National Football League

Why Titans first-round pick JC Latham can be ‘an All-Pro before you know it’

Published May. 8, 2024 5:08 p.m. ET

JC Latham met with Bill Callahan during his pre-draft visit with the Titans. Scheduled to be a 30-minute meeting, it morphed into a two-hour conversation, during which the 67-year-old offensive line coach and 21-year-old draft prospect picked each other's brains.

They discussed their backgrounds. They discussed the standout offensive linemen at Alabama before Latham. They watched college and NFL film.

They bantered back-and-forth about Latham's tape.

"I was saying, ‘Hey, a guy did this move one time and it might have affected me — it might not have — but I want to know if I see it down the line, what's going to happen?'" Latham recalled at his introductory press conference. "‘How do I do this?'"

Latham enjoyed his time with Callahan.

In his eyes, the chemistry was there.

"There's so many techniques I've never even heard about before, just because he's such a legendary coach," he said. "So just to be able to be coached by him and pick his brain and just understand what type of guy he is on a personal level, but also understand the environment that he created with his technique and discipline, I loved it all."

The Titans are banking on that being the start of a special Latham-Callahan partnership.

The No. 7 overall pick, Latham will play left tackle for Tennessee after playing right tackle for Alabama the past three seasons. The team is hopeful that his upside plus Callahan's teaching chops as a legendary offensive line coach will create a franchise blindside protector, one who keeps second-year quarterback Will Levis upright.

Latham's power gives him the chance to be the best of what was a deep 2024 OT class. He's squatted 1,000 pounds. According to Kentucky offensive line coach Eric Wolford, Latham's position coach the past two years in Tuscaloosa, he had the most lean muscle mass ever recorded at Alabama (278 pounds of lean muscle mass on a 360-pound frame).

On the field, Latham plays with an aggression that his former IMG coach, Bobby Acosta, believes comes from his time as a defensive player. He was a standout defensive tackle in his first two years of high school football in Wisconsin before transferring to the Florida academy, where he won a national championship.

"This guy is a genetic freak," Wolford told FOX Sports. "A lot of times when we use that phrase, ‘This guy possesses power,' he can move a guy off of a spot. A lot of times, though, we don't equate that with also foot quickness and agility. He's got the combination of both. He can bend. He has great athleticism. He has power to knock people off the ball."

Latham was one of the first players on the field at Alabama practices. An hour after they ended, he'd send Wolford clips from the day, asking for a critique of his pass-set.

"How does this double team look?" he'd text. "What do you think of my footwork here? Are my eyes in the right spot?"

His intensity for his craft carries into his demeanor.

He takes the smallest things as slights. Like Alabama's decision to keep him at right tackle after Evan Neal, who manned the left side, left for the NFL after the 2021 season.

"I remember it pissed me off the first time I saw a guy play with a grill in against me," Latham said. "I'm thinking he's caring more about how he looks than me. So I took that with a lot of disrespect."

Latham draws from the mentalities of mixed martial artist Israel Adesanya and late NBA great Kobe Bryant.

"As Kobe stated one time, he was willing to put in the work knowing that he might not get the results he seeks. A lot of guys don't do that," Latham said. "If I were to tell you, ‘Hey, give me 10 hours of your day to do this, but the other person is only doing six. And I'm not guaranteeing you that you might have the spot [over him].' You might not be committed to it because you don't know the results yet. So Kobe's mindset, that's what got to me, because that's what I can do. Without knowing the result, I know that I'll be a lot closer to my goals than they will be just because of the time that I'm putting in.

"And then something that Israel Adesanya said was that when he's in the ring and he's fighting … he tells himself he's willing to die for it," Latham continued. "And that's what got to me, gives me goosebumps even right now. I'm willing to die on the field. Nothing is stopping me on the field. No broken toe. I don't care. …

"You're going to have to be willing to die for it to beat me. If you can't go there, then you don't have a chance."

[ARTHUR: Titans’ draft, free-agency moves show they’re not interested in long rebuild]

Many scouts and coaches see untapped potential in Latham. He's played offensive line for only five years, and he hasn't yet had the luxury to focus on one position.

In high school, he was the No. 1-rated offensive tackle in the 2021 recruiting class after two years at left tackle. At Alabama, where he played on the right side for the first time, he allowed just two career sacks on 1,016 pass-block snaps, according to Pro Football Focus. He also played some guard in Tuscaloosa.

"He's going to be an All-Pro before you know it," Acosta told FOX Sports.

Latham said that Callahan believes he's athletic enough to make the transition back to left tackle.

"He told me that he knows, especially with his teaching, the sky's the limit with me," Latham said. "We're ready to go and hit the ground running."

That's the dream for the Titans.

Ben Arthur is the AFC South reporter for FOX Sports. He previously worked for The Tennessean/USA TODAY Network, where he was the Titans beat writer for a year and a half. He covered the Seattle Seahawks for SeattlePI.com for three seasons (2018-20) prior to moving to Tennessee. You can follow Ben on Twitter at @benyarthur.

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