McNichols Ready to Make Most of Another Preseason

NASHVILLE – Jeremy McNichols knows the value of the preseason as well as anyone. He also is well aware that the payoff is not always immediate.

The last time the Tennessee Titans had a preseason (2019), McNichols was their leading rusher in two of the first three games and finished with 109 yards on 27 carries, which was second on the team.

Nonetheless, Tennessee cut him at the start of the regular season. Franchise officials never forgot about him, though. They re-signed him nearly a year later, toward the end of the 2020 training camp, he played in all 16 games of the regular season and finished as Tennessee’s second-leading rusher with 204 yards on 47 carries.

It is an important reminder for the 25-year-old running back and others like him, who live on the fringe of the roster, as the first of this year’s three preseason contests draws near. The Titans will play the Falcons in Atlanta on Friday (6 p.m., CDT).

“Stepping on the field, you’ve got to show out and have fun and compete with your teammates and whoever you’re playing,” McNichols said. “So, any game we get an opportunity to play, just go out there and play hard, do your job, and try to win it.”

In all, McNichols has been released eight times by six different teams since he entered the NFL as a fifth-round pick by Tampa Bay in 2017. Half of those came in the final cuts before the start of the regular season.

The Titans made it two years in a row last season when there was no preseason. Days after he was one of those waived to get to the regular-season roster limit of 53 players, they re-signed him to the practice squad, which was expanded due to COVID-19 and offered the opportunity to be added to the gameday roster. After two games he was returned to the regular roster where he remained throughout the schedule.

That made last season different than any of McNichols’ first three in the NFL.

“Jeremy’s been in this league for a while, and it’s a grind,” running back Derrick Henry said. “And that’s what he does. He just grinds. He works hard. He does the job whenever he’s called. That’s all you can ask for.”

Before last season, he had been called upon plenty in the preseason but not many other times.

In 2018, he was with the San Francisco 49ers and led that team with 23 rushes and two rushing touchdowns in the preseason (his 75 rushing yards were second). And in 2017 with Tampa Bay, he also finished second on the team with 79 rushing yards on 24 attempts.

McNichols did not make the initial 53-man roster for either of those teams appeared in just three regular season games, two with San Francisco in 2017 and one with Indianapolis in 2018.

After the Titans released him the first time, it was nearly three months before another team signed him (Chicago) and another month-plus after that before he was in uniform for another game (with Jacksonville).

Yet he is clear about the fact that he never has considered calling it quits. And why should he? It seems another team always calls or – in the Titans’ case – calls him back.

“I just take it day by day,” McNichols said. “I mean, we can’t determine anything right now. Just come out here, compete, play hard for my teammates and coaches. The rest of it is going to take care of itself.

“… I just grind and take it day by day. It’s just determination and the chip on my shoulder that I come out here with every day.”