Titans’ GM firing an indictment of Will Levis pick

Carthon joined the Titans after a six-year tenure with the 49ers, where he was the director of player personnel (2021-22) and the director of pro personnel (2017-20).

“He played an important role there constructing one of our league’s best teams,” owner Amy Adams Strunk said at the time of his hiring on Jan. 18, 2023.

The Titans (3-14) finished the year tied with the Browns and Giants for the league’s worst record, earning the No. 1 overall pick of the 2025 NFL Draft. Firing Carthon could signal what direction the team plans to go with the upcoming draft’s top pick.

Carthon was one of the more aggressive general managers last offseason, signing running back Tony Pollard (three-year, $24 million) and wide receiver Calvin Ridley (four-year, $92 million) in free agency. He also acquired cornerback L’Jarius Sneed from the Chiefs for a 2025 third-round pick and a 2024 seventh-round pick swap, then signed him to a four-year, $76.4 million extension. 

Those win-now moves failed, but the team’s shortcomings are more related to Carthon’s selection of Levis in the second round of the 2023 NFL Draft.

In two seasons, Levis had as many head-scratching plays as positive ones. In 12 games this season, he was 190-of-301 (63.1 percent) for 2,091 yards (6.9 yards per attempt), 13 touchdowns and 12 interceptions. His 27.6 QBR, which measures overall quarterback performance, “including how he impacts the game on passes, rushes, turnovers and penalties” (h/t ESPN) on a scale of 0-100, ranked 37th out of 38 qualifying quarterbacks, ahead of only Browns quarterback Deshaun Watson (23.1).

With Carthon’s aggressive push in free agency last offseason and the Titans having an estimated $61.3 million in 2025 cap space, Tennessee might have been a player for someone like Vikings quarterback Sam Darnold or Jets quarterback Aaron Rodgers and Saints quarterback Derek Carr if either becomes available.

But his firing suggests a clash between how Carthon and Titans ownership wants to build the team going forward. The front-office move is also a bold vote of confidence in head coach Brian Callahan, who deserves his share of the blame for Tennessee’s dismal season.

Whereas the Panthers saw enormous growth in second-year quarterback Bryce Young in head coach Dave Canales’ first season in Carolina, Levis showed no such growth under Callahan.

It wasn’t as though Carthon set Callahan and Levis up to fail, either. Carthon invested heavily in the offensive line, spending two first-round picks (2023, 2024) on left guard Peter Skoronski and left tackle JC Latham, and improving the overall talent around Levis last offseason.

Arguably, no coach did less with more than Callahan, but he evaded the chopping block.

It’s hard to see Carthon’s firing as anything but an indictment of the Levis pick and ownership’s unwillingness to make the same mistake twice. However, keeping Callahan could be worse.