The Titans overhauled their coaching staff this offseason. The first official departure after Mike Mularkey’s firing was wide receivers coach Frisman Jackson. Jackson left the Titans to take the same position at Baylor University.

I caught up with Jackson in a phone interview to get his thoughts on the Titans’ young wide receivers, the underwhelming 2017 offense, his time in Nashville, and more.

JM: How do you recap your experience as the Tennessee Titans WR coach? 2017 was your first season as an NFL coach.

FJ: I had a great time in Tennessee. I couldn’t have asked for a better room. My guys worked hard for me. A lot of the time when you’re a first-year coach in the NFL, the players will test you. I never got any pushback from my guys. They respected me. I think it helps that I played the position in this league. My personality required that they respect me. I didn’t bend or fold with those guys and I think they respected that. I had a really fun time. We went to the playoffs and won a game. As a first year coach, I had some great things happen for me.

JM: What was your take on the rookie seasons Corey Davis and Taywan Taylor had?

FJ: Obviously it was disappointing for Corey because he missed so much of the year. He missed training camp and OTA’s. That’s valuable time for a guy to get acclimated to the system and to the speed of the game at this level. It’s that time where you learn how to practice, how to prepare and how to take care of your body. There was just so much stuff that he missed. A lot of people saw his potential in the playoff game against New England. You saw the flashes of what he could possibly do. I expect him to have a good second year. It was a rough first year for him. It was rough for us in the room because we expected him to come in there and be a dominant player from the beginning.

Taywan started off hot. I think he hit that rookie wall in the middle of the year. I always told him he just has to continue to learn and develop. He has a bright future. He can run, he’s not afraid to take a hit and he loves football. He’s a young guy and we played on some big stages. He had to be out there in some big games and a lot of time, he just wasn’t ready to make the plays.

JM: I was really curious to know how much the injury really effected Corey Davis. It sounds like it was significant.

FJ: He missed so much of that time in practice where you make mistakes and learn from them. That’s why practice is so valuable. He just didn’t get a lot of practice hours. He came in right in the middle of the playoff hunt and we thrust him into the starting lineup. He was learning on the fly. A lot of the lessons he learned, he learned them right in the middle of a game. Those are the things you’re supposed to learn in practice. He didn’t get that opportunity. Mistakes that another guy would make in practice, he was making them in games. It’ll help him in the future.

JM: What do you think Corey Davis and Taywan Taylor need to do this offseason in order to continue moving in the right direction?

FJ: For Corey, it’s about doing everything he can to take care of his body. He needs to have a healthy offseason so he’s able to participate in OTAs and all that type of stuff. He needs to be able to practice during training camp. He didn’t play in any preseason games. Playing in this year’s preseason would be good for him. He can run routes, he’s fast and he can catch the football. He has all the traits. He just has to make sure he does everything he can to stay healthy.

For Taywan, it’s some of the football IQ things. It’s about understanding coverages and different leverages. How a defensive back plays certain routes. It’s about understanding how to run those routes. How to mix up things in his releases. It’s just a lot of football stuff that you learn as you go through your second year. Obviously I wish I was still there to help develop those guys but that’s the nature of the business.

JM: For Taywan, you mentioned football IQ. A lot of Titans fans were frustrated by a lack of snaps for him. He made some plays throughout the year, the touchdown against the Colts obviously, also a big gain on a go route where he beat AJ Bouye. We didn’t really see a lot of him. Is football IQ the reason why?

FJ: It came down to us being in the playoff hunt. A lot of times, you go with the veteran guys who have been through these battles before. I’m sitting in the room with a guy like Eric Decker who’s played in a Super Bowl. He probably didn’t perform the way he wanted to for us, or how we expected him to. This is a guy who’s played in a Super Bowl. He has over 50 career touchdowns and he’s a veteran guy who’s played the game at a high level. He’s been through this before so let’s go with him. That was our mindset. Obviously we would have liked for Taywan to play more. I think he didn’t play as many snaps towards the end of the year just because of the situation we found ourselves in.

JM: I was gonna ask about Eric Decker next. He never seemed to really get it going outside of that huge catch against Kansas City. He’s a free agent and we haven’t really heard of the Titans being interested in bringing him back. Did you expect to get more out of him?

FJ: I felt like he was a guy we brought in that could help mold and mentor Corey Davis and Taywan Taylor. We saw him as a veteran guy that could help us. Obviously it didn’t work out the way he wanted it to statistically. That’s just football. I wish he would have been able to provide us more of a spark in the passing game. We probably should have done more things to try and get the football in his hands. That’s just the way things went.

JM: Why do you think the receivers struggled to get on the same page as Marcus Mariota? It seemed to still be a issue late in the year.

FJ: Corey Davis missed six games throughout the season. He didn’t participate in training camp or OTA’s. We signed Eric Decker right before training camp. He missed OTA’s and he was injured during training camp. We really had one guy in Rishard Matthews who was in there consistently. He missed three games but he was the only guy that was consistently in the lineup with Marcus . A lot of this stuff is timing. It’s about understanding each other’s nuances and what each player is good at. Marcus is probably thinking about who he likes on which routes. We just never got that opportunity to be able to learn that type of stuff because these guys missed a lot of football.

JM: How hurt was Marcus Mariota throughout the year? Some felt he was worse off than the team may have let on.

FJ: I think he had the normal bumps and bruises that a starting quarterback has in the NFL. I wouldn’t say he was more hurt than they let on. I don’t think he had more injuries than a Tom Brady or Phillip Rivers had. I think some of the things he wanted to do in the running game, he wasn’t able to do some of the stuff he showed in the past. Some of those injuries maybe limited his ability to do that.

JM: We saw some hints of frustration out of players like Rishard Matthews that seemed directed at Terry Robiskie’s offense. I was hoping you could shine some light on what the players really thought of the offense. I’m also curious to hear what you thought of the offense.

FJ: The year before I got there, this offense was one of the top offenses in the league. I think it was in the top 12 overall and it was the top rushing offense. It was an offense that’s built off being able to run the ball and we just weren’t able to run it as consistently as we did the year before. That hurt a lot of things. I played the wide receiver position. We always want the ball. The quarterback can target a receiver 100 times in a game, and we’re gonna want it 101 times. We’re never satisfied with how many balls are thrown our way. Could we have been a little more creative? Maybe, but I don’t think that’s what slowed the offense down. I think a lot of it had to do with guys not being able to get on the same page because they missed so much time on the practice field.

I personally didn’t have a problem with the offense. If Rishard Matthews doesn’t miss three games, I think he has over 1,000 yards receiving. If Corey Davis doesn’t miss a bunch of time, he has a more productive season. I don’t wanna blame everything on injuries because we didn’t perform while we were in there or when the opportunities presented themselves. I do think injuries played a part in it though.

JM: Do you think there’s a chance Mike Mularkey could have kept his job if he was willing to make a change at the offensive coordinator spot?

FJ: Man, I was so far out of the loop on that front. When I got the news that we were fired, there was no reason given. I still haven’t heard a reason to this day. I just got a text that said Mike Mularkey had been relieved of his head coaching duties. I never found out a true reason. I know people wanted Mike to get a new offensive coordinator to open the offense up and throw it more. People also get mad when you throw it 60 times a game; now they’re saying you’re throwing it too much. I think you have to find a happy medium. Whatever that is, I hope they find it with the new staff.

JM: That text came from a high ranking team official?

FJ: Yeah, it was just a text that said Mike Mularkey had been relieved of his duties.

JM: I gotta ask this one fun question. You played as a wide receiver for the Cleveland Browns from 2002-2006. Who was the most frustrating quarterback you played with?

FJ: The most frustrating Cleveland quarterback… We had so many of them. In my four years there, I think I played with seven quarterbacks. I was there during training camp when Charlie Frye was there. That was his starting year, that would have been my fifth year there. I wouldn’t say one guy was the most frustrating. I was pretty hurt that things didn’t work out for Tim Couch. I thought he had the talent to be a really special player. It didn’t work out for him for a variety of reasons. He’s a good friend of mine and I wish it worked out for him.

JM: Earlier you mentioned that you expected Corey Davis to come in and dominate from the beginning. That suggests to me that everyone was really high on him. I don’t know how privy you were to their draft board, but did Jon Robinson and company have Corey Davis ranked much higher than Mike Williams or John Ross?

FJ: People don’t even know this, but I recruited Corey Davis out of high school. I’ve known him since he was 18 years old. I even recruited his brother, they both went to Wheaton Warrenville South. I’ve known Corey for a long, long time. I had a different relationship with him. I knew what type of guy he was. His head coach at Western Michigan was my teammate in college. He’s been a receivers coach in the NFL as well. I knew the type of skillset Corey had. I was comfortable with the type of coaching he was receiving. I liked Mike Williams as well. I would have been happy to get either one of those guys. All three receivers that went in the top 10 missed a lot of football. They were all hurt.