Kid at play

Titans' Kearse comfortable with foot, underdog role

First Person	Jevon Kearse
Photo Credits: Brian Bahr/Getty Images, Scott Halleran/Getty Images, Scott Halleran/Getty Images

Give the Tennessee Titans their due. They made the AFC title game last season despite star defensive end Jevon Kearse barely seeing the field. Kearse broke his left foot on the second play from scrimmage in the season opener and wound up missing 12 games. He finished 2002 with just one start, four games played and two sacks. That made it three consecutive seasons in which Kearse's sack and tackle totals have decreased following his explosive 1999 defensive rookie of the year campaign.

The preseason reviews on Kearse's foot say he has overcome some early tentative workouts and is starting to find his rookie-season footwork once again. We shall see. Kearse saw 16 snaps of action last Saturday night in the Titans' preseason opener against Cleveland, assisting on just one tackle. With an eye on him not overdoing it, Tennessee has avoided having Kearse take part in two-a-day practices. SI.com's Don Banks talked with Kearse this week, as the big end and the Titans continued their 2003 training camp in Nashville:

SI.com: Jeff Fisher's shirt the other night against Cleveland: bowling shirt or GQ-cool?

JK: Bowling shirt all the way. No way ever is that working into the cool section. Something didn't go right with it. I don't know if it was the design or what. Something just didn't look right about it.

SI.com: Why don't the Titans get any love?

JK: I don't know why. Maybe people are writing us off because after making that 1999 Super Bowl run, we've never gotten it back to that level despite having pretty much the same guys.

SI.com: What if you had this same team but were the New York Titans?

JK: Oh, we'd be blowing up all over the place, with all kind of predictions and stuff around us. But right now we're just staying the underdogs in Tennessee. That's just us.

SI.com: The new Madden '04, what's the early review?

JK: New Madden, ah. It's sitting in my locker right here. I got it (Monday) and I've got to play it tonight for the first time. So I'm going to have get back to you on that one.

SI.com: I hear the Titans aren't so strong in this year's Madden.

JK: Just another sign of disrespect. I guess we've got to start off even in video games being the underdog and working our way up. I guess we've got to get used to it. They must be trying to make it reality-based.

SI.com: OK, we can't avoid it any longer. What's the state of the foot?

JK: The state of the foot is great. It's healed, 100 percent healed. There's some callus from the healing process, which causes soreness when the muscles and the tendons rub over it. So I have some soreness here and there, but I think I can play a good three- to four-hour ballgame once a week. I think I'll be good with it once the season gets here.

SI.com: Are you tired of thinking about it? Tired of talking about it?

JK: Yeah, I'm tired of talking about it, because I want to tell people, "If you want to know about it, just watch. Just watch and judge for yourself."

SI.com: Is your mindset to go somewhat easy with it this preseason, and then step on the gas Sept. 7 for the opener against Oakland?

JK: Nah. I'm going hard on it right now to get used to it, and to get it behind me. To get my foot through the soreness it has to go through. Our head doctor just spoke to the doctor who did my surgery and he said there's going to be soreness throughout the year, so it's all a matter of how much I can put up with and how much goes away.

SI.com: Have you got any of the usual Kearse first-step explosion back, or is it still coming?

JK: It's coming. It's coming. People say they see it, or they think it looks like me, but I don't personally think it's me yet. The number looks like me, and maybe the quickness and the speed. But I don't feel like myself quite yet. Then again, it could be here any moment now.

SI.com: What's up with that faded, old hat that your defensive line coach, Jim Washburn, wears every day?

JK: That NFL 75th anniversary hat (from 1994)? He's a very superstitious guy, and if he had anything to do with it he'd still have the same hat, the same shoes, the same shorts, and the same shirt as he had his first day when he came in here in 1999.

SI.com: How could your old college coach, Steve Spurrier, be struggling in the NFL?

JK: I don't know. I personally don't know the answer to that one.

SI.com: Are you surprised that the Ol' Ball Coach hasn't had more early success?

JK: No. I'm not surprised. When you coach in the state of Florida, you're going to get a lot of good players and have good teams there, whereas in the NFL you've got different rules to go by. You got men in this league. It may take some time, and hopefully they won't get better against us. But I think if you give him some time, he'll win in this league.

SI.com: Word is you're the biggest kid in the Titans locker room. What's your latest gadget?

JK: My latest gadget? I've got like 10 remote-control items, from planes, to tiny little cars, to gas-powered cars. But my latest thing has got to be Madden. Now I've just got to find time to play it.

 

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