Coming off a miserable offensive performance and an overall malaise in Sunday’s overtime escape in Cleveland, Titans coach Mike Mularkey gave his team the entire bye week off.

Surely, Mularkey should have kept the players in town, some might say, for two days of practice allowed on a bye week. After all, the Titans failed to score a touchdown in the 12-9 win against the winless Browns.

But save for those who are rehabbing injuries, Mularkey took the opposite approach and let the players go for the full week.

He says the players met an incentive that he gave them in order to have the bye off. He declined to say what that incentive was, though it can be easily assumed that it pertains to winning games or being atop the standings.

Mularkey hopes to accomplish several things with that action. First, it should give the players time to rest, heal and get mentally prepared for the final nine games of the year.

“We’ve played two games in less than a week,” the coach says. “They’ve been going at it pretty hard since they’ve been here in late July.

“If it was a different time of year, it might have been different. I might have brought them in today, but I want them to recover. We’ve got a lot of games left to play. I want their bodies back and get healthy and have a healthy team when we get back in here.”

The other thing Mularkey wants is to allow his players to simply get away from football for a week.

“I want them to go home and spend time with their families,” he adds. “They’re working pretty much every day of the week, except Tuesdays, and most of them come in here then. So, I want them to be around their families.”

-- Terry McCormick