Titans' All-Pro safety Kevin Byard aims to make Tom Brady 'look like Blake Bortles'

Blake Bortles continues to serve as a punching bag in the Titans’ locker room as Tennessee trains to take on Goliath.

Titans All-Pro safety Kevin Byard said neither he nor his teammates are intimidated by Tom Brady and the top-seeded, five-time Super Bowl champion New England Patriots, whom they face in an AFC divisional round playoff game Saturday night at Gillette Stadium in Foxborough, Mass. And in discounting any aura surrounding New England, Byard took the latest shot at the AFC South rival Jaguars.

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“It’s a playoff game, so it’s not like it’s the preseason where I can go out there, ‘Oh, it’s Brady,’ and I’m chillin,’” Byard said after practice Tuesday. “This is a playoff game. So I don’t really care if it was Joe Montana. You know what I’m saying? I’m trying to go out there and win the game. I want to make him look like Blake Bortles if I can and try to catch a couple picks.

“Tom Brady is a great quarterback, but it’s a playoff game. I’m not really looking at it like that.”



Byard, who led the NFL with eight interceptions this season, picked off Bortles twice in the Titans’ 15-10 victory against the Jaguars in the regular-season finale, which clinched a second consecutive winning season and the franchise’s first playoff berth in nine years. It also finished a season sweep of the AFC South champion Jaguars, who play the Steelers in the other AFC divisional game Sunday in Pittsburgh.

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The Titans are loose, confident and their attitude could continue to serve them well against the Patriots. They are 14-point underdogs, just days after pulling off one of the largest road comebacks in playoff history, rallying from a 21-3 deficit to defeat the Chiefs 22-21 in a wild card game Saturday at Arrowhead Stadium.

Titans Pro Bowl left tackle Taylor Lewan said the underdog role is nothing new.

“It’s standard, dude. It’s standard. Like pickles on a sandwich,” Lewan said. “That thing just comes all the time. So it is what it is. We’ve just got to focus on what’s important, and that’s these guys in this locker room. It’s 11 guys on the field at a time and making sure that our 11 plays better than their 11.”

The Titans play a physical brand of football and have developed a history of winning games when they're able to keep the score close.

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Tennessee has a 7-4 record in one-possession games this season and has lost by more than 10 points just twice. They’re 9-2 since last season in games decided by four points or fewer.

“I think they know now that we can win in a playoff situation,” Titans coach Mike Mularkey said. “Jacksonville, to me, was as close to a playoff atmosphere that possibly can be. That's two games that we've had to win and our guys have found ways to win them. I think we still have work to do, there's no question about that, in all three phases. I think it gives us some confidence — I hope it does, it should — that we can win, and win anywhere against anybody, anytime.”

The Titans also rallied from a 14-0 halftime deficit to defeat the Chiefs at Arrowhead last season, a topic of conversation in the locker room last weekend, when they trailed 21-3.

Marcus Mariota leads the NFL this season with five game-winning drives in the fourth quarter or overtime.

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“I think really, it’s just this group of guys. They continue to believe in each other,” Mariota said. “They know you can be down, but we’ve always got an opportunity to come back and win. It’s a great culture to be a part of, and something that I’ll never take for granted.”

Titans linebacker Derrick Morgan, who leads the team with 7.5 sacks, said nobody respects them.

“You see the noise and you see the disrespect from the media, from y’all, but it comes with the territory,” Morgan said. “We haven’t been a very successful team in the last 10 years. It’s easy for people to overlook us. So we’ve got to take care of business and start winning games like this to get the respect that we desire.”

Not to mention an unlikely third crack at the Jaguars.

Reach Jason Wolf at jwolf@tennessean.com and follow him on Twitter at @JasonWolf and on Instagram and Snapchat at TitansBeat.

DIVISIONAL PLAYOFFS: TITANS (10-7) AT PATRIOTS (13-3)

When: 7:15 p.m. Central Time, Saturday

TV/radio: CBS / 104.5-FM