Will Levis on his chemistry with Calvin Ridley: 'It's been good'

Titans quarterback Will Levis has a cool problem to contend with in training camp. Tennessee signed several talented wideouts, including Calvin Ridley, to give the team a more dynamic offense.

Now Levis is building chemistry with Ridley and Tyler Boyd while maintaining it with DeAndre Hopkins, who is headed into his second season with the Titans.

Levis appeared before the media in Nashville this week and reporters were curious with how he’s growing more confident in Ridley, the former Alabama star and first round draft pick who got to the Titans from the Jaguars.

“It’s been good,” Levis said. “We’ve just got to keep working at it, especially just the balls down the field. It’s really cool to see us start connecting more on those.”

Levis said it’s imperative to be able to judge Ridley’s speed and how he holds “space out there.” And sometimes, Levis just needs to throw a deep ball with where he believes Ridley will be.

“He’s so dang fast, sometimes you have to throw the ball a little differently,” Levis said.

The Titans definitely will give off a different offensive vibe this season. Mike Vrabel is gone. Brian Callahan, the offensive coordinator with the Bengals, now is the head coach. Callahan’s offense is going to feature more passing. Under Vrabel, Tennessee liked to run the ball and use it to set up play action. But that always was a terrific plan with Derrick Henry in the backfield. However, King Henry moved on from Tennessee, with the powerful running back signing with the Ravens.

Plus, there were other key additions. Tennessee signed former Cowboys running back Tony Pollard. Then they drafted Alabama offensive tackle JC Latham with the seventh pick of the draft. The Titans did not consider any quarterbacks for the seventh selection, since they appeared satisfied with Levis, who was a second-round pick from Kentucky in 2023.

Earlier this year, Callahan talked about how much research he did on Levis before he took the job. During the interview process, Callahan told Sports Illustrated that he studied four full games and then cutups of all of Levis’s 255 pass attempts.

“Every time I watched him, I was like, ’This guy’s a pretty good player,’ ” Callahan told SI. “And I think everybody was a little shocked that he slipped the way he did [in 2023].”

Callahan added “you see he’s athletic, he’s strong, he’s tough. He’ll stand in the pocket and he’s got a great release. It’s quick. And he’s got a really legitimate arm. And he will play a little bit in that kind of swashbuckling style. He was trying to earn guys’ respect. He was trying to show people he could play. That’s part of earning your way as a young quarterback. He did some things that I think that his teammates rallied around, which was fun to watch.”

That’s why the Titans signed players like Ridley to see what Levis can do with better talent around him.