{"id":17913,"date":"2025-05-02T12:45:09","date_gmt":"2025-05-02T12:45:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/17913\/"},"modified":"2025-05-02T12:45:09","modified_gmt":"2025-05-02T12:45:09","slug":"how-xavier-woods-might-figure-into-ljarius-sneeds-future-with-tennessee-titans","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/17913\/","title":{"rendered":"How Xavier Woods might figure into L’Jarius Sneed’s future with Tennessee Titans"},"content":{"rendered":"

Cornerback L’Jarius Sneed<\/a> has spent so little time on the field since being traded to the Tennessee Titans<\/a> that the teammate he’s almost certainly spent the most time playing and practicing alongside is safety Xavier Woods<\/a>, who he played one year at Louisiana Tech with in 2016.<\/p>\n

Sneed sat out through most of the Titans’ offseason activities<\/a> and training camp in 2024, managing pre-existing injuries dating back to his time with the Kansas City Chiefs<\/a>. He injured his quad just five games into the 2024 season and the issue lingered, eventually landing Sneed on season-ending injured reserve.<\/p>\n

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Heading into the 2025 offseason, Sneed is still rehabbing from his quad injury and he’s dealing with off-field legal issues<\/a> stemming from a lawsuit about an alleged altercation in Texas in December.<\/p>\n

Asked about his long-standing relationship with Sneed at an introductory Titans<\/a> press conference on May 1, Woods said they have talked but weren’t super close in college since Woods was a senior when Sneed was a freshman.<\/p>\n

Woods doesn’t seem to believe the Titans signed him to be Sneed’s keeper, but he’ll embrace the role of helping a talented player make the most of his ability just like he did the past few years with ascendant star Jaycee Horn in Carolina.<\/p>\n

ANALYSIS: Tennessee Titans QB Cam Ward shares major trait with recent NFL rookie sensations<\/a><\/p>\n

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“Jaycee knew that if he was able to be out there every game, or at least a majority of the games, he can be a Pro Bowler and All-Pro,” Woods explained. “So it\u2019s just putting your head down and just working. This injury thing, it\u2019s a little bit of luck. Football has a 100% injury rate. It\u2019s a little bit of luck, a little bit of God in there. And it\u2019s how do you train? You put those things together and leave it in God\u2019s hands.<\/p>\n

“I can be an influence on Sneed and Sneed can be an influence on me. Sneed has been to the Super Bowl. I haven\u2019t been to the playoffs since\u2026 it\u2019s been so long I can barely remember. I think it goes back and forth, not just me influencing him but him influencing me as well.”<\/p>\n

If staying healthy and on the football field is mostly a matter of luck, Woods has been one of the luckiest players in the NFL in recent years. He played 100% of the Panthers’ defensive snaps in 2024, a feat he also accomplished with Minnesota in 2021. He’s played 96% or more of his team’s defensive snaps six of the last seven years, and has only missed nine games in eight pro seasons.<\/p>\n

Woods joins a Titans secondary built around Sneed, young cornerbacks Jarvis Brownlee Jr. and Roger McCreary and veteran safety Amani Hooker, as well as third-round draft pick Kevin Winston Jr<\/a>. Woods says he’s reached a point in his career where he doesn’t view himself as a strong safety or a free safety, but rather an all-purpose safety who’ll do the job in front of him.<\/p>\n

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The Titans begin the on-field portion of their 2025 offseason program in early May, with OTA practices beginning on May 27.<\/p>\n

MEET CAM WARD: Don’t believe Cam Ward will be Tennessee Titans’ hero? This is how he’ll prove you wrong<\/a><\/p>\n

Nick Suss is the Titans beat writer for The Tennessean. Contact Nick at nsuss@gannett.com<\/a>. Follow Nick on X, the platform formerly called Twitter, @nicksuss.<\/p>\n

This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Tennessee Titans: How Xavier Woods factors into L’Jarius Sneed future<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Cornerback L’Jarius Sneed has spent so little time on the field since being traded to the Tennessee Titans…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":17914,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2061],"tags":[9089,7,9091,6457,110,1447,9088,233,6,9090,3713,526,394,2411,527,8505],"class_list":{"0":"post-17913","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tennessee-titans","8":"tag-amani-hooker","9":"tag-football","10":"tag-jarvis-brownlee-jr","11":"tag-jaycee-horn","12":"tag-kansas-city-chiefs","13":"tag-kevin-winston-jr","14":"tag-ljarius-sneed-2","15":"tag-minnesota","16":"tag-nfl","17":"tag-roger-mccreary","18":"tag-sneed","19":"tag-tennessee","20":"tag-tennessee-titans","21":"tag-tennesseetitans","22":"tag-titans","23":"tag-xavier-woods"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/114438309478380741","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17913","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17913"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17913\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/17914"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17913"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17913"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17913"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}