to do in college, as well.
\nAll-in-all, the Titans still believe that Ward is their franchise quarterback, but his development is going to be crucial as he looks to take another step forward in Year 2. The team will likely have Ward undergo some testing to determine the exact severity of today\u2019s injury, and they\u2019ll hope that the resulting recovery time won\u2019t keep him from being available for voluntary Organized Team Activities in May.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Titans quarterback\u00a0Cam Ward\u2018s rookie season came to an unceremoniously early ending today when he exited today\u2019s season finale with an<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-887","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.demoviewer4.com\/keith-ponder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/887","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.demoviewer4.com\/keith-ponder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.demoviewer4.com\/keith-ponder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.demoviewer4.com\/keith-ponder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.demoviewer4.com\/keith-ponder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=887"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/wp.demoviewer4.com\/keith-ponder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/887\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.demoviewer4.com\/keith-ponder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=887"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.demoviewer4.com\/keith-ponder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=887"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.demoviewer4.com\/keith-ponder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=887"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}