| The Jaguars beat the Titans despite giving up seven sacks. (US Presswire) |
It's hard to complain when a team gets just its second win of the season in Week 12.
But the Jaguars know their pass protection must improve after giving up seven sacks in their 24-19 win over the Titans on Sunday. They came into Sunday's game giving up slightly less than three sacks a game -- a relatively average figure by NFL standards. The protection broke down on Sunday, though.
The Titans brought blitzes from all directions and seemed to confuse the O-line. Coach Mike Mularkey said that there should be no blitz that the pass protection doesn't have an answer for.
“We didn’t hold up very simple rules,” Mularkey told the team's official website. “It was just a mental error and it got us hit. We can’t have mistakes. A guy is going to get beat every now and then in a one-on-one block for whatever reason, but to have mistakes happen with protections and calls -- those are things we’ll look at.”
Though he still managed to pass for 261 yards and two TDs, perhaps Chad Henne's first start at QB contributed to the problem. Mularkey stopped short of saying Henne held the ball too long, but did say everybody will need to improve in that area going forward.
“It wasn’t the best, by any means,” he said. “It wasn’t one specific area. We have to clean that up, absolutely."
Gutsy performance from RB Parmele: His stats won't jump off the page, but RB Jalen Parmele, who made his first start of the season, showed some toughness by running eight times for 45 yards on Sunday despite injuring his groin in the first quarter.
“Talk about a guy dragging his leg literally through a hole while he’s running over defenders,” Mularkey said. “You just know he’s hurt.”
Injury update: Parmele will likely be questionable for next week's game against Buffalo. CB Derek Cox (leg) left Sunday's game and is still being evaluated. His status is unknown. FB Greg Jones (thigh) missed the last four weeks and remains unlikely to return to practice this week, making it doubtful he'll play at Buffalo.
RB Maurice Jones-Drew (foot), who has missed the last five games, will likely miss at least one more. Mularkey was asked if he was a candidate to be put on IR, but that doesn't seem to be in the plans.
“We want to finish strong and we need everybody we can who can help us finish strong," Mularkey said. "Every game is important doing that. If we thought it was a year-ending thing, we would have handled that differently a long time ago. We still think he can come back for a few games.”
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