John Glennon

jglennon@tennessean.com

The Titans continue to work with the NFL about its questions regarding the team's ownership, president and CEO Steve Underwood said Monday.

Founder and owner Bud Adams died in 2013, leaving the franchise to a handful of family members. In March, the group met with NFL commissioner Roger Goodell to "ensure the team is under the proper ownership structure."

Susie Adams Smith and Amy Adams Strunk, daughters of Bud Adams, have 33 percent ownership each of the parent company which owns the Titans. The family of Adams' deceased son, Kenneth Adams III, also has one-third ownership — his grandsons, Kenneth IV (11 percent) and Barclay Cunningham Adams (11 percent), and their mother, Susan Lewis (11 percent).

The Tennessean reported at the time that the NFL's finance committee was not in agreement with the team's group ownership structure and asked it to make adjustments.

Titans changes: Webster out as GM, Mularkey a candidate for coach

Underwood said that process is ongoing.

"Those are things we're working through with the league since I came back to work here," said Underwood, who came out of retirement and returned to work for the franchise in March. "We've made progress in trying to work through our issues with the league. I think we've made good progress. We expect to continue working with the league to help get there."

Over the weekend, a Pro Football Talk report said "there's a belief among key members of the organization that the team has hired a noted antitrust lawyer to defend the position of the franchise that the current structure complies with league rules."

"We have never discussed those things publicly," Underwood said Monday, "and we're not going to start this afternoon."

The reports of contention between the league and the Titans ownership group have led to speculation that a sale of the team might be in the works, but Underwood took the opportunity Monday to shoot those rumors down yet again.

"The team has never been for sale, and it's not for sale now," he said. "I would always be looking at who the writer of the story says is the source for those remarks, and when you see no source — you don't see anyone identified, nothing attributed to anyone — then you need to remember what I tell you now: The team is not for sale now and it never has been for sale."

Mariota, other Titans praise Webster, Mularkey

The Titans fired general manager Ruston Webster on Monday and announced they would interview interim coach Mike Mularkey and others for the head coaching job vacated when Ken Whisenhunt was fired in November.

Might the perception of ownership issues impact the search for a coach and general manager?

"We've had over a dozen inquiries from highly qualified head coaches and general manager candidates since word got out this morning that Ruston had been dismissed," Underwood said. "So my answer to (that) question is no. In three hours, we've been kind of overrun with requests — 'Can we be on your interview list?' — both from individual candidates and from their agents and representatives."

Reach John Glennon at 615-259-8262 and on Twitter @glennonsports.