This, as best Brian Callahan can explain it, is how things will work:

Callahan will call plays for the Tennessee Titans' offense this season. He'll have a hand in designing those plays as the coach in charge, but he'll collaborate in that process with offensive coordinator Nick Holz, quarterback coach Bo Hardegree and a long list of other assistants. He'll go into every game with a tiered list of preferences, including input from quarterback Will Levis, that rank what the team's favorite plays to call by situation — second-and-long or third-and-short, for example — are.

As the game goes on, Callahan will adapt as necessary, adjusting to aspects of the defense the Titans haven't seen before or situational constraints that change how aggressive or relaxed the offense needs to be.

In a perfect world, Callahan will already know by Saturday how he'll react to any situation thrown his way Sunday.

"That’s how you hope it to be, how you want it to be," Callahan said. "Where you make your money on Sundays is how quickly we can adjust and pivot and adapt to whatever we’re seeing that might be different than we anticipated."

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Callahan and Holz spoke Wednesday about how the long-time friends will divide their responsibilities as Titans' coach and offensive coordinator. As Holz puts it: "I’m just like a regular offensive coordinator except I just don’t call the plays." At surface level, it's easy to view that quote as an oxymoron like "vegan beef" or "dairy-free ice cream." What exactly does an offensive coordinator who doesn't coordinate the offense do?

But this is the arrangement Callahan is accustomed to. He worked five years as Cincinnati's offensive coordinator while coach Zac Taylor called the plays. Before that, Taylor worked on Los Angeles Rams staffs where coach Sean McVay — not assistants who've since become successful coaches like Taylor, Matt LaFleur and Kevin O'Connell — called plays. When the Kansas City Chiefs and San Francisco 49ers met in the Super Bowl, the matchup pitted play-calling coach Andy Reid against play-calling coach Kyle Shanahan.

In some ways, Holz is particularly suited for this role. He's never been an NFL offensive coordinator. But in 10 seasons as an assistant with the Raiders, Holz worked for five head coaches, four offensive coordinators and four quarterbacks coaches. Adapting, in effect, became his superpower. He has ideas and ideals of his own, but he also knows how to find common ground to devise the best plan within the construct of a coach's vision.

"I think (our conversations) have been pretty one-minded for the most part," Holz said of working with Callahan. "We’ve had some discussions about ‘Hey, we’ve done this’ or ‘we’ve done this.’ We’ll both walk back to our offices, go a separate way and come back and revisit it. But there’s a lot of similarities."

Without knowing what's going to happen in free agency or the NFL draft, there's only so much advance gameplanning Callahan and Holz can be doing. Levis is a certainty, though, and both have taken the steps to get to know their budding franchise quarterback.

Holz says Levis' two attributes that jump off the film are his arm talent and toughness. He said he sees the baseline skills in Levis that make him such an attractive piece as a potential organizational cornerstone.

Callahan kept Levis abreast of the staff hires he intended to make throughout the interview process. Not because he believes Levis is owed input, but because he thinks good relationships are forged through trust. He wants to be able to go to Levis with information and for Levis to be comfortable coming back to him with ideas of his own. Callahan brought up the example of Cincinnati quarterback Jake Browning as someone who was willing to come to him and Taylor and say on a Friday or Saturday: "Hey, I don't like this play. Don't call this."

The instances where Browning vetoed a play didn't make Callahan defensive. It fortified their relationship. That's where Callahan wants to get with Levis.

"He plays a huge role in this whole thing too," Callahan said. "He needs to feel like he at least has my ear and can come to me with anything he thinks and that I’m able to tell him what’s happening for us. I think that’s important for him to feel like he’s got some involvement and some ownership of what’s happening."

Callahan, Holz and Levis will be involved in the process of designing, formulating and organizing the gameplan.

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The only thing Callahan will have to do on his own is handle the pressure of the moment.

"Where good players make their money and where good staffs separate themselves in this league is how quickly you can pivot in the process of a game," Callahan said. "In between series you’re usually thinking about what’s coming next. The anticipatory part of that process is really what separates play callers in the league."

Nick Suss is the Titans beat writer for The Tennessean. Contact Nick at nsuss@gannett.com. Follow Nick on X, the platform formerly called Twitter, @nicksuss.

This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Tennessee Titans: Brian Callahan calls plays. What does Nick Holz do?